We will make uemployed work for benefits - Osborne

Mon, 30/09/2013 - 13:36 -- nick

Chancellor George Osborne has announced a plan to make long-term unemployed people work for their benefits - despite strong evidence it doesn't work.

This idea has been around for a while - the Taxpayers' Alliance released a report earlier this month recommending it - but it will become policy from April next year.

Speaking at the Conservative party conference today, Osborne promised to implement a new 'Help to Work' scheme, its mandatory nature being hidden behind supportive language.

Those who have been through the Work Programme for two years without getting a job will be required to undertake one of three options - work placements, such as cleaning up litter; daily visits to a job centre; or taking part in compulsory training.

Before his speech this morning, Osborne said:

"We are saying there is no option of doing nothing for your benefits, no something for nothing any more. People are going to have to do things to get their dole and that is going to help them into work.

"They will do useful work to put something back into their community; making meals for the elderly, clearing up litter, working for a local charity.

"Others will be made to attend the job centre every working day. And for those with underlying problems, like drug addiction and illiteracy, there will be an intensive regime of help.

"No-one will be ignored or left without help. But no-one will get something for nothing."

He did not address the main issue of goverment compulsory work programmes, the displacement of existing jobs.

Osborne suggested that jobseekers "will do useful work to put something back into their community; making meals for the elderly, clearing up litter, working for a local charity."

All of these are jobs currently being done by paid staff, and Help to Work may increase unemployment as companies use unpaid labour in place of employees.

The government already has a mandatory work activity scheme, and its own evaluation of it showed that it was not helpful in supporting people into jobs.

The Chancellor did not announce where the savngs to fund the scheme would come from, but thinktank the Policy Exchange estimated that it would cost over £1 billion in the first year alone.

Policy Exchange's polling showed that 80% of British people are in favour of 'work for your benefits' schemes, and this is likely to be behind the policy given its cost and lack of proven effectiveness.

The announcement also included further tightening of benefit sanctions, with a first occurrence leading to money being removed for one month and a second leading to a three-month stop.

The number of sanctions has been rising since the coalition came to power, and have been handed out for such spurious reasons as an individual attending a job interview instead of signing on, and a jobseeker being sanctioned for not looking hard enough for work in the week before starting a paid job.

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