Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate she has made of the average number of kickstart places made available by each employer participating in the scheme.

Employers wishing to participate in the Kickstart scheme can apply direct or with the support of a Gateway organisation – a Gateway application will usually include jobs from a number of employers. As of 6^th May (since the beginning of the Scheme) the average number of vacancies per approved Kickstart application is 15 for Employers, 41 for Gateways, and an average of 28 for both Employers and Gateways combined.

*the above figures have been rounded to the nearest whole number. Although care is taken when processing and analysing Kickstart applications, referrals and starts, the data collected might be subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system, which has been developed quickly.

The management information presented here has not been subjected to the usual standard of quality assurance associated with official statistics, but is provided in the interests of transparency. Work is ongoing to improve the quality of information available for the programme.