Inactivity seminar

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Inactivity seminar April 11, 2003
Disabled people - what works??

• Mike Daly
• Lone Parents, Older Workers and Disability
  Analysis Division

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• 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?
• Leads to employment outcomes which are not all
  dead-weight
• Attracts sufficient volumes to make impact on
  aggregate figures

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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)

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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

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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)

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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• Superseded Supported Employment Programme April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

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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 - lt5 of total

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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

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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 havent got
  it right yet in Jobcentre Plus

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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

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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

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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

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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

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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