Scapegoats

It's not been a comfortable week for the Conservatives.  HSBC, Stephen Green, tax avoidance, and that "black and white ball" when the obscenely rich gathered to give money to the Tories.  They had a raffle.  On Wednesday I paid a quid for some raffle tickets and won a bottle of cheap plonk.  But the Tories' raffle was nothing like that.  One of the prizes was an "iron man" with Iain Duncan Smith - a long cross-country run.  But as always the Tory deception machine kicked in.  MPs were instructed to deflect every question to an accusation against Ed Miliband and Labour.  The media happily co-operated, the BBC especially so, but it got pretty desperate.  Today came the announcement that a new Tory government will target people who are unable to work because of obesity.  They will have to go on a diet or lose their benefits.  (Hasn't IDS told them that he's got a much simpler way - just sanction them and starve them thin?)  Mark Harper was wheeled out onto the Today programme this morning to explain the idea, and with commendable (and unusual) persistence Mishal Hussein made him talk about tax avoidance as well.  The deception machine went into top gear and Harper trotted out the untruths too fast to be contradicted.
But this was by no means the daftest idea of the week.  The Tories have been muttering for some time about extending right-to-buy to housing association tenants.  Now IDS has come up with the notion of giving their council houses to tenants who've been on benefits but come off for a year.  Now, I could list all the reasons why this is insane.  But the New Statesman has already done it.  And the Mirror points out that an investigation in 2013 found that a third of all the council homes sold off in the Thatcher years are now owned by private landlords.  It's no surprise that this story didn't get much attention from the mainstream press.  It's so barmy it won't happen, even under majority Tory government.
But this scapegoating of people on benefits isn't going away.

"For Hardworking People"

That's the slogan for this year's Conservative Party Conference - although they're all forgetting and referring to "hardworking families".  So they're not for the single, the pensioner, the sick, the disabled, etc., etc.  We already know that the latest kicking of welfare claimants is that all those who are long-term unemployed will be subjected to a form of workfare.  They know that they're onto a winner with the electorate.  But it's doubtful whether they will elaborate on exactly how it's to be done.  Remember that the government currently refuses to disclose which firms and organisations take free labour from MWA and the like.  If lots more people are to be offered for free labour there will need to be more companies involved.  Will we be allowed to know which ones?  (Short answer - no.)
The media continue to ignore the fact that the government refuses to publish the numbers of those who have been "sanctioned".  I found this link (in a comment on the Conservative Home website); "A Selection of Especially Stupid Benefit Sanctions".  All of them are sourced, and a lot come from MPs.  Essential reading for Iain Duncan Smith, one would have thought.
For many churches, today is Harvest Festival; and many of them will be donating the produce to their local food banks.

Work, of various kinds

The noises coming out of the Conservative party conference suggest strongly that something like "Work for your Benefit" is on the cards. While that might satisfy a lot of voters, the question remains, as always, of what work the unemployed are supposed to do. Perhaps they will be the "volunteers" creating the Big Society. And that's something that A4e's Mark Lovell is keen to get the company involved with, having been in talks with Paul Twivy, a PR man who runs something called the Big Society Network. There's no reason, of course, why private companies shouldn't get involved, and they won't make money out of it, but for most of them it will be part of their PR strategy.

A4e has been at fringe meetings at both the Labour and Conservative conferences, as usual. And they've also been in Spain, where, the Financial Times reports, the government has started taking an interest in the unemployed and is talking to A4e "about what a programme to help the unemployed might look like."

A4e has another website called Tomorrow seeking contacts with employers who are faced with making people redundant. The language is somewhat startling, and the music on the home page very irritating. And shouldn't this be the role of Jobcentre Plus?

Limbo

First we note that Jim Knight, who had to defend the last government's actions on welfare-to-work, lost his seat at the general election. He is no longer an MP but it's fascinating that he is still a minister, because they all remain in office until a new government is in place.

The private companies which profit from government contracts are in limbo, like the rest of us. If, as seems likely, Conservative Theresa May becomes Work & Pensions secretary, contracts for phase 2 of FND will not be signed. Work for Your Benefit, Community Task Force Phase 2, Invest to Save, and the Personalised Employment Programme are also under threat if a Tory government carries out its promise / threat to implement the Work Programme. The problem with that is that it means asking bidders for FND phase 2 to revise their bids, and that could result in legal challenges. We can only wait and see.

Gordon Brown and the unemployed

"But they shouldn’t be doing that, there is no life on the dole anymore for people, if you’re unemployed you’ve got to go back to work. At six months…" That's a quote from Gordon Brown's run-in with an elderly lady today. And, of course, it's gone unremarked. He didn't finish the sentence, but clearly the intention, if a Labour government is returned, is to copy the Tories' idea of Workfare - compulsory "training" or work-for-your-benefits, or even a cut-off point for benefits. There's nothing to distinguish Labour and the Conservatives, then, and whoever gets in we're going to see an increase in the resentment that so many unemployed people feel at being stigmatised. I see a growing number of posts and blogs on the internet from JSA claimants venting their anger. That is going to get worse.

There's a relevant article on CFE News saying that "Charity claims NEETs view employability courses with contempt".

"Barnardo’s Scotland director Martin Crewe claimed that young people not in education, employment or training (NEETs) view courses designed to improve their job prospects with contempt. Mr Crewe stated that that was not what they wanted, and said: "What they want are real jobs and programmes that will get them employed - not a short-term placement which will leave them more or less back where they started. Sitting around in classrooms for long periods working on their CVs is not going to provide a major boost to the employability prospects of the young people we work with. They know it from day one and regard such schemes with contempt." He went on to say that the Barnardo's Works programme had got 80% of its young participants into sustained employment.

A Brief History of Welfare-to-Work

A recap of some history. The last Conservative government faced growing unemployment, particularly amongst young people, and the fact that employers would not train their own staff. They introduced various schemes - YOPS, YTS and so on - which encouraged the growth of numerous private training companies. Some of these companies were simply scams. Of the ones which were not scams (including A4e) few survived the end of the Tory government.

Labour introduced New Deal. This focussed first on young people, and offered a much more structured approach to training and support for the unemployed. It was followed by New Deal 25+. Private companies were central, naturally. New Deal was about genuine training, and private companies of various kinds - FE colleges, industry training bodies and specialist organisations - were best placed to deliver that training. But it was Jobcentre Plus which organised this and issued the contracts. By 2005 a budget was allocated to each JCP region and it was the JCP region which decided how to allocate the funding. Programmes ranged in length from 6 weeks to 52 weeks. The providers could interview prospective clients and take on only those who were willing and able to benefit from the course. Clients then undertook vocational courses such as NVQs while doing a real work placement. Providers were rigorously audited, and payment was on the basis of weeks on the programme, qualifications gained and job outcomes. There was a great deal of flexibility, with new courses such as Basic Skills being introduced, and scope for local schemes. For one quarter, Oct - Dec 2004, there were 34,410 starters on NDYP and 24,580 on ND 25+. In the following quarter the figures were 38,910 starters on NDYP and 22,630 on ND 25+.

But the then Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, David Blunkett, decided in 2005 that "new contracts for relevant and affordable provision should be put out to competitive tender, to come into effect from April 2006 onwards". What this meant was that private companies would organise New Deal region by region. Jobcentre staff could be sacked. One company that did particularly well in gaining these contracts was A4e.

The three years which followed showed just how bad an idea it was. The structure of the contracts was such that they were almost bound to fail. There was no filtering of prospective clients; everyone unemployed for the required period, regardless of whether there was any chance of them benefitting, was sent on a 13-week programme. There was scope for only minimal skills training. Clients were supposed to be put into work placements, but there were far too few genuine placements available, and many clients spent weeks working with voluntary organisations, or kicking their heels in the training centre. The system encouraged "creaming and parking"; the effort went into those clients who were most likely to get work, while those for whom a job was very unlikely were largely ignored. To win the contracts providers had promised job outcomes of 50%. This was always unattainable, and even before the unemployment rate started to climb the outcome rate averaged about half that. The definition of a job outcome (16 or more hours per week and expected to last for 13 weeks or more) was shown to unrealistic as available jobs became increasingly casual and part-time.

Back to the drawing board? Flexible New Deal is supposed to remedy the defects of the previous contracts. Clients will be offered training suitable to their needs, and not be required to sit in a training centre for weeks on end. The only attendance requirement is for 4 weeks of work placement. There is even an element of competition between providers. Clients have a choice between two providers in each area - hence A4e's roadshow to advertise their presence. And payments are dependent on outcomes to a much larger extent - 80% of the total - so the pressure to get clients into work is even greater.

Jobcentre Plus has been overwhelmed by the numbers of newly unemployed, and have had to take on more staff. But this is a temporary measure. On the basis of public-sector-bad, private-sector-good, JCP Support contracts are in place, with private companies offering the kind of support to claimants that they would once have expected from the Jobcentre itself.

The Conservatives promise an even smaller role for Jobcentre Plus. Their "Work Programme" will see the renegotiation of current contracts to convert them into a programme which more nearly expresses the ideas of David Freud. Private sector providers will only receive full payment if their clients stay in work for a full year. How many will want to bid for these contracts remains to be seen.

The ideology of the free market has prevailed over evidence and common sense.

Is FND finished?

The Flexible New Deal contracts have only just got under way, but already seem irrelevant. The Conservatives have said that they will "renegotiate" them to transform them into their (or David Freud's) idea of welfare-to-work. The Tory proposals would pay providers only for outcomes - and 12-month "sustainable" job outcomes at that. Anyone with a glimmering of knowledge of the current jobs market knows how scarce such permanent jobs are. FND providers were concerned that it wouldn't pay; and that was with 80% of the payment on job outcomes of 13 weeks or more. Who will want to bid for contracts with 100% on job outcomes of a year? Even if some up-front money is provided to help cover costs, will the only bidders be institutions like FE colleges, who have the necessary infrastructure anyway, and large companies like A4e and Serco which can bear the costs? We shall see.

Meanwhile, A4e continues to look to other areas of business. In Northern Ireland they've been awarded a £400,000, 2-year contract to provide a free debt advice phone line.

Tory policy - how new is it?

The Conservatives are making much of their welfare-to-work policy. But the BBC's Nick Robinson, on his blog, has pointed out that the plans are pretty much the same as Labour's, and that both parties are exaggerating the differences between them. One of those keen to make the distinction clear is James Purnell, the man who presided over the late, unlamented New Deal contracts and devised FND. On the Demos website he points out the "Holes in Conservative welfare plan". And for a view from the left of both of Tory and Labour, read Dave Osler's article on the Liberal Conspiracy site.

Meanwhile, FND is up and running. It was interesting to see that when the BBC's Working Lunch today wanted a view from one of the providers they looked to Serco.

Good news from the Tories

The Conservatives' plans for a "Work Programme" will hearten all welfare-to-work contractors. "Tories would force jobless to work" reports an article in the Times, describing a plan to "tackle the dependency culture". "The welfare plan is the brainchild of Lord Freud, the former Labour adviser who defected to the Tories earlier this year. It would abolish the Labour government’s New Deal programme designed to get the long-term unemployed into work. It would also effectively mean the end of Jobcentre Plus, where bureaucrats design training programmes for the unemployed." Presumably Lord Freud thinks private companies can design better programmes than "bureaucrats" - and I did speculate recently that JCP would be next for privatisation. As the article says, this plan is based on the American model.

People like Lord Freud are evangelical about the role of private profit in getting the jobless into work. Good news for A4e and all the other contractors.