Minister Urges DWP to Prioritize Employment Over Welfare
The reforms will see Jobcentre Plus transformed into a new jobs and careers service, a focus on helping youth employment, and devolved employment services.
The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) will be transformed from a “department for welfare” into a “department for work,” the secretary of state for work and pensions has said.
Liz Kendall set out on Tuesday the government’s ambition to reform the department, including a fundamental overhaul of Jobcentre Plus whereby it will be transformed into a new jobs and career service, formed by partnering it with the National Career Service.
The DWP will also establish a “youth guarantee” for all those aged 18 to 21, which will offer training and apprenticeships and help young people find work. The plans come as one in eight young people are not in education, employment, or work, according to a government press release.
The final reform is to devolve new powers of employment support to local leaders, which Ms. Kendall said was key to enabling areas to develop local growth plans.
“We will give local places the responsibility and resources to design a joined up health, work, and skills offer that’s right for local people,” she said at the launch of the “Pathways to Work” report in Barnsley, South Yorkshire.
Ms. Kendall also announced plans for a Labour Market Advisory Board, a panel of external experts who will provide labor market insights and advice.
Goal to Increase Employment to 80 Percent
The reforms to Ms. Kendall’s department come as part of the new government’s goal of increasing the employment rate to 80 percent of working-aged people, which would mean adding more than two million people to the workforce.
The employment minister said the changes were needed because under the previous Conservative governments over the past 14 years, DWP had focused more on welfare than work.
She said: “They turned Jobcentre Plus into a benefit monitoring service, not a public employment service, which was its original aim. They paid nowhere near enough attention to the wider issues like health, skills, childcare, transport that plays such a huge role in determining whether you get work, stay in work, and get on in your work.
“The result is a system that is both too siloed and too centralized. We fail to properly join up health work and skills, and we aren’t rooted in local economies and driven by local needs.”
“The DWP will shift from being a department for welfare, to being a department for work,” she said.
The minister confirmed that jobseekers’ obligations to engage with support, look for employment, and take jobs when offered will continue.
9.4 Million People Economically Inactive
The work and pensions secretary announced the plans amid spiraling economic inactivity and a rising number of people off work with long-term illness.
The Office for Budget Responsibility said that spending on sickness and disability is set to increase by £30 billion over the next five years.
While the figure is down slightly on measurements released in June, it is higher than estimates.
The ONS says that since record-keeping on economic inactivity began in 1971, the rate had generally been falling.
“However, it increased during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and fluctuated around this increased rate,” the statistics agency said.
2.8 Million Out of Work Because of Long-Term Sickness or Disability
According to the DWP, the UK also has a near-record 2.8 million people out of work due to long-term sickness or disability.
The Conservatives’ proposed measures had prompted criticism from charities who called the plans an assault on disabled people.
