unemployment

Written by Tony Wilson, Director of Policy at Inclusion

You may have spotted the Prime Minister’s announcement last month of community work for the long-term unemployed.  In four areas, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) are going to test the impact of requiring people who have been on Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) for more than two years to do community work for thirty hours a week for up to six months – “ahead of a nationwide rollout in 2013.”

Today a Trade's Union Congress (TUC) analysis of official statistics has found that 279,000 people will spend this Christmas on the dole, a figure that has increased by 35,000 since last year. In 2007, the number was 127,000. 

TUC is concerned about the long-term scarring effects on career prospects and health for the long-term unemployed. TUC calls on the government to provided well-funded and personalised support to the long-term unemployed and not to label them as 'scroungers'.

Analysis just published  by UNISON, the public sector trade union, suggests that on average there are more than 4 unemployed people for every advertised job vacancy in England, Scotland and Wales. London is one of the hardest hit regions, with more than 31 unemployed people for every job advertised in Hackney, and 18 for every vacant job in Lewisham.

For more, see http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=2017

Starting tomorrow evening on Channel 4, “The Fairy Jobmother”, is a new reality TV show in which the Fairy Jobmother (aka former A4E employee Hayley Taylor) works with long-term benefit claimants to help them find employment. The programme tracks Hayley Taylor as she moves in with families experiencing long term unemployment and attempts to improve their employment prospects with her advice and guidance.  

Iain Duncan Smith the Work and Pensions Secretary, has outlinedproposals to make the workforce “more mobile” in the Sunday Telegraph. He has revealedthat ministers were drawing up plans to encourage jobless people living in council houses,to move from areas of high unemployment to areas where more jobs are available.

Claimants are outnumbering vacancies by more than 15 to one in some areas of Britain, according to TUC analysis cited in the Guardian. The analysis found that the claimant to vacancy ratio was 5:1 for the country as a whole, with ratios of 7.6 in London and 6.1 in the North East.

According to Camilla Cavendish,the benefits system has produced a generation of men incapable of finding work or a wife. Writing in the Times, she criticises the huge potential for ‘fraud’ and ‘foulplay’ within a system that has created an army of ‘unemployed, unmarriageable and unconfident men’.  The women do not want them, she argues, because they can raise families on benefits without their help.  Controversial?

JSA unemployment seems to have peaked. But long term unemployment is rising. Worse still, employment is also falling and economic inactivity is rising.

Yesterday's announcement of the monthly unemployment figures caused great confusion. The Labour Force Survey count (to December) showed a small decline (down by 3,000) But the JSA figures (for the month to mid January) showed quite a marked rise - up by 23,500. Why the difference?

Updated 17/12 - DWP published their White Paper on Tuesday, aimed at 'Building Britain's Recovery: Achieving Full Employment'. I've had a good read through, and would defnitely recommend reading the summary which is here, as it really is full of content. The summary below is made up of useful excerpts I've picked out from the White Paper, including a bit of background to set out what the Bill is being based on.

Overall, there are a lot of reforms set out here, including more information on skills accounts, 'better off in work' credit, and additional plans to tackle youth unemployment. There is also a lot in there for working families, lone parents, carers, and people with disabilities. This White Paper is by no means a short-term plan to fend off the recession, but outlines reform in all key areas - more powers to Jobcentre Plus staff, Housing Benefit reform, a review of Pathways to Work, and an aim to work back up towards full employment.

There's a new documentary series starting on Channel 4 on Thursday 20th August called Benefit Busters. It seems to focus on the experience of ground level welfare to work delivery, filmed in co-operation with providers, which makes a change to some of the stories of recent months. Here's a link with more information, and the blurb follows.

From the New York Times:

Over the coming months, as many as 1.5 million jobless Americans will exhaust their unemployment insurance benefits, ending what for some has been a last bulwark against foreclosures and destitution.