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Claimant commitment
Following today’s announcement regarding the rollout of the claimant commitment, I thought people might enjoy the response reproduced below, which I received to a recent enquiry to DWP Communications about how this will take place. You may need a quiet half hour or so.
“Dear Rosie,
I’ve confirmed with policy experts that we don’t require either a legislative change or new legislation to enable the roll-out of the Claimant Commitment to JSA Claimants. This is because the Claimant Commitment will be used within the current JSA regime. Building on the successful Live Innovation Trials and Pathfinder approach, we are preparing for the introduction of Universal Credit by introducing a programme of learning and development for advisers to embed a cultural change and a new coach/athlete model for supporting claimants. This will include strengthening how we shift claimant behaviour towards proactive job-search that sets the right foundation ahead of Universal Credit’s smoother, clearer, more stable incentives to work. This will be supported by improved products, primarily the Claimant Commitment, which will help to enable this change. It is important to note that whilst the Claimant Commitment will replace the existing product for the claimant group agreed for roll-out, it will for legislative purposes act as the Jobseeker’s Agreement and claimant acceptance of it will not be a condition of entitlement for JSA as it will be for Universal Credit.
You are correct to say that generally claimants who are able to work would fall into the All Work Related Requirements group when claiming Universal Credit. Our aim is to encourage them to get into as much work as they reasonably can do as quickly as possible. Advisers will take account of individual circumstances and set requirements that, if complied with, give the claimant the best possible prospects of finding paid work.
The Claimant Commitment is at the heart of this personalised approach. Compliance with requirements such as active job search and engagement with advisers, increases the chances that claimants find work more quickly than they would otherwise, but too often in the current system there is a lack of clarity about requirements and consequences. The Claimant Commitment will address this, for the first time setting out all requirements and consequences in one place – ensuring claimants understand what is required.
One of the main differences between current JSA and Universal Credit conditionality is that claimants in the All Work Related Requirements group have a responsibility to look for and find work. Claimants should treat this responsibility as their “job” and our intention is that claimants should aim to spend as many hours looking for work as we would expect them to spend in work - for the All Work Related Requirements group this has been set at 35 hours per week. These more robust requirements will be supported by a new sanctions framework under Universal Credit.
However, as I have explained, the JSA Claimant Commitment will be underpinned by JSA and not Universal Credit legislation and as such will not have the same powers as for those claiming Universal Credit. Current JSA conditionality will continue to be applied and the Claimant Commitment will be a tool which facilitates a culture change and a more robust approach to diagnosing claimants circumstances and setting appropriate work related requirements, which will provide the best chance of finding work.
Kind Regards,”
This belongs in the management-speak bingo thread…
I was unemployed during the whole of 2011. It does not take 35 hours to find and apply for all the job vacancies available in a given week - and I was applying for all I theoretically had the competence to do including unskilled minimum wage jobs (the sort I’d never be considered for because I’m “overqualified” and over-competent, but it kept my jobcentre ‘adviser’ happy.) It takes from 16-24 hours per week depending on the vacancies available and the method of application. That is, it takes longer to fill in an application form that addresses a 20-point person spec than it does to send a CV and covering letter. I found my jobcentre staff have no clue about the most effective ways to look for work (it’s about targeting, not applying for every vacancy in sight) and no scope to assist jobseekers effectively even if they wanted to, because they are all on six-month contracts which are renewable at the regional manager’s discretion, and so they are not offered any training above an introductory level.
However, I was doing voluntary work that accounted for one or two days a week at the time, which the jobcentre decided could be added to my jobseekers agreement. Under this new regime, if the same JSA regulations apply, hours of voluntary work should still count. If they do not, then this 35 hour a week jobsearch notion is simply a way to give jobcentres another opportunity to sanction claimants, or else tangle them in oppressive time wasting exercises.
The DWP should pray that I am not made unemployed again any time soon. I caused them a small amount of trouble over an unlawful jobseekers direction and one or two more minor incompetencies when I last signed on. The way things are developing, next time I will be not just have to cause a little trouble but, to retain my dignity and ensure I am able to look for work in the most effective way, I would have to declare war!
I was unemployed during the whole of 2011. It does not take 35 hours to find and apply for all the job vacancies available in a given week - and I was applying for all I theoretically had the competence to do including unskilled minimum wage jobs (the sort I’d never be considered for because I’m “overqualified” and over-competent, but it kept my jobcentre ‘adviser’ happy.) It takes from 16-24 hours per week depending on the vacancies available and the method of application. That is, it takes longer to fill in an application form that addresses a 20-point person spec than it does to send a CV and covering letter. I found my jobcentre staff have no clue about the most effective ways to look for work (it’s about targeting, not applying for every vacancy in sight) and no scope to assist jobseekers effectively even if they wanted to, because they are all on six-month contracts which are renewable at the regional manager’s discretion, and so they are not offered any training above an introductory level.
However, I was doing voluntary work that accounted for one or two days a week at the time, which the jobcentre decided could be added to my jobseekers agreement. Under this new regime, if the same JSA regulations apply, hours of voluntary work should still count. If they do not, then this 35 hour a week jobsearch notion is simply a way to give jobcentres another opportunity to sanction claimants, or else tangle them in oppressive time wasting exercises.
The DWP should pray that I am not made unemployed again any time soon. I caused them a small amount of trouble over an unlawful jobseekers direction and one or two more minor incompetencies when I last signed on. The way things are developing, next time I will be not just have to cause a little trouble but, to retain my dignity and ensure I am able to look for work in the most effective way, I would have to declare war!
I agree 100% with what you have said here.
The 35 hour requirement will inevitably result in a huge rise in sanctions. There needs to be a JR of the latest guidance as it is setting people up for failure. I do have some media contacts who would be willing to publicise cases of inappropriate/deliberate/punitive sanctions.
We really have moved back to the way that the “actively seeking work rule” was applied in the 1930s when unemployed people had their benefit stopped for not demonstrating that they had applied for every vacancy going.
One reason this punitive and counter-productive rule was reversed was that the National Unemployed Workers Movement organised mass job applications to local employers resulting in protests by employers that the rule was wasting their time.
Employers are already complaining that they are getting loads of wasteful, inappropriate applications via Jobcentres or because people are under threat of sanctions.
“One reason this punitive and counter-productive rule was reversed was that the National Unemployed Workers Movement organised mass job applications to local employers resulting in protests by employers that the rule was wasting their time”.
i remember when i was last unemployed having to explain several times to the lady at the jobcentre why it was i was not applying for jobs doing probate/family/immigration/other fields of law beyond my competence ....
Claire
BHP law
“Employers are already complaining that they are getting loads of wasteful, inappropriate applications via Jobcentres or because people are under threat of sanctions.”[/quote]
We receive unsolicited CVs and ‘phone calls etc from time to time, all of them completely unsuitable (even if we did had a vacancy) - and we only recruit by application form.
I wonder what the CBI and small business orgs are doing to raise this issue with DWP/Ministers - presumably this is a real pain to employers from Tesco’s down to the local grocers shop?
I wonder how JCP would respond to a claimant who walks around town with a sandwich board saying ‘Give me ajob’ for 35 hrs a week?
[ Edited: 30 Aug 2013 at 02:23 pm by Peter Turville ]Yes, us too. And when we last advertised for a non-advisory post we we flooded with applications and CV’s (which we specifically state we don’t accept anyway)- far more than we could realistically deal with- the vast majority of which were clearly hopelessly unsuitable and inappropriate and bore no resemblance to the person spec or JD. They had very obviously been completed by people desperate to meet their jobsearch requirements. It made the task of assembling a shortlist extremely time-consuming and frustrating.
For a laugh your adverts might want to tell would be applicants to apply at their local jobcentre in the first instance.
Searching for a job is full-time work.
Therefore you are in work
Therefore we are stopping your benefits.
Yes, there is a kind of perverse logic to that which sort of takes me back to my days as a first year philosophy student and reminds me of the classic example of deductive reasoning which is both false and invalid, and runs along the lines of: -
All men are mortal
Socrates is mortal: therefore,
All men are Socrates
I think I’m in danger of falling down the rabbit hole again.
Well don’t expect to attract any points if you do. Falling down a rabbit hole does not constitute having LCW. Nor, indeed, does it in any way affect your claimant commitment. People can quite easily seek work regardless of rabbit hole-related mishaps.
and anyone today who concocted story about a young girl falling down a rabbit hole might eventually find themselves in the dock alongside other well known celebrities - Oh, err ... I have a dtr of the same name and live very close to place that inspired that part of the story.
Well don’t expect to attract any points if you do. Falling down a rabbit hole does not constitute having LCW. Nor, indeed, does it in any way affect your claimant commitment. People can quite easily seek work regardless of rabbit hole-related mishaps.
Lol. Priceless.
And I think I’d best be avoiding talking to young girls then. White rabbits, March Hares, Doormice and Mad Hatters, yes. Young girls, Nooo.