Two bits of news

Two small news items including A4e.

The first is a piece in the Sheffield Star about the city's most profitable companies. A4e has moved from 12th place to 4th, it's profits having increased from £5.6m to £9.9m.

The second is a report on the BBC's news website about the young unemployed. It cites A4e's Vox Centre in Brixton (which the piece calls its "flagship centre") which trains youngsters in vocational skills for "entry-level" jobs. Since opening last June they haven't had any success in getting these youngsters into work.

Corporate Watch

The Corporate Watch website is always worth a look; but there are a couple of articles from April this year which are particularly relevant. One is titled "Political deployments of the unemployment ‘crisis’" and deals with the whole history of welfare to work. It looks at "propaganda as news" with a close look at recent television programmes and local press stories concerning A4e. Another article asks "Who benefits from the benefits system?" and contains more history and a long list of figures for "New Deal private sector providers and the amounts received from the DWP in the financial year 2008-9". (A4e is a long way in the lead with £84,433,506 for its 11 contracts.)

From welfare-to-work to education: A4e has opened its eighth Vox Centre in Brixton. These are privatised school exclusion units which offer skills training. They claim that 2009/2010 figures show that 75% of their alumni move into jobs or further education. There are no comparative figures for local authority units.