Inactivity seminar – April 11, 2003

Mike Daly

Lone Parents, Older Workers and Disability Analysis Division

Disabled people - Disabled people - what works??what works??

• From earlier discussion of trends, short answer is ‘obviously nothing we have tried so far’

• (Looking at GB evidence – but nobody else has the answer)

• Focus on moving from inactivity to employment – also need to reduce flows from employment to inactivity

• But what do we mean by ‘works’?a) Leads to employment outcomes which are not all

dead-weightb) Attracts sufficient volumes to make impact on

aggregate figures

What have we tried?

– Support from specialist Disability Employment Advisers

– Mandatory Work Focused Interviews– Rehabilitation/retraining (Work Preparation)– Supported Employment (Workstep)– Individualised support from external Job Broker

(New Deal for Disabled People)– Training (through WBLA)

What have we tried (2)

– Support in work through Access to Work:• Travel to work; support workers; special aids &

equipment; adaptations to premises; communicator support at interview

– Temporary wage subsidy - Job Introduction Scheme

– Making work pay – Disabled Persons Tax Credit– Encourage part-time work as a stepping stone -

Permitted work rules

Generally low numbers

• Disability Employment Advisers (DEAs)– 670 DEAs conduct 100,000 interviews per year –

but most on JSA rather than incapacity benefits– 18, 000 job entries a year – most of these JSA

clients– Jobcentre Plus planning for 7,500 job entries for

people on incapacity benefits this year (excluding NDDP jobs)

Low numbers (2)

• Work Preparation:– 11,000 starts 2000/2001– 1,700 job entries recorded (Understates

performance significantly)• Workstep

– Superseded Supported Employment Programme April 2001

– 24,500 currently on Supported Employment & Workstep

– 2,600 starts in the first year of Workstep

Low numbers (3)

• NDDP– Since July 2001, over 40,000 starts– Around a third achieve job entries, nearly half

sustained– Well below targets – but some brokers at or close

to target levels– Originally hoped for 100,000 sustained job entries

over 3 years• WBLA take-up by IB clients is low - <5% of total

Low numbers (4)

• Access to Work– 20,000 existing beneficiaries– 13,000 new beneficiaries– Two thirds of cases already in work

• Job Introduction Scheme– Around 2,000 a year

• Disabled Persons Tax Credit– 36,000 currently in receipt– Take-up levels thought to be relatively low

• Permitted Work Rules– Too early for findings– But higher take-up than previous ‘therapeutic earnings’ rules

Evidence of effectiveness (1)

• Disability Employment Advisers– A quarter in work 6 months after assessment– A third of those said would not have got job otherwise– half of customers were satisfied with their DEA contacts.

• Mandatory WFIs– ONE pilots found no evidence of impact– But experience with Lone Parents suggests can have an

impact, if we get it right– Early evaluation results suggest we haven’t got it right yet in

Jobcentre Plus

Evidence of effectiveness (2)

• Work Preparation– Recent work to establish best practice– Mixed messages on effectiveness of provision– 20% in work 13 weeks after – but no estimates of

net impact• Workstep

– Too early to know how many progress to unsupported employment

– This was not a principal aim of previous SEP – nor the only objective of Workstep

Evidence of effectiveness (3)

• NDDP– Much too early for overall impact assessments.

• Access to Work– Case study approach to estimation of deadweight– Significant deadweight present – but low enough

for overall programme to be cost-effective• Job Introduction Scheme

– Research suggests some net impact – no hard evidence

Evidence of effectiveness (4)

• DPTC– No evidence yet on net impact– Research on Disability Working Allowance

suggested not many job entries as a result – But know that financial concerns a significant

barrier to return to work• Permitted Work Rules

– No evidence that therapeutic work was a stepping stone

– Research in progress on PWR

What is the problem?

• Most of this has been aimed at those who are closer to the labour market – not at the inactive

• Only recently (Jobcentre Plus, NDDP) have we seriously tried to convert ‘want to work’ into ‘looking for work’

• And these measures have been seriously flawed• Piecemeal approach – good reason for thinking

measures succeed through interactions

So what would work?

• Being tested in IB pilots:– Mandatory WFIs– Some re-design of process – but particularly better

training– Additional mandatory WFIs for most new

claimants– Access to further caseloading – either Jobcentre

Plus or external through NDDP– More consistent/coherent access to other help,

such as rehabilitation– Improved financial incentives