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New Work Programme good for ex-offenders?
The Work Programme offers tailored ongoing support
The Work Programme is the flagship offering in the new Welfare to Work process. It replaces the previous provision including Flexible New Deal. It has been in operation throughout Great Britain since the summer. It is still bedding down. This will take some time because it is a big system.
Some 40 contracts, each between £10 million and £50 million a year, have been awarded, split across 18 local areas. The contracts run for up to five years.
Each contract is awarded to a Prime Contractor. They manage a network of 20 to 30 Supply Chain Partners, drawn from a range of organisations including the Third Sector. These organisations collaborate with the Primes to provide local support tailored to the individual need of the client and sustained over years.
The contracts have been specified using the new Merlin Standard. This has been developed jointly by the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) and other stakeholders to deliver an effective supply chain of services to get “hard to reach” people, who are stuck in unemployment, back to work.
They are called “black box” contracts because the Primes are given great flexibility to fashion individual support packages. The system is monitored by DWP not on process, but on outcomes. That is payment by results according to achieved long term employment. Work Programme is designed to offer controlled but flexible support to help clients get work and stay in work. No more “one size fits all” support.
To sustain and drive standards of service an element of competition is introduced by awarding two, and sometimes three, prime contracts per area. Prime Contractors who deliver the best outcomes will be allocated a bigger slice of the business over time by DWP.
More effective support for ex-offenders
From April next year ex-offenders leaving prison will be able to go to their Job Centre Plus (JC+) adviser and go straight onto the Work Programme from day-one of release. Till then ex-offenders only become eligible after 13 weeks of unemployment.
Once on the programme they will be directed to one of the Prime Contractors for an individual programme to be devised. This may include a package of appropriate services available from the Prime’s network of Supply Chain Partners.
This is how one manager of a London based Prime described to me the scope of the offering:
“Our targets are based purely on supporting people into jobs that last. A job is considered an “outcome” (in most cases) when the client has been in work and off benefits for 26 weeks (6 months). Therefore the ability of that job to last is the driving factor (be it self employed or otherwise).
In regards to Self Employment specifically, there is no direct target, but someone becoming self-employed is supported as an option if appropriate.
We do not focus on specific routes into employment over others (that is self-employment in preference over employment), rather we focus on the sustainability of that employment choice.”
Managers of other Primes said similar things regarding targets.
Exciting prospect for self-employment
This newsletter has long focused on self-employment as an option for ex-offenders planning their resettlement. A survey at the large Local prison where I work showed that 26% of new arrivals described themselves as previously self-employed. Many prisoners are entrepreneurial. It is risk taking that got them into prison. For some self-employment is their only hope of earning a living in the future.
I run an enterprise skills course in prison that enables ex-offenders to write a detailed business plan for their resettlement in self-employment after release. We help them to find a business idea that won’t get them locked up. Work Programme offers an exciting opportunity to provide on-going support for all, including those seeking self-employment.
I ran a pilot workshop last week where senior representatives from a Work Programme Prime Contractor answered questions from a group of a dozen inmates planning self employment.
“Can we come to you with a business plan and get expert advice and mentoring to make it work?” they asked. “No problem” was the reply from the Prime.
“Might there be some help opening bank accounts and getting modest backing?” “Yes.”
Will you stick with us over the time it takes to get going?” “We are there for the long term” was the reply.
My students found it exciting. I found it exciting. One Prime manager told me that last month 30% of their referrals were for self-employment.
Building the link for seamless support
Continuous, seamless support for ex-offenders through the prison gate has long been a mainstay of government resettlement policy. Leaving prison brings on many changes. It is easy for people going through the process to lose their way, no matter how well they have been supported before release. To ease the process they need ongoing support from people they have met before release.
Now we hit a snag. Clients going for Work Programme are allocated to the competing Prime Contractors on a strict computerised rota. The client cannot opt for a particular provider.
Taking control away from the client is a bad thing, when they are planning law abiding resettlement. So how can we build that link to provide seamless support?
Invite Prime Contractors into prison for regular meetings with prisoners
If a prison’s resettlement and education functions have been working well, then those leaving the prison represent a significant market opportunity for the providers of Work Programme. Let’s not forget that Primes are competing for successful outcomes.
Primes cannot compete directly for clients. But it is in their interests to offer information to ensure that potential clients are best able to take the opportunities offered by Work Programme, when they arrive through the system.
So staff in prisons should have no difficulty in getting Primes to visit resettlement events in prison to offer information. It will help the Primes and their sub-contractors to get clients who are better aware and therefore ready to participate successfully.
I want all the local Primes to visit the prison I work in and talk to the inmates. Two of them have already gladly agreed in principle. That way we can better inform ex-offenders about their opportunities for a successful and law-abiding future. The short reference section at the end of this paper points to where Primes in your area can be contacted.
There are doubts and difficulties
The economic climate seems to be closing in for a long winter. Employment opportunities are getting harder to find. Payment by results inevitably shifts the burden of risk away from the public purse and onto the service provider.
Recent surveys from the Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations and London Voluntary Services Council indicate that providers participating in Work Programme are being starved of funds. There are apparently not enough referrals to go round and not enough outcomes to bring in sufficient payment by results.
Some commentators fear that the Third Sector is being particularly badly hit. Eighty-eight percent of the Prime Contractors are private enterprises. There is evidence that they are not passing enough work to their Third Sector partners, further down the supply chain in the Work Programme, to keep them going.
Some fear that what looks like a big plus for Big Society will in fact have the opposite effect, by resulting in wholesale privatisation of the Welfare to Work sector. It would be a tragedy if failings in implementation undermined what looks like a very positive programme. There are signposts to recent articles in the reference section.
Efforts by the resettlement community to direct clients to Work Programme can only help to reduce these difficulties.
New Enterprise Allowance
Work Programme is not the only Welfare to Work provision for those seeking self-employment. There is an alternative national scheme called New Enterprise Allowance (NEA). It is alternative in the sense that a client cannot be on both programmes.
It has significant benefits. NEA offers business mentoring on a national basis. It offers a weekly allowance over 26 weeks. It is worth a client’s full benefit entitlement for the first 13 weeks and half that for a further 13 weeks. There is the possibility of a loan of up to £1,000 to help with start-up costs.
However, NEA is not available the moment an ex-offender leaves prison. To be eligible the client must have been unemployed for six months. There are no exceptions. The programme seems to have more rigorous cut-off dates than Work Programme and a narrower range of possible services.
The offer of a loan is not guaranteed. It is available for projects with “high growth potential”. I have not been able to find a clear definition of this, even from those administering the loans.
The two year NEA programme (it ends March 2013) has a total national ceiling for provision of 40,000 participants, with 1,200 of them in London . I was told by one provider that applications are running at 300% of capacity, so new applicants need to get in before the programme runs out of places.
One interesting feature of NEA is the setting up of Enterprise Clubs, where aspiring entrepreneurs can meet with local business people to get advice and participate in collective self-help. There may be arguments for setting one up in a prison.
However, there is no money available from government for setting up Enterprise Clubs, unlike their employment equivalent, Work Clubs. Also the “Important legal information” that accompanies the official documentation on setting up an Enterprise Club is not encouraging. In eight crisp paragraphs this document makes clear that DWP and JC+ have no involvement in, or responsibility for, any Enterprise Club. They are on their own and unfunded.
Feedback please
We are keen to follow up and report customer experience of Work Programme and NEA. Please send any reports on how they are performing to ask@thelearningjourney.co.uk .
References
For information and contact lists regarding Work Programme go to: http://www.dwp.gov.uk/supplying-dwp/what-we-buy/welfare-to-work-services/work-programme/
For articles reporting cracks in the edifice of Work Programme and useful links to related topics go to:
For information on New Enterprise Allowance go to:
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/adviser/updates/new-enterprise-allowance/
