The network of 646 jobcentres across the UK is the DWP’s main mechanism of supporting benefit claimants into work. The government’s recently published Green Paper ‘Pathways to Work’ outlined the additional support work coaches will play in helping those out of work back into employment. This is a laudable aim. Everyone able should have access to fulfilling and rewarding employment as part of a supportive welfare system.
It seems, though, this isn’t always the experience of people interacting with their local jobcentre or work coach. The government’s own research found that 60% worried that the jobcentre would force them to look for unsuitable work if they reached out for support.
Indeed, a report by the National Audit Office (the government’s independent public spending watchdog) found that the DWP have consistently failed to hire enough work coaches for the past 3 years in 5 of the seven regions in order to meet even current demand. The most recent statistics, covering the first six months of 2024-25, suggest that the DWP faced an average shortfall of around 2,100 work coaches to be able to effectively support benefit claimants in moving into work.
In September 2024, at a district level, the average caseload for a work coach ranged from 67 to 123 cases per coach. The DWP has what they term a ‘flexibility framework’ allowing jobcentres to implement measures where a caseload is expected to exceed 110 for at least 3 months, in order to ease the coaches’ workload. From September 2023 to November 2024, 57% were implementing these flexibility measures. For context, these five measures are –
– Level 1: Shorten the first meeting with claimants from 50 to 30 minutes
– Level 2: Meet employed claimants in the Intensive Work Search category monthly instead of weekly or fortnight
– Level 3: Reduce support for self-employed claimants in the initial 12-month period from four 30-minute interviews to two
– Level 4: Pause some work coach support for people with health conditions and disabilities who claim Employment and Support Allowance (DWP suspended this measure from the framework in May 2024 because it had little impact on reducing work coaches’ workload.)
– Level 5: Meet all claimants in the Intensive Work Search category fortnightly after 13 weeks, instead of meeting some claimants weekly.
What does this mean in light of the changes the government announced aimed at helping those with health conditions and disabilities into work? Well, consider for example, the ‘level 1’ measure; that first meeting with the work coach is vital – it helps the work coach understand what barriers that claimant faces, it helps the claimant understand what will be expected of them and begin to explore how the jobcentre can facilitate the removal of those barriers. How effective will that meeting be, having been trimmed to just 30 minutes, bearing in mind it will have been done so due to the other demands already placed on the work coach as a result of an excessive caseload? This doesn’t sound like the more ‘tailored,’ more ‘personalised’ support the government promised as part of its reforms.
If the government isn’t able to provide adequate support to benefit claimants currently, then what hope is there that it can do so in light of the changes they propose to bring, placing more emphasis on people with health conditions to find work? The government propose to invest £1 billion (taken from the estimated £5 billion savings in its welfare reforms) and put this into a new employment support package. This investment is certainly welcome. But as part of its reforms, most people in receipt of the new ‘health’ element of UC will be expected at a minimum to engage in ‘conversations’ about their needs and employment goals. Whilst we welcome this, it’s difficult to see how meaningful that conversation will be if it takes place in a 30-minute timeframe.
If the government’s aim is to support people with health conditions into work, even those who might have considered themselves unable to work due to their health, then the system these people rely on and interact with needs to be properly resourced, or we risk hobbling people’s life chances from the off. Not only is that fundamentally unfair to the claimants trying to move into employment in spite of their health, but it also undermines the government’s aim of boosting employment to bolster economic growth.
For most people, their work coach is the ‘face’ of the DWP. It surely isn’t asking much that they have the time to provide the personalised support these people need and deserve.
If you’d like to find out more about the NAO’s report into the shortage of work coaches, you can find a summary of the report here.
