23 March 2010 – Lone Parent Obligations: Early findings of implementation as well as experiences of the Income Support and Jobseekers regimes

Findings are published today from the first stage of the evaluation of Lone Parent Obligations (LPO) which considered the early implementation of LPO and experiences of the Income Support and Jobseekers regimes, based on in-depth interviews with staff and customers.

Findings from the report show that:

• The implementation of LPO has gone well to date. Staff reported being well-supported and most of the customers interviewed, affected by LPO, were aware of the change to their benefits and why the changes were happening.
• Both Lone Parent Advisers (LPA) and generalist staff, depending on the case study area, supported lone parents on Jobseeker’s Allowance. LPAs were reported by some of the staff interviewed to be more aware of the range of (financial) support for lone parents, but less confident at working within the JSA regime.
• At the time of the research, staff had limited experience of applying the JSA parent flexibilities. They tended to have good awareness of them, but there were exceptions.
• Within the JSA parent flexibilities, staff described difficulty in defining appropriate childcare. This was seen as subjective and customer-led, whereas what would constitute affordable childcare was easier to calculate, for example, with the help of Better Off Calculations.
• For those lone parents on JSA, there were differences in their confidence and capability to ‘self-help’ during the first stage of the JSA regime. There were no instances of the JSA customers that were interviewed having been fast-tracked within the JSA regime or accessing support through New Deal for Lone Parents.
• Staff felt that the ending of Income Support entitlement would help to encourage lone parents to look for work. Being on JSA seemed to have had a positive effect on customers’ attitudes to work and job search behaviour, with many lone parents reporting that they were more likely to look for work on JSA than IS, in part because they disliked attending sign-on appointments.

Notes to Editors:

1. ‘Lone Parent Obligations: early findings of implementation as well as experiences of the Income Support and Jobseekers regimes’ by Rosie Gloster, Jo Casebourne, Sarah Culshaw, Lidija Mavra, Amy O’Donnell and Ann Purvis is published today as part of the DWP Research Report series (Number 645). A copy of the report can be downloaded from the Department’s website at: http://research.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd5/rrs-index.asp and a copy of the stand-alone summary from http://research.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd5/summ_index.asp
2. The findings are based on qualitative fieldwork in five case study areas. This included 75 interviews with Jobcentre Plus staff and 203 interviews with lone parent Jobcentre Plus customers split between four stages of the lone parent customer journey, as follows:
   1. 52 interviews with customers with younger children receiving IS and as yet unaffected by LPO;
   2. 51 interviews with customers six to eight weeks before their IS entitlement was due to end;
   3. 51 interviews with new and repeat claimants to JSA since LPO had been implemented;
   4. 49 interviews with customers who had moved from IS to JSA because of LPO.
3. This forms part of a comprehensive programme of evaluation research, using a mixed-methods approach, to assess the effects of LPO. The evaluation includes further in-depth interviews with customers and staff, large-scale surveys tracking customers over a period of time, as well as analysis of in-house and other data sources. The evaluation is being carried out by a consortium of independent research organisations, led by the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion.
4. Recently published reports include a review of international literature; “Lone Parent Obligations: A review of recent evidence on the work-related requirements within the benefit systems of different countries”, by Dan Finn and Rosie Gloster, DWP RR 632, 2010.
5. LPO was introduced in November 2008 within Great Britain and Northern Ireland. This required lone parents, who were claiming benefit solely as a lone parent, to look for work as a condition of benefit receipt, if their youngest child was aged 12 or over. This age reduced to 10 in October 2009 and will reduce to 7 in October 2010.

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