Reflections on those accounts

It's very telling that no one in the media has shown the slightest interest in A4e's latest accounts.  How different from the furore nearly three years ago which brought down Emma Harrison and very nearly destroyed the company.
How have they done it?  They've scraped their way back to profit, just, from a dire situation, and they've done it by not trying to compete with the big boys.  The chairman talked about "discipline".  They've put in realistic bids for contracts but withdrawn when they could see that they were going to be undercut by companies which could afford to lose money initially and then get the contract changed to allow them a profit.  It's not a game A4e wants to play any more.  And they've pulled out of foreign parts (except for Australia), presumably because it was costing too much to keep up that international presence.  From a company with limitless ambition they've become a medium-sized outfit looking to make a living.
I suppose we should be pleased.  But there's no comfort in the fact that a few huge companies now run the bulk of our public services and behave as if there are no risks or consequences of failure.

Meanwhile, there was an interesting story on the Disability News Service website last month.  A former A4e employee, Chris Loder, took the company to a tribunal claiming constructive dismissal.  He alleged that he had been forced to work with vulnerable ESA clients, some with mental health problems, when he had no experience in this area and was given no training.  A former colleague, supporting him, described the policy as "incredibly dangerous".  The article prints a long statement from A4e refuting the claims.  The tribunal's verdict is due this month.

And speaking of verdicts, there still isn't one in the Slough fraud case, being heard in Reading.  Before the holidays it was reported on the courts' website that the jury was out, but today there's no further news.

Do you remember A4e's Hayley Taylor and her 5 minutes of fame as the "Fairy Jobmother"?  It seemed the company might have another star in the offing.  ITV have a programme starting this Thursday called Bring Back Borstal, and A4e were publicising the fact that one of their managers, a woman connected with their prison education contracts, was going to be on it.  That link has now disappeared, so I've no idea what's happening.

Slippery figures for the Work Programme

The ERSA (the trade body of the w2w providers) has put out a statement warning that the Work Programme is not likely to meet its targets.  Hardly a surprise.  But what's interesting is the way in which the various media reports of this spin the figures.

Take the version in the Financial Times.   They report the ERSA saying that on average 22% of starters "have been placed into jobs".  Round the country the rate ranges from 18% to 26%.  But the signs are that a lot of the jobs are temporary.  The Recruiter website reports the range but headlines it as "nearly a quarter".  The Telegraph's version is that "a fifth" "have found jobs".  But on Radio 4's PM programme Kirsty McHugh of the ERSA said it was "approaching one in four".  Okay, you can say that it's a minor point.  But none of the reports point out that more than that number would be expected to have found work without any intervention - the dead weight figure. 

Radio 4 asked McHugh if the prime contractors were going to need to go to government for financial help; she dismissed the idea.  But one small contractor, Groundwork Southwest, has gone into administration, and several charities have pulled out.  The Work Programme isn't working.  Even those who find work are likely to be in temporary or part-time jobs.  Better than nothing for the clients, but useless to the providers.

For a little light relief, take a look at the latest post on Hayley Taylor's website and ask yourself if you would like this "Fairy Jobmother" to write your CV.

Could this be the start?

Patrick Butler of the Guardian reports an interesting development in the outsourcing business - A4e's failure to get a contract.  The contracts are for assessing people's eligibility for Personal Independence Payments, which will replace DLA.  Ten companies have been shortlisted, including all the usual suspects - G4S, Serco, Atos, Ingeus etc.  But not A4e, who did put in a bid.  To have shortlisted A4e would have meant provoking howls of protest, because they are still under investigation.  We are still waiting to hear about that contract for the EHRC helpline.  Exaro broke the story that A4e had got the contract; the government denied it.  But we still haven't heard who has got it.  Not including A4e in the latest contracts sets a significant precedent.  When they are exonerated will they be back in the mix?  Or is this the start of the decline of the company?


It must be galling for Emma Harrison to see her former employee Hayley Taylor continuing to pull in the dosh.  She has a new American series on More4 tonight.  The Liverpool Echo sounds less than thrilled at the prospect. 

Strange figures

I'm puzzled. While the projected figures for the Work Programme are being questioned there are contradictory figures being put out for the performance of Flexible New Deal. On the one hand, there's the document put out by the DWP which we mentioned the other day,entitled "Ad hoc analysis of Flexible New Deal costs" dated January 2012. This gives a table of outcome statistics which shows 407,690 starts (excluding re-referrals) and 49,740 sustained jobs of 26-30 weeks, over 16 hours a week. That's 12.2%. Isn't it? But in response to a question from Stephen Timms MP, Chris Grayling provided, on 20 January, a table of results broken down by provider for jobs lasting 3, 6, 9 and 12 months. And the 6 month figures average to 16%. A4e averaged 15% over its 5 contracts. So which one is right?

You might say it doesn't matter much, since even the larger figure is appalling. But then let's look at a piece in the Guardian by Ian Mulheirn, director of the Social Market Foundation. He points out that for the WP the "non-intervention performance", i.e. the figure the DWP estimates will get jobs without any input at all, is 30%. Just think about that. And ask why the WP is being promoted as the solution to everything. Leave people alone and 30% will get work.

I don't normally bother any more with the daft advice given by Hayley Taylor, that most famous of A4e's alumni, but the latest question-and-answer on her site makes me cross. A 59-year-old, very experienced in admin, IT, management and as a JCP advisor has applied for lots of jobs and got some interviews, but hasn't found work. What should she do? Taylor says, " I think to remove any dates that relate to your age being worked out by a prospective employer is something I would reccomend." I know we've argued about this before, but how on earth do you keep dates out of an application form? And how do you construct a CV which gives no clue as to your age? Anyway, says Taylor, you're getting interviews so you must be doing something wrong at the interview. "Work on this area and I feel you will suceed." So it's this poor woman's fault. How helpful. It couldn't just be that they pick somebody younger, could it? I'd like to think that there was better advice being dished out by WP providers, but somehow I doubt it. By the way, there's a film on Vimeo called Hayley's Top 5 CV Tips. I can't bear to watch it.

"The Report" on the Work Programme

Radio 4's "The Report" tonight on the Work Programme had a straightforward thesis: it is unlikely to succeed when it is being delivered by the same private companies which have failed on all previous welfare-to-work schemes.

They homed in on the Pathways to Work programme which failed so dismally for those companies. A4e and Reed, you remember, were interrogated by the Public Accounts Committee on why they had performed so much worse than Jobcentre Plus. Now, A4e's Nigel Lemmon ( Executive Director A4e Welfare) says that they did better in some areas than in others; but the programme pointed out that this was only on their own measures of performance. (Lemmon later on said that all the criticism of A4e was unfair.) Dan Finn, who is a professor of social inclusion, said that JCP did better because they had been doing the work for years - er, yes - and because they were in competition with the private sector. (No evidence was given for this, because there is no evidence.)

Then we got Hayley Taylor. But what she said was actually true; people are not realistic and the government has no comprehension of people's lives. A report from the DWP says that half the people on benefits are not looking for work. I haven't seen the report, so I don't know what that figure includes. There was an interview with Colin in Leeds, a graphics designer unemployed for 3 years, who described the poor facilities and lowest-common-denominator approach he has experienced on New Deal and FND. Then Hayley Taylor openly criticised her old employer, A4e, for the first time. She knew it was hopeless when she was faced with an 18-year-old who didn't want to work and a redundant 55-year-old who was desperate for a job and was expected to deliver the same lesson to them in the same class. The impression was given that this was the reason she left A4e, whereas she seems to have left to star in her own show. Anyway, the programme pointed out that much of the criticism they had heard was about A4e, which seemed to have an unenviable reputation. Yet it got the second-largest share of the WP contracts. We heard from Martin who is with A4e for the second time; he was shattered to hear them telling him that his CV was no good, when it had been done by the same A4e people the first time around. He said he felt he was serving a prison sentence.

The presenter said that they had spoken to numerous people on the WP who feel that they are being ignored because there are too many people on the programme. They also complained about assumptions that every client was illiterate, innumerate and stupid. One commentator said that the big companies had all bid for the WP because that was all there was, and they all assumed that the government will have to step in and renegotiate when it goes wrong. Chris Grayling said that won't happen. The CE of the WISE Group complained that they had lost out on the contracts and had to lay off 40% of their staff. The presenter then said that they had a confidential document which shows that Ingeus offered a 60% discount for part of the contract, and they were not the only providers which had done this. Grayling denied that the government was putting price before quality. It was pointed out that only half the promised 40% of the work went to small companies and voluntary sector, and there were fears that the primes would cherry-pick the easiest customers and pass the hardest on to their sub-contractors. Finally, and significantly, the presenter said that everyone they had spbout oken to in their research wanted a job. All in all, this was a worthy attempt to present a serious programme about the Work Programme.

Here's the document about A4e's "Families Unlimited" project to get sub-contracts for the new workless families contracts. There's an American organisation with the same name. Perhaps they didn't know.

I'm thinking of setting up a website with practical advice for the unemployed; jobsearch, application forms, CVs, interviews etc. What do you think?

Business as usual

Anyone who thought that A4e's embarrassment over the workless families contracts would prove a turning point in the company's fortunes is probably guilty of wishful thinking. It's business as usual. Roy Newey is in India with a trade delegation of training organisations, including some FE colleges, and he is quoted as saying, "eastern India provides exciting opportunities to further strengthen India-UK cooperation in skills and education sector." Mark Lovell has been in the US. I suspect that Emma Harrison will not be giving interviews for a while; but there's a piece in the Sun, (dated 1 September) which is straightforward PR for her; and the Sun, sadly, has a bigger circulation than the Guardian. And now the BBC is running an item about research into "problem families" which reminds us that Cameron "appointed Emma Harrison as a 'family champion' to lead a drive to get workless families back into employment" with not even a nod to the Guardian revelations. We won't get to know whether Harrison's cosy relationship with MPs has been damaged, but it won't affect the company's ability to win contracts in the future.

The Financial Times previews the Radio 4 programme on the Work Programme (Thursday 15 September, 8.00 pm). Chris Grayling denies that there will be any renegotiation of the contracts, although "providers now say privately that they intend to make cost savings if they are unable to meet targets, raising the spectre that very little will be spent on helping those going through the scheme." And with the sort of irony which leaves one shaking one's head in disbelief, the programme quotes Hayley Taylor as saying that the WP is "crude and often ineffective". " “Grouping people together is just not going to work because what someone who has been long term unemployed needs and what someone who has been newly made redundant needs are two totally different things,' she said." If that's the level of insight of the programme, with all those staff and clients whose views were solicited ignored, then it won't be worth listening to.

Advice from Hayley

Nothing to do with A4e (except that Hayley Taylor used to work for them). But I saw this on her blog, and was concerned about the quality of the advice she was giving. Someone asked:

"Hello Hayley, I am 20 years of age and have been on JSA for about a year and a half on and of. In march i came to the end of the future job fund scheme where i was working in a primary school as a admin assistant. Now im back on JSA but im doing voluntry work in a hospital as a admin assistant, As im classed as internal i applied for a administrator position which is a doctor’s secretary and i have a interview tuesday! Which im really excited about but really nervous at the same time. It will be a pannel interview of three people which i know so it wont be so bad. But im just wondering what questions will they ask so i can prepare myself? And any tips you could give me please. Thank you x " [sic]

The answer from Ms Taylor:

"Congratulations, you are living proof that volunteering really does open doors and a world of opportunities, as now you are at interview stage!! It’s impossible for me to be specific with what questions you will be asked during your interview, but I would say that at 20 and without a vast amount of work history, the questions are likely to be more generic. Be sure to have enough copies of your C.V in order to offer one to each member of the panel, be clear on why you would like the position, and have a great answer prepared, smile, show enthusiasm, tell them you are willing and eager to learn, have at least two questions prepared to ask them, and don’t forget to thank them for their time when you leave. I wish you luck, and am sure you will be fantastic. Hayley x"

Now I really do hope the young woman gets (or got) the job. But it won't be on the advice from Ms Taylor. For most admin jobs you are likely to be given a test before the interview, at the computer or on paper, to show whether your English, maths and IT skills are adequate. This candidate would be unlikely to pass unless her poor English in this post is just carelessness which she can put right. You don't need to hand out copies of your CV. They've already got them, photocopied, in front of them. You will look rather foolish if you don't anticipate this. You don't know what questions you're going to be asked, but you do need to gen up on the nature of the business; they are not just going to ask about you, but about what you know, and I would have thought that would particularly apply to a medical secretary post; so do your homework.

It's a bit worrying, really.

Jobs, jobs, jobs

A4e is advertising what looks like a fantastic job - Trainee Strategy & Policy Assistant. You'll need at least a 2:1 degree or a Masters, you'll be mingling with politicians and travelling abroad. An ideal opportunity. But there's something of a puzzle. A4e never gives salary figures but this doesn't mention pay at all. Despite saying, "We will expect you to roll up your sleeves and put a lot into your work. You will be used to that from things you have already achieved at school, university or elsewhere," there's not a whisper of remuneration, and I'm wondering if this is, in fact, an "internship", i.e. an unpaid job, although it doesn't say so directly.

Former A4e employee Hayley Taylor has a new job, a paid one. She "will front Fish4jobs’ regional job fairs, providing face-to-face advice to jobseekers and will host a series of online career workshops hosted by Fish4jobs with practical advice on writing an effective CV and giving a successful interview. Fish4jobs marketing director Sarah EL-Doori says: 'At Fish4jobs we want jobseekers to find the right job to match their skills and experience. Hayley is a fantastic ambassador for us with her practical approach and success rate at helping people find a new role.'"

There's work for A4e in Saudi Arabia. On 2 July Roy Newey tweeted that he was "very excited to get invite from Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to design cost operate 5 new job placement centres - this year. Impressed with a4e." Now, lots of British companies make money in Saudi Arabia, so it would perhaps be unfair to single out A4e for criticism here. But when, on the same day, Newey says, "Amazing opportunities for a4e to learn and contribute to global ideas on improving people's lives. An honour to have a seat round the table," you feel that the slogan jars a little. But then he was off to meet the President of Pakistan.

Saudi Arabia and here

I don't know why I was initially surprised to read that A4e is seeking business in Saudi Arabia. Roy Newey arrived there on 4 June and tweeted that he was " looking forward to meetings with government to support skills and employment programmes." Why should I think that this is a step too far? After all, it's just business, as it is for many other companies and governments who regard the nature of the Saudi regime as irrelevant to trade and profit.

There has been only one more review (that I've seen, anyway) of The Fairy Jobmother, and that's in the Independent. The writer, Laurie Penny, calls it "possibly the ghastliest piece of poverty porn ever made" and she doesn't get any more complimentary as the piece goes on! One could almost feel sorry for Hayley Taylor. If she had stopped after the US series she would have retained some dignity. This new series was obsolete before it began. There has been no reaction from those papers (the Mail and the Express, for instance) which have demonised the unemployed; perhaps it embarrasses even them. Most of the media have become bored with the concept and are turning to more intelligent examinations of the problems of poverty and unemployment.

There has just been another reminder of how history gets rewritten. Iain Duncan Smith has been on the radio defending his government against the criticisms of the Archbishop of Canterbury. He described the Work Programme as if it's a wholly new idea to involve the private and voluntary sectors in getting people back to work. Don't ever ask how well, or badly, the private sector has performed; just forget the last contract and give them the next one.

Watch it if you must

A new series of The Fairy Jobmother begins on Channel 4 on Tuesday 7 June. I won't be watching. I wouldn't waste a minute of my life on it. If you do, dear reader, do post your thoughts.

It's worth remembering how this particular piece of what's been termed "poverty porn" came about. Channel 4 screened Benefit Busters, three programmes which took a serious look at the issues surrounding the welfare-to-work industry. The first two were filmed in A4e offices. Who now remembers the scenes in Hull, of clients being insulted and given nothing useful to do, of the man who got a job only to have it come to an end after a week? No, it was the first programme, which saw Hayley Taylor haranguing single mothers in Doncaster, which impressed producers. Ms Taylor was a character. And so she became a star, leaving A4e for a whole new career, here and in the US.

So will she fix up more hopeless cases with jobs which they certainly wouldn't have got if the cameras weren't there? Will you be shown idle, feckless people as if they were typical of the unemployed? Probably.

The BBC Panorama programme tonight (Monday 6 June) ought to be more informative: "With the government promising a welfare revolution, getting people off benefits and into work, Panorama visits the seaside resort of Rhyl in North Wales. In some parts of the town, nearly half of the adult population are on benefits. The programme follows the real life stories of some of the unemployed there, and asks the government whether this battle can really be won." But will there be any mention of the New Deal and FND providers who have dealt with these people in the past? Probably not.

Vox and meetings

If you don't read the Daily Express (and why would you?) you'll have missed Emma Harrison's Jobs Tips. Not to worry, you can read them on A4e's website. Your confidence in A4e's competence may be shaken, however, by the howler in the introduction - "ensuring your poised and ready for an interview". Anyone applying for a job would be well advised to do better than that on their CV.

A growing part of A4e's business are the Vox centres, which give skills training to children and young people who have been excluded from schools. Emma is opening the 10th such centre today, at Sheffield Wednesday football club. She seems to think that it's "a fascinating new model"; the private company stands the cost of setting up the institution and the local authority buys places in it. It is not new at all. Private companies running special schools, for instance, operate on exactly the same model. It doesn't look as if any of these centres have been inspected by Ofsted yet. Emma says she's not concerned about public sector cuts, and she may well be justified.

One company which has decided that the Work Programme is too big a risk is Sarina Russo, an Australian outfit. Despite being put on the framework they've announced that they are not going to bid for any of the contracts as prime contractor. They say that they support the payment model, but they only want to be sub-contractors. That's going to leave only a handful of companies, like A4e and Serco, which are willing to take the financial risk.

Ex-A4e employee Hayley Taylor who, in a few short months, rose to "international careers expert" has had a meeting with Chris Grayling. She says, "it was good to hear that the issues the unemployed face are being addressed, although it remains to be seen what the outcome will be." One wonders whether Grayling is meeting any of the unemployed.

Websites and a new year

As 2010 closes, A4e's prospects of profits look good. But I can't help wondering whether the cult of personality is going to be detrimental to the company in the long run. There's yet another website, Working Families Everywhere, spreading the word about the new opportunity (and with, of course, a video of Emma Harrison). This latest enterprise gets its own Facebook page to go with Emma's own page (which 169 people apparently "like"). I've lost count of all the websites devoted to A4e and Emma Harrison; and she's become the face of welfare-to-work for the Daily Express and, apparently, for David Cameron. But when you court publicity you draw attention to your shortcomings. A4e's results will be under scrutiny as never before.

And Emma has competition in the publicity stakes. Ex-A4e employee Hayley Taylor is back from the USA, where she was called an "international careers expert", and is preparing a new series of The Fairy Jobmother whilst appearing on ITV's Daybreak.

But let's be clear. There are only so many jobs that you can fix up with your personal contacts and with employers who want to appear on the telly. And pushing people into "volunteering" doesn't count. A huge amount of public money is going into the Work Programme and into all those other contracts which A4e has. Time to show that we're getting what we're paying for.

A follow-up to the Private Eye piece on Jonty Olliff-Cooper is on the Blood and Treasure blog. Well worth reading the comments!

A good 2011 to everybody.

From A4e to stardom

Who is A4e's most famous former employee? Yes, it's Hayley Taylor. Plucked from deserved obscurity by the Benefit Busters programme, where her reward was to be invited to tea with Emma Harrison, she went on to star in "The Fairy Jobmother" in Britain. Those three programmes were greeted with much cynicism here, but they are obviously more open to her message and style in America. The press coverage of the start of her series there is rarely critical. She's described as an "international career specialist" amongst other things, and I've seen only one review, on Media Life, which sees through the hype. But Hayley has everything going for her, and now has her own Facebook fan page. Nowhere in all this publicity is A4e mentioned. I can't help wondering what Emma makes of all this.

Pathways, Work Programme and Hayley

In a piece headed "Pathway to nowhere" the latest edition of Private Eye again highlights the failure of Pathways to Work. The Eye has got hold of Ofsted reports on the 6 Pathways contracts. Reed comes out worst, and is slammed, but A4e in West Yorkshire is also criticised: "action to resolve staff underperformance has been slow". The Eye points out, again, that A4e employs David Blunkett, and indeed the latest Register of Members' Interests shows that he was paid £25k - £30k by the company.

The Indus Delta site carries a piece by Richard Judge, Finance Director of Serco's Welfare to Work arm. He's again questioning the viability of the Work Programme model. After saying that it's "an exciting opportunity to address long-term worklessness in all benefit groups, rather than a focus on Jobseeker’s Allowance" he goes on to point out that cutting the funding while increasing the number of clients is a backward step. The AME/DEL switch - paying providers what the government has saved in benefits etc. when someone gets a job - sounds good but leaves questions. "If we do not know how much money we can earn, then how can we possibly know how much we can spend getting the outcome that delivers the savings in the first place?" He recognises that it's not likely that the providers will get enough of the money to give them confidence to spend big sums at the outset. Is Judge speaking for all the providers? Are they still haggling with the DWP over this?

Meanwhile, Hayley Taylor of Benefit Busters and Fairy Jobmother fame is about to star in the US version of Jobmother. They're giving it 8 episodes there, amazingly. None of the previews mentions her former life with A4e, probably because the company isn't known there, but Hayley has become an "international career specialist". If one website, Deadline Hollywood is anything to go by, there will be the same sort of mixed reaction over there as here.

Round-up, 31 July 2010

This week saw the last of the three "The Fairy Jobmother" programmes. There's little more to be said about this grisly show, but the Workers' Liberty site has the best review by Cath Fletcher. She points out the "gender politics" inherent in the show. "Hayley tells the women she’s coaching that they’re beautiful. A random good-looking woman in a coffee shop is found to be self-employed. Employment makes you attractive, you see and if you run your own business you’ll have guys falling over themselves to meet you. The men, on the other hand, are sent down the boxing gym to work out their frustrations, brain injury being, apparently, a fantastic aspiration for working-class blokes. When in episode one Dean found work as a kitchen fitter this meant he could now ‘'provide for his family’'." She also points out that, "The Fairy Job Mother has some worthwhile insights about life without work. That it’s impossible to take agency work, for example, because once you sign off it takes six weeks to sign on again, and in order to survive you have to turn to the local ‘’loan man’’ as the programme politely put it (the term’s loan shark, Hayley, when the interest rate’s 60%). And if you think, hard, about the couple in episode one, it might occur to you that had it not been for her mother’s offer of free childcare, even getting work experience would have been impossible for Maxine. Not that the programme mentioned that. The Fairy Job Mother does, in a small way, what grammar schools used to do for working-class children – give a few of them special treatment so they can get out. If Hayley Taylor could magically visit every unemployed person in the country and offer her special brand of motivation, would there be any more jobs? No. Why does this programme exist? To make us feel that it’s only the undeserving poor who’ll get hit by benefit cuts. The clue’s in the title. This isn’t a solution. It’s a fairy tale."

Of more lasting interest is the publication of the proposals to reform the benefits system. There is no guarantee that these sensible reforms will ever be inplemented, because the initial costs are high; but if they are not, it will undermine Iain Duncan Smith's whole programme.

And what of A4e? Their travelling salesman Roy Newey has been in India with the trade delegation which accompanied David Cameron on his trip to that country. In England, A4e has sold a series of workshops to Hertfordshire County Council for people running childcare facilities. They're called "Business Success in Childcare", and a document online describes what they do (with messy graphics). And if we needed a reminder that A4e and their like are about making money, there's an interesting job advert on the totaljobs site for a Partnership Manager. "You will be building relationships with key strategic stakeholders to raise A4e’s profile in each district and source critical local information and identify local sales opportunities. Such stakeholders are likely to include: Local Authorities and other local government bodies,City Strategy Pathfinders,Local Strategic Partnerships, Local Employment and Skills Boards,Regional Development Agency representatives and Local Jobcentre Plus representatives. The role will also consist of leading the development of localised solutions to secure sales and tender success as well as understanding the financial and contractual drivers to deliver profitability. Identify opportunities to improve every aspect of business activity to achieve business goals." Now, there's nothing wrong with any of this. A4e is a private company which exists to make money. That's capitalism. But it should be borne in mind whenever we read the guff about "improving people's lives".

In the News

The difference between news and PR is always hard to discern with A4e, and there seems to be none at all today with a story in the Peterborough Evening Telegraph which is largely taken from A4e's own site. But hey, it's a good story. The brother of the Dragons' Den star Duncan Bannatyne, name of Bill, doesn't share his brother's good fortune. He had been working as a fork lift truck driver, but had been unemployed for a year and so was sent to A4e. The upshot is that he is now working - for A4e. The photo, on both sites, has the poster in the background with the cartoon Emma Harrison on it.

Emma herself was in Downing Street last week with other "philanthropic entrepreneurs" to discuss Cameron's "big society" obsession. According to the ICG site she was happy to endorse the project. "A4e (formally Action for Employment) is the prime contractor for government services like 'Flexible New Deal' and 'Education for Offenders' and have helped more than a million people in Britain back to work. 'Let us all accept that people have been helping people for ever - and that it gives us all a wonderful sense of purpose and is a thing that we can all do. It would build communities, friendships, self esteem, confidence and help people get back to work,' said Emma Harrison, who is also the founder of the charity Foundation for Social Improvement (FSI)." I wonder where that figure of "more than a million" comes from. Does it include the results of all the subcontractors?

It's the last of "The Fairy Jobmother" tonight, and the latest pearl of wisdom from Hayley is “The jobs are there. It’s being prepared to start at the bottom and work your way up. There’s something there for everyone if you’re prepared to work hard enough.” (The Herald). So if you can't find a job it's because you're not trying hard enough. Thanks, Hayley.

That programme - and the Work Programme

Channel 4 has somewhat unwisely put up a page about "The Fairy Jobmother" entitled "Hayley Taylor's Top Tips on Gaining Employment". She gives seven fairly basic recommendations. Then there is a large number of comments, obviously carefully vetted, praising the show and asking for help for themselves or their relatives in finding work. Hayley answers only a couple of them; but it would be a full-time job in itself to answer all of them.

Turning to the Work Programme, there's an excellent article on the Public Finance site by Dan Finn, Professor of social inclusion at the University of Portsmouth. It should be essential reading for anyone interested in the subject. Yesterday's Observer has an article claiming that "Iain Duncan Smith's plans for a welfare revolution have run into trouble after the Treasury rejected a series of proposals put forward by his department." IDS's plans are based on the need to invest in reform of the benefits system, but Osborne is intent on slashing the bill for welfare benefits straight away. This comes after Serco's warning that the providers are not happy with plans for the WP contracts. Meanwhile, the "third sector" has been lobbying Chris Grayling to secure their involvement in the WP. It's reported that Grayling "had promised to consider some form of mechanism that could see prime contractors lose their contracts if they 'stuff the voluntary sector'."

I was half listening to The Daily Politics today and thought I heard it said that the government planned to create actual jobs to slot the unemployed into; it would be a refusal to take up such a job which would result in benefits being stopped. Did anyone else hear this?

TV - and being ill

With odd timing, A4e has published accounts of TV programmes "Benefit Busters" and "Famous, Rich and Jobless" on their MyA4e site. These are clearly dated July 2010 but read as if they are recent or haven't yet happened. Perhaps they are meant as a reminder that "The Fairy Jobmother" is just a spin-off. After all, the Doncaster Free Press managed to review that programme, calling Ms Taylor a "job expert", with but a single mention of "training company A4e". However, for all the hype, Jobmother only managed to get 8.9% of the viewers on Tuesday (according to MediaWeek), compared with 20.7% for BBC1's mini-series "The Silence" and 11.2% for ITV's "The Bill". It will be interesting to see how the second episode fares.

Reminding us that A4e has many irons in the fire, their Pathways site tells us that "A4e pathways are at the forefront with support for employers and GPs with the introduction of the fit note. A4e Pontypool pathways have contacted every GP surgery in Torfaen and Monmouthshire offering their expertise in reducing long term sickness related absence from work. The response from GP surgeries has been good and a number of meetings to discuss how the A4e pathways team could have a key role in supporting people where the doctor recommends an early return to work is work in progress." There is information about these new "fit notes", which were introduced in April, on the NHS website. So you could find yourself being referred to A4e just for being ill.

Was it a fix?

I've been reluctant to claim that Dean's success in getting a job on The Fairy Jobmother was contrived by the TV company, simply because we have no evidence of this. But others have been less cautious. Take Liam Tucker's posting on the TV Pixie site, for instance. He says: "The circumstances by which they got that work were entirely suspect, and that’s where the Hayley Taylor’s expertise falls down. Gaining Maxine unpaid work experience at Boots and Dean a wageless stint on the bins might’ve been possible in the real world, but grabbing the latter an interview with a fittings company out of the blue was unrealistic, to the point where those genuinely seeking work in the real world might be moved to complain. Job-hunting isn’t that simple for people with a patchy CV, and this was The Fairy Jobmother’s Achilles heel, effectively making it purely bludger-voyeurism, created for those comfortably in work to sit and gawp at the underclass."

It's perhaps significant that this criticism comes from the people in a position to know just how unrealistic it was. Other reviews miss this point. The Express & Star, for instance, focusses on Hayley Taylor and her methods, mentions that, "The pair get £261.62 a week, totalling £1040 a month in benefits – more than some working families," and sees nothing unusual in Dean's getting the first job he goes after. The Metro is just plain silly.

It's not impossible; and if the TV company and the employer assure us that there was no arrangement, we'll accept it. But even with that assurance, the programme gave the impression that if you really want a job, you can get one easily. And if it was a fix, it dishonestly fuelled hostility to supposed "dole scroungers".

The Fairy Jobmother - episode 1

I didn't watch it, and the reviews suggest that I made the right decision.

Dean got a job. Of course there was no collusion between the production company and the employer - shame on you for even thinking such a thing. But Jane Murphy on the Orange TV blog says: "Dean manages to clinch a position as a kitchen fitter's assistant. And that's where the premise falls down. Because this is all very inspiring - but if you have precious little work experience, particularly in the current economic climate, you're highly unlikely to get the first job you go for. I can't help thinking that if Dean had applied for the kitchen fitter's position without Hayley's help, he wouldn't even have got an interview. It's one thing to be willing to work - but it's quite another to find the determination to persevere through the inevitable disappointments and rejections while you look for a job."

Michael Deacon in the Telegraph catches himself being patronising: "I was going to say what a horribly middle-class idea, patronising the working class for our entertainment. But then I remembered that there’s nothing more horribly middle-class, or more patronising to the working class, than some jumped-up journalist being drippily self-righteous in the working class’s defence. So I won’t." But he is unable to resist being critical of Hayley Taylor: "I wasn’t quite so keen, though, on Taylor’s main educational prop: a large drawing of a twisting road (representing her subjects’ lives), on which she would affix stickers showing symbolic road signs. “The gated level crossing sign,” she announced, sticking it for some reason in the middle of a field, represented her subjects’ “debt” and “fear of coming off the benefits system”. Despite this, she seemed nice enough, in her briskly mother-ish way, although I have a tip of my own for her. If you’re going to scold your subjects for speaking in an unsophisticated manner (for example, saying “hiya” instead of “good morning”), it’s probably best if you don’t praise them by saying, “You’re doing really, really good.”

The Independent's Tom Sutcliffe falls into a patronising attitude: "Hayley Taylor, the Fairy Jobmother, is a bit like Pauline, the restart officer from The League of Gentlemen, approaching the jobless with upbeat mantras and slightly childish visual aids (a road map titled "Hayley's Drive to Life"). But where Pauline was malign and undermining Hayley is tender-hearted, encouraging and briskly effective. When Dean whined and whinged that his unemployment was everybody's fault but his own, she didn't see exasperating fecklessness – she saw fear of failure, and she soothed it away in a briskly maternal manner, transforming his resentful hoodie hunch into something close to upright posture. He got a job anyway, and – more to the point – he still has it. Set alongside a film like Between Life and Death, The Fairy Jobmother could easily look like the terminal decay of the serious documentary. In fact, it effectively smuggles a lot of education and information inside the boilerplate, can-do narrative arc. Did you know that one reason the jobless are so reluctant to take a chance on short-term jobs is that you lose your benefits as soon as you get work but it will take six weeks to get them restored if something goes wrong? Quite a gamble when you can't afford to lose." Yes, Tom, we did know that.

And there are two more episodes. Can't wait.