Lying with statistics, and reforming welfare

SICK BENEFITS: 75% ARE FAKING. Yes, that's the good old Express's headline. Call it vicious and disgusting and the owner, porn king Richard Desmond, would no doubt take it as a compliment. For the government's view of the figures, see the DWP website. Their figures show 39% of claimants were found "fit for work" and another 36% stopped claiming. For a very different take on this, see Left Foot Forward . Now, this is a complex subject with a long history, an it's not really relevant to this blog. What IS relevant is that a lot of people are now going to be forced onto the Work Programme, into the hands of providers who proved useless in getting such people into work on the Pathways programme.

I've just been listening to an interesting piece on Newsnight. James Purnell, who played his part in the Labour government's outsourcing of welfare-to-work, spoke about how Labour voters no longer back the welfare state. He talked to the pollster Peter Kellner, who said that people think it should be a contributory system, benefits in return for contributions, but they now see it not working that way. John Cruddas, another Labour MP, said that the old covenant had broken down. Purnell put forward his view that there should be a guarantee of a government-provided, minimum wage job for everyone out of work for a year, along with an obligation to take it. You would get a higher pension if you'd paid in all your life. In the studio he faced a Tory MP who talked nonsense, and a woman from a think tank who raised some questions. Essentially, Purnell said we should scrap the current system and go back to the drawing board, cutting out most of the minor benefits. The welfare state should be there to protect people. I would have liked to raised some questions about the role of the private sector.

Think Tanks and Opportunities

A recent edition of Private Eye carried a piece about the "think tank" Demos, where former Work & Pensions secretary James Purnell now works. Demos, says the Eye, is funded by companies like A4e and PWC, which stand to benefit from the Work Programme. (The Demos website doesn't list its funders.) Another former minister with a new job is Jacqui Smith, who now advises Sarina Russo Job Access, an Australian company also bidding for Work Programme contracts. Now Ed West of the Telegraph points out that another influential think tank, the IPPR, is funded by a long list of taxpayer- funded bodies headed (alphabetically, at least) by A4e.

This week Ken Clarke, the Justice Secretary, announced new opportunities for the private sector, in "offender management". As usual, A4e is ahead of the game. They work with offenders in various parts of the country, including providing "employability focused qualifications to offenders carrying out their Community Payback orders in their local communities" in the North East.

And then there's Work Clubs. These are to be part of the Work programme, provided by the Jobcentres, for those who haven't been out of work very long. But A4e have already launched their own Work Clubs in the North East and Derbyshire. Is this a pre-emptive move to take the work away from the Jobcentres?

If anyone wants a handy guide to what A4e does, there's one here. Spot the mistake in, ironically, the "Education & Enterprise" section.

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.