Nearly half of Universal Credit claimants have got a job (roughly 2.3 million in work, from the total 5.6 million people claiming this benefit). Some of them work in warehouses: maybe they work for you. But policymakers in the UK rarely pay any attention to the viewpoint of employers in relation to benefits and Active Labour Market Policy (ALMP).
Manchester Metropolitan University’s Business School want to put that right, so it was my pleasure last month to attend the launch of the Universal Credit and Employers research report by Dr Katy Jones and Dr Calum Carson. This was the first major independent research project to focus on employer views and experiences of Universal Credit (UC) and related employment support. UKWA was delighted to participate. I was one of nearly two hundred interviewees whose input was assessed as part of this study. The findings have already attracted strong support. Plenty of people from the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP) attended the launch event and the researchers have even been invited to the All Party Parliamentary Group on Universal Credit.
The reason that this is important right now is that over the next couple of years, DWP will be moving people on legacy benefits onto UC. This will expand interventions beyond the unemployed to include workers on a low income. For example, from this September, 600,000 in-work claimants will be subject to new expectations to engage with Jobcentres and demonstrate efforts to progress in work.
But the research found that employers’ understanding of UC is patchy. Some still believe there is a 16-hour per week limit which can affect benefits (there is not). Other limitations do apply however, and the report explains that employers were frequently perplexed when “staff had requested not to receive bonuses or increases in their wages because of the impact this might have on their UC payments”. The researchers also found that “mistakes made by employers could have disastrous consequences for staff” but the system does not allow for this. Employers were frustrated that genuine mistakes could not be rectified, so they were unable to protect their staff from financial penalties.
The report concludes that ALMP policymakers need to listen to “people who know most about the realities of the labour market”. It recommends involving a wide selection of employers – in terms of business size, sector, and geography – rather than just a handful of ‘ad hoc’ large companies. Specifically, in order to hear the voice of small and medium sized businesses, it calls for “employer representative organisations to be a much more active stakeholder on this agenda – at local, national and sectoral levels”. This is where UKWA comes into its own, providing a voice for the industry to engage with government. And I’m absolutely up for that!
Clare Bottle
UKWA, CEO
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