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Written Question
Medical Certificates
Monday 3rd February 2025

Asked by: Viscount Younger of Leckie (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have any plans to reform the fit note.

Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

As part of the £240m Get Britain Working SR package, the department will deliver eight inactivity trailblazers and three of these will be health and growth accelerators. The accelerators represent a shift by the NHS towards prevention and commitment to a role in addressing economic inactivity, including exploring the role of the fit note in this system.

The Government has no current plans to reform the fit note (Statement of Fitness for Work) in terms of the content of the form or the healthcare professionals who are legally allowed to issue them.

Written Question
Employment Schemes: Finance
Monday 3rd February 2025

Asked by: Viscount Younger of Leckie (Conservative - Excepted Hereditary)

Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have made an estimate of the potential impact of the £240 million funding allocated to the Department for Work and Pensions in the Autumn Budget 2024 for trialling new ways of getting people back into work on savings to the public purse in each of the next five years.

Answered by Baroness Sherlock - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)

£240 million was announced in the Autumn budget to help us deliver and build on labour market reforms to Get Britain Working. Measures in the White Paper will include:

  • £45m for Youth Guarantee Trailblazers so that all young people in England, aged 18-21, can access quality training and education opportunities or help to find work.

  • £55m for the development of the new public employment and careers service, which will be open to everyone, transforming our ability to support people into and on at work.

  • £125m for Trailblazers to tackle economic inactivity through increased engagement and tailored approaches in England and Wales.

  • And £15m to support local areas in England to go further, developing their own Get Britain Working Plans.

We are working with trailblazers to create their local plans and we are developing an evaluation strategy to measure impacts, including savings to ensure we make the most effective interventions to Get Britain working.