in touch – January 2010
Each month, in touch keeps you up to date with the latest news from Jobcentre Plus.
In this month's edition, we feature the Government’s White Paper – Building Britain’s Recovery: Achieving Full Employment– which sets out help now for people who have lost their jobs, measures to get people off benefits and into work, and a blueprint to fulfilling employment. There are also details of the Young Person’s Guarantee, launched this month, which ensures that all young people will be guaranteed a job, training or work experience.
We also cover news of the revised benefit rates from April 2010, the success of the online Benefits Adviser and the centenary of the opening of the first Labour Exchanges.
Finally, there are details of Carers at the Heart of 21st-Century Families and Communities, part of the national carers strategy.
Latest news
Benefit rates announced
A list of revised benefit rates that apply from April 2010 can be found at
www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/benefitrates2010.pdf
30,000 people now using the online Benefits Adviser each week
Since its launch last year, the enhanced Benefits Adviser is now receiving more than 30,000 unique visits a week.
The Benefits Adviser is available online via the Directgov website and enables customers to find out which benefits, pensions or credits they may be eligible for. It also lets customers know the amount of benefit they are entitled to.
It can be accessed by visiting www.direct.gov.uk/benefitsadviser
In addition, customers can enter potential new circumstances to see how this affects their benefits, for example if they start work or increase their hours at work. It is made clear that any financial information provided is an estimate only.
Customer news
Young Person’s Guarantee
The Young Person’s Guarantee will be launched at the end of January 2010, meaning that from that date all young people will be guaranteed a job, training or work experience.
Four new offers have been developed to support the guarantee:
- new jobs created through the Future Jobs Fund
- Routes into Work: pre-employment training and support to move into jobs in a key employment sector
- work-focused training
- a place on a Community Task Force.
Some of the additional support is already available. To date we have agreed to fund around 98,000 jobs through the Future Jobs Fund, and hundreds of young people have also begun work-focused training and routes into work.
December’s White Paper announced more than 100,000 new opportunities for young people and brought forward the Guarantee to the six-month point of a young person’s claim to Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA). They will be required to take up one of the offers from the Young Person’s Guarantee, the six-month offer or from Backing Young Britain (such as non-graduate internships) before they reach the 10-month point of their claim.
Jobcentre Plus will also make this support available earlier to young people from disadvantaged groups. For example, care leavers and young offenders are able to access a Future Jobs Fund opportunity at the 13-week point of their claim to JSA.
The White Paper – Building Britain’s Recovery: Achieving Full Employment
Last month, the Government published a White Paper on achieving full employment. It also launched the cross-Government strategy, Investing in Potential, which set out what the Government is doing to maximise the number of young people aged 16 to 24 in education, training and employment.
Some of the key points include:
Help now for people who have lost their jobs:
- a guarantee of a job, training or work experience after six months’ unemployment for every young person
- extended access to the provision of expert support on starting your own business, and a £50 Self-Employment Credit for people who have been unemployed for three months
- tailored, specialist help for unemployed professionals and people over 50.
Measures to get people off benefits and into work:
- a Better Off In Work Guarantee for everyone on benefits for six months to make sure they are at least £40 per week better off when moving into work, through a new Back to Work credit
- accelerated requirements for partners of those on benefits to prepare for work
- measures to make it compulsory for young unemployed people to take up a job, training or work experience before they reach 10 months of unemployment
- a consultation on reforms to Housing Benefit, setting out proposals to improve work incentives, including a Transition into Work payment that maintains the benefit at the out-of-work rate for a set period of time – making the transition into work smoother and simpler.
A blueprint to fulfilling employment:
- a Family Friendly Working Hours Taskforce with leading employers to make recommendations on making work flexible for parents and increasing the availability of part-time work
- consultation on proposals to help carers balance work with their responsibilities, including leave for hospital visits, or to care for someone with a terminal illness.
The full White Paper is available at www.dwp.gov.uk/buildingbritainsrecovery
Stakeholder news
More help for carers
As part of the national carers strategy, Carers at the Heart of 21st Century Families and Communities, Jobcentre Plus is committed to improve the support and advice available to carers who wish to re-enter the labour market. Many carers want to combine paid work with their caring responsibilities.
Last December, Jobcentre Plus introduced new work-focused support for carers. Any carer who is not working full time and wants help to move into paid employment now has access to adviser support and training designed to meet their needs.
Jobcentre Plus will pay for replacement care to enable carers to effectively participate in interviews and training.
Each Jobcentre Plus district now has a Care Partnership Manager. These managers work with local authorities, the NHS and voluntary and private-sector carer specialists to help develop support services to improve the help for carers wanting to combine caring with paid work.
Jobcentre Plus advisers are receiving special training to help them give carers better information and support. More than 2,500 advisers will be trained by June 2010.
Help us to remember 100 years of jobseeker support
Next month will be the 100-year anniversary of the opening of the first Labour Exchanges, the Government service to help jobseekers into work and the predecessor of today’s Jobcentre Plus.
To mark the event, we want you to share your memories about Labour Exchanges, Employment Exchanges and Jobcentres on the centenary’s official Facebook page.
It was 100 years ago, and following the passing of the 1909 Labour Exchanges Act, that Winston Churchill, as President of the Board of Trade, rushed to get 62 exchanges open by February 1910. It was the start of what was then a radical concept: that Government should bring together people looking for work and employers looking for workers.
The launch of the first Labour Exchanges saw crowds of several hundred people across the country line up to be the first to get jobs. The original exchanges had separate entrances and rooms for men and women and large screens separating staff from the public.
Since then, the service has gone from strength to strength. Today’s Jobcentre Plus employs around 82,000 people in 750 offices who help customers into jobs from 17,500 new vacancies received every day.
And now we want to hear from you. Did a Labour Exchange, Employment Exchange or Jobcentre help you to find work? Are you a current or former member of staff? Do you remember the job boards of the 1970s and 1980s? Did you find love or have a celebrity encounter in a Jobcentre. If so, we want to hear from you!
Join us in commemorating the occasion and recount your anecdotes on Facebook www.facebook.com/pages/Labour-Exchange-centenary/163590306210
About in touch
in touch aims to provide you with short summaries of the latest news, progress of our modernisation programme, forthcoming changes to benefit rules, updates on performance, as well as news on important policy issues which affect our shared customers. in touch complements Touchbase , the quarterly publication from DWP, by providing a monthly focus on Jobcentre Plus related issues.
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