Jobless scheme is slow to work

ONLY one in every 30 jobless people in Oldham have found work through a flagship Government scheme.

The proportion of long-term unemployed helped by the £435m Work Programme in Oldham is only 160.

According to the Government’s own analysis, more people would have found work if the programme had never been set up.

4,630 people were put in the scheme in its first 13 months in the borough, but only 160 (3.46 per cent) found work for “several months” — slightly lower than the 3.53 per cent national rate.

Two years ago, the department for work and pensions estimated that five per cent of the long-term jobless find work whether they are given help or not.

Labour said the figures showed the Government’s welfare revolution — offering payment-by-results to giant private firms — was “comprehensively failing”.

But Mark Hoban, the work minister, said a quarter of 800,000 jobless people had found some work

The figures remain a deep embarrassment to ministers, who have repeatedly boasted the Work Programme — by using the expertise of private firms — was the answer to long-term unemployment.