Oral Answers to Questions Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateThérèse Coffey
Main Page: Thérèse Coffey (Conservative - Suffolk Coastal)Department Debates - View all Thérèse Coffey's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
(3 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe furlough scheme, as we have heard, has been a huge success in helping millions of employees to keep their link to their employer, as well as providing other opportunities for people who are self-employed, with support through grants or through the benefit scheme. Our plan for jobs is a cross-Government initiative that will promote employment opportunities for people of all ages. Our local jobcentres are fully reopened, and we will provide additional support to claimants by doubling the number of work coaches. We are also expanding SWAPs, the sector-based work academy programme, and we have launched our ambitious kickstart scheme, which will provide a vital first step on the jobs ladder for many young people.
I am very supportive of the recent action the Government have taken to help young people into work. I have, however, had a number of older constituents contact me, as they have unfortunately lost their jobs because of covid-19. I would therefore be interested to know what steps the Government will take to encourage employers not to overlook the skills and experience that those in their 50s and 60s can bring to the workplace when they are hiring.
My hon. Friend is absolutely right to highlight the value that experience can bring to the workplace and to a potential new employer. The SWAPs programme allows those looking to pivot into new rules to gain experience in that new area, and in the coming months our job-finding support package will draw on private sector expertise to help those who have recently lost their job, while our job entry targeted support scheme—JETS—will provide extra help to individuals who have been unemployed for three months or more and find themselves at risk of long-term unemployment.
The residents of Hastings and Rye are full of potential and talent that needs to be unleashed, but the recent pandemic has put pressure on local jobs. The kickstart scheme is engineered to help people between the ages of 16 and 25 to gain skills and employment. May I ask what my right hon. Friend is doing to help people over the age of 25 to get the skills and training they need?
Our £30 billion plan for jobs will see us support people of all ages in building the skills they may need to return to work. One of the key elements is what we are calling SWAPs—the sector-based work academy programme, which is expanding the opportunities in priority areas such as construction, infrastructure and social care, and which can provide training, work experience and a guaranteed job interview to those people ready to start a job. Of course, older workers will be eligible for this and can gain important new skills to pivot into sectors to secure employment.
I welcome my right hon. Friend’s response. There is no doubt that we must ensure that the younger generation gets the best chance in life post covid-19, but in North Devon we have a slightly older population. Many of my constituents have also lost their jobs and need additional help and support to retrain. Will she assure the House that those who are a little bit older will not be forgotten?
Indeed, and key to identifying those important opportunities and ways to help people over the age of 25 will be our network of empowered work coaches who engage proactively with claimants to help them to identify the options they need to help to build their skills, increase their confidence and return to employment. We are already doubling the number of work coaches, and my hon. Friend will be interested to know that, in North Devon in particular, we have launched a new 14-week IT connect 50-plus programme, an initiative supporting those over the age of 50 to develop digital skills and apply for jobs online.
The Secretary of State said in July that work coaches were the ones who could help to tease out the great skills that people have and what makes a good fit for a new role. She was right, but the pledge she made in July for 4,500 new work coaches to be in post by October has resulted in only 300 being in post to date, as was revealed last week. The crisis has now gone on for six months, and average work coach caseloads are already over 200, so can she tell the House what is going on and why, since April, she has been so slow to act?
The hon. Lady is perhaps far from what is going on. I think she has very recently visited her local jobcentre to discuss this. I want to encourage her by saying that a number of people can be on-boarded into the Department at any one time, given the comprehensive amount of training that is needed to be a work coach. We have also done this in such a way that many existing DWP civil servants can move from being in the service centres in order to get promoted to being a work coach, building on their valuable experience. I can assure her that we are well on track for making sure that we have the right number of work coaches, and indeed replacement decision makers, on the agreed timescale.
Applications only started on 2 September, and already thousands of employers have expressed interest in providing kickstart opportunities for young people. We are working hard to deliver the scheme. We have not yet developed data on the local level, but I am confident that the management information will start to become available so that we can identify right across the country exactly how we are providing support.
I strongly welcome the kickstart scheme and the incentives it gives businesses to employ young people in my constituency of Harlow and across the country. Will my right hon. Friend set out what further action the Department is taking to support skills and apprenticeships so that our town can be part of the apprenticeships and skills nation that we so want to be?
It is important that a wide range of choice is available to young people, in particular, as they set out in their career, so we will be having kickstart but we will also be having aspects of apprenticeships. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education announced an additional £2,000 of support for each new apprentice hired from the age of 25. In Harlow specifically, our jobcentre has been running virtual academies and designing SWAP—sector-based work academy programme—schemes to support claimants, working with local employers, including the civil service. Additional funding for the National Careers Service will also mean that over a quarter of a million more people will receive individualised advice on training and careers through their local jobcentre.
It has been less than two weeks since the Government launched the kickstart scheme, which will help thousands of young people on to a vital step on the jobs ladder. Thousands of employers have already expressed an interest and I am pleased that several have already had funding approved. Smaller organisations that do not expect to take on more than 30 kickstarters during the scheme will gain access to funding through an intermediary. I know that several organisations are applying to that gateway, for example Suffolk County Council and Suffolk chamber of commerce. We are having productive discussions with the Federation of Small Businesses, which very much wants to be part of the solution for small businesses and young people.
This is a Great Britain-wide £30 billion plan for jobs. I know that the Scottish Government are undertaking their own initiatives, but I am sure that my hon. Friend will want to ensure that we put the full efforts of the UK Government into helping people in Scotland get back into work.
I thank my right hon. Friend for that answer. What steps is the Department taking to ensure that young people in Scotland are not disproportionately affected by the economic fall-out from covid-19, given that we were suffering from a higher rate of unemployment when the pandemic hit?
My hon. Friend is right to point out that Scotland was already starting to struggle with unemployment rates compared with other parts of the United Kingdom, but I want to assure him that we will not only work with kickstart, but ensure that we have a Scotland-specific job entry: targeted support—JETS—programme so that we can tackle people who perhaps need either support to pivot into different sectors, or intense support which recognises that they may have been unemployed for some time. We will ensure that the people of Scotland get the full support of the UK Government.
It is a tragic consequence of the pandemic that some families of NHS key workers have lost their loved ones to covid-19 after they contracted the virus while serving on the frontline. It is absolutely right that they receive compensation for that. May I ask the Secretary of State to justify the news that low-paid relatives who receive the compensation payment are to be stripped of their benefits? That is not the case with comparable payments such as the Grenfell and Windrush compensation schemes, so why are NHS families being treated in that way?
The hon. Gentleman will know that when people have a substantial amount of money—and I recognise the route he indicated on how they have received that—it usually takes them over the £16,000 threshold for support through the welfare system. He specifically referred to some other programmes, where it is absolutely acknowledged that there has been a complete failure within Government in that regard. I suggest to the hon. Gentleman that that is not the case regarding the NHS, but I am sure, as the NHS is a separate employer from the Government, it will continue to work with its employees and the relatives of people who have sadly died.
I find that answer lacking in reason and compassion. There was news this morning that the country’s largest food bank network has warned that UK destitution rates are set to double by Christmas. We know that the Government believe they deserve praise for the fact that universal credit has not collapsed like the test and trace system, but the real test of a social security system is whether it gives people the support they need. The food bank statistics prove that this is just not happening at the moment. Clearly that will get worse as the furlough scheme ends. We have set out our further suggestions on how to prevent the looming disaster. What are the Government’s plans to prevent it?
We have set out the unprecedented steps we took to ensure that vulnerable people would not go hungry as a result of the pandemic, focusing especially on children. While schools were closed to most children, free school meal vouchers were still in operation if schools could not provide a meal. Further support was given through the summer food fund, money was provided to food charities to help get food to people who were struggling, and 4.5 million food boxes were given to vulnerable people who were shielding. Together with the extra £9.3 billion in welfare support that has been given to households across the country, we believe that this is a strong way to have supported people in these difficult times.
My hon. Friend asks an important question about our work with the business community and across the Government. The DWP has been an integral player in the development of the plan for jobs. Together with my right hon. Friends the Secretaries of State for BEIS and for Education, we have had several roundtables with the business community and others to ensure that people who are looking to enter employment can develop skills and have additional funding, going down the apprenticeship or traineeship route, as well as kickstart. I am also in regular discussions with other Cabinet colleagues on the creation of new opportunities wherever possible.