Keeping us in the dark

We've all been going on about media bias towards the Tories, particularly in the BBC, for ages now.  So it was no surprise that when Iain Duncan Smith appeared on Question Time last night there were no questions chosen about any of the "welfare" issues in the news - despite the fact that they also had the shadow minister for "welfare reform".  The internet was buzzing with excitement.  But no.  Iraq, Islam in schools ..... and we waited in vain.  The Salma Yaqoob, with whom I had disagreed on everything else, decided to have a go at IDS.  He hated it.  Chris Bryant joined in, refusing to be shouted down.  A middle-aged man in the audience (I can't remember whether this was before or after the spat) told IDS exactly what he thought of him and was cheered.  Dimbleby hastened to move on.  The cynics among us decided that assurances had been given to IDS that there would no no hard questions for him.  But his face, when he found himself under attack, was a sight to behold.  He really doesn't like it.
But there has been a small chink in the BBC's protective wall.  The appalling delays in processing PIP assessments have been well known for months.  Suddenly the media decided it was a story.  Mike Penning was on the Daily Politics yesterday, apologising and being very lightly grilled by Andrew Neil.  This morning the Today programme took it up.  A good journalistic report was aired and then a Labour MP (I'm sorry, I've forgotten her name) commented clearly and ably.  No DWP spokesman was available, apparently.  But what we didn't get was the background to this debacle; no discussion of the wider implications of outsourcing.
Another issue we wouldn't know about but for the internet is the report that the Trussell Trust had been threatened that the government might try to shut them down because the DWP wanted to discredit them.  It was an obscure website, civilsociety, which first reported this.  Strangely, I can't now get at the article.  But Channel 4 News took it up the following day (see Jackie Long's blog) and today the Independent weighs in, having done some digging.  Citing "sources" they say that the man who did the threatening was "Conservative MP Andrew Selous, parliamentary private secretary to Mr Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions Secretary."  He denies it vehemently, but the Indy is confident enough to do a profile of him.  It's an excellent article.  But where is it in the rest of the media?
And there's the row about the Oxfam cod film poster.  The Daily Mail got outraged about it; but there's been no debate on the BBC, and other papers have ignored it.
Until the mainstream media do their job properly the Tories will continue to get away with murder.

Margaret Hodge interview

I missed it, but Margaret Hodge was on The Daily Politics today talking about the PAC report.  You can watch it here.  She had to battle against poor interviewing, but she made her points.  There is "still a cloud hanging over A4e".  Providers are still claiming money for outcomes they had nothing to do with, jobs or self-employment already set up before referral.  The interviewer, Carole Walker, kept trying to push the line that this was in Labour's time, but Hodge insisted it was under the current contracts.  And, she said, "You don't pay a company if they have not done the work."
She was also exercised about the fact that no figures have been released.  How can we know how well A4e or anyone else is doing if, 15 months in, there is still a refusal by the DWP to tell us the stats?

That's the crux of it at the moment.  The documents leaked to Channel 4 News showed that, with the first year of the WP not yet completed, A4e's outcome figures were dire.  That first year is well and truly over now, but figures promised in the "Autumn" are still not out, and rumour has it that they won't be released until the end of November (which is winter on my calendar).  What are they hiding?

Emma Harrison on the Daily Politics - again

The BBC's Daily Politics programme is going on at the moment, and the "guest of the day" is A4e's Emma Harrison.  She was introduced as if she had never been on the show before, but she's been on twice to my knowledge.  So, how is she doing?  Her first contribution was an intervention in a discussion on the Miliband brothers, though with nothing useful to say.


A report was cited that says that 4 out of 10 employers say they hire immigrants rather than British youngsters because the British lack the "soft skills" such as how to deal with customers.  Emma said that A4e teaches the soft skills, it's of prime importance.  She said that it was more of a London issue.  And her clients are getting and keeping jobs.


Now she's intervening in a discussion on French politics!  Neil asks her to comment.  And now we're on to the Lib Dem away-day.  Why is Harrison on the programme at all?  She is asked to comment on what the journalist says about the Lib Dem agenda, and she says that they should ask what people want, represent the voice of the consumer; and "get in early with the SME stuff".


And that's it, programme over.  Harrison has had some completely painless exposure and unchallenged publicity for A4e.  

More thoughts on The Politics Show

You can see the piece on A4e Brixton on the BBC news website. It's headlined "How firms like A4e help unemployed people back to work".

What disturbs me about The Daily Politics today is how little challenge there is to what is said. Andrew Neil didn't know that people are not referred to A4e etc. until they've been unemployed for a year, so when he asked what A4e could provide that the state couldn't, Harrison was free to talk about wanting to get to people earlier. It was the perfect opportunity to bring up the fact of the failure of the Pathways programme, the rare example of when a direct comparison is possible between the private companies and the Jobcentres. But he didn't. There was no challenge about the record of A4e (and the other providers) on New Deal. And her assertion that anyone who "fully engages" with them can get one of those "hidden jobs" should have been pounced on, but it wasn't. They were too anxious to get to the ructions in the Labour Party. But they wouldn't have challenged it anyway, because the media are too lazy. They had one tiny idea - that A4e is set to make money from the Work Programme - and didn't do any research.

Emma on The Daily Politics

A4e's Emma Harrison popped up today as the guest on The Daily Politics. Weirdly, she was asked her opinion of George Bush's memoirs. But then the programme focussed on the housing benefit changes. There were contributions from the House of commons from Caroline Flint and Simon Hughes, then David Freud, minister for welfare reform, was introduced, sitting on the sofa next to Emma. He said that he expects rents to go down and no significant increase in homelessness. Harrison said that the changes had to come, that benefits had been too generous, meaning people couldn't afford to take jobs. But she worries, she said, that vulnerable people will panic at this. Freud said that there's a lot of misunderstanding about it.

Anita Anand, the interviewer, said that the new Work Programme would mean a lot more business for Harrison's company. There was a short film report from an A4e office in Brixton, showing decent facilities, but mostly low-wage jobs on offer. The office was said to secure 50 jobs a month, but many of these were short-term. Figures were quoted for A4e's income, which I didn't manage to write down. The reporter pointed to other areas of A4e's business, pushing how much the company stands to gain. Andrew Neil then asked Harrison what she provides that the state can't. She said that she would like to get people earlier than at present; she can tell when people are going to become long-term unemployed. Jack Dromey, the Labour MP, took Freud's place. He forecast that unemployment would rise to over 3 million. He said that he doesn't doubt that A4e does some good work, but he doesn't want to see big companies getting more work out of this. Harrison retorted that they use the voluntary organisations. A4e can find jobs for anyone who "fully engages" with them; they can find the "hidden jobs" that never get advertised.

I'm not sure what this programme achieved, beyond again presenting Emma Harrison as the face of welfare-to-work and avoiding the hard questions.

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?