Work Programme statistics briefing
The Work Programme is the UK Government’s main programme to support long-term unemployed people back to work. This research looks at the impact of the programme for blind and partially sighted people.
Title: Work Programme briefing; Author: Sue Keil; Publisher: RNIB
Background and key messages
The Work Programme is the UK Government’s main programme to support long-term unemployed people back to work in England, Scotland and Wales. This briefing demonstrates that comparatively few blind and partially sighted individuals are benefitting from the Work Programme, with only 90 people in Great Britain having gained employment from participating between June 2011 and March 2015.
Government schemes such as the Work Programme, are currently not providing the right quality or consistency of service for blind and partially sighted jobseekers, resulting in poor outcome rates, at a time when employment opportunities for those furthest from the labour market are low.
A key question remains: what has happened to the 600 blind and partially sighted people who completed their two years on the Work Programme and were returned to Jobcentre Plus without having secured a job?
We hope that lessons can be learned from the shortcomings in the current Work Programme, which has failed blind and partially sighted participants, and an innovative approach developed to supporting more blind and partially sighted people find and keep work.