Libel and an appeal

If I was still a jobseeker (and thank God I'm not) I would be trying to instigate legal action against the Daily Express for libel. Yesterday they had to tone down a vicious piece about "workshy Britain". Today they've come back with two vile little pieces instead of one. One headed "4m Scrounging Families in Britain" reports the latest figures, with nothing whatever to justify the "scroungers" label. They quote their pals the Taxpayers' Alliance (which is simply a Tory-funded lobby group) on the subject of "over-generous benefits". Not content with that, there's an equally nasty piece headed "400 jobs up for grabs .... but nobody wants them". Apparently it's in Penzance. "A spokesman at the town’s Jobcentre blamed our soft-touch welfare state which has taken away the incentive to find work." This chap is not named, unsurprisingly. There's no analysis of what these vacancies are actually for - how many are not real jobs, for instance, or whether they require skills or experience which no one in the area has. No, it's just another way to traduce the unemployed. Just what is the editor's motive in this maniacal campaign?

I've been contacted by a Radio 4 journalist who is working on a programme about the government’s Work Programme, and wants to hear from people who are currently doing courses run by private providers such as A4E, Ingeus, Reed in Partnership, Seetec etc., or have recently been on FND. She would be interested to hear about the experiences of both clients and current or former staff of all the providers. Her email address is anna.meisel@bbc.co.uk and her telephone number is 07706154283. She assures me that all contacts will be treated in strict confidence.

Not entirely unrelated is a request from me to a few people who have posted comments on this blog in April, May and July this year which I have not published. Doncaster and Nottingham were mentioned. Please get in touch with me via a comment I will NOT publish.

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.

ESF Phase 2 - nothing for A4e

The announcement of the successful bidders for ESF phase 2 has been made. (For some background on the European Social Fund see this website.)

Now, when the PQQ stage shortlist was announced, A4e had succeeded in 8 of the 12 areas in making the shortlist. But they haven't won a single contract. The biggest winner is Seetec, with 4 areas. Ingeus and Intraining each have 2, and ESG, Reed and Working Links have one each (Cornwall is still to be decided).

Interesting.