Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 4
4
Acknowledged
The Department did not know enough about its claimants to understand what support they needed...
Recommendation
The Department did not know enough about its claimants to understand what support they needed and how many eligible claimants would go on to participate in Restart. The Department’s work coaches know a lot about their claimants, but much of this information is recorded as freeform text on a person’s benefit claim. This makes it difficult for the Department to collate and consider this information when it designs employment support. As an example, the Department said it had recently learned from providers that around 45% of people going onto Restart in some areas have English as a second language. Individual work coaches will know this about their individual claimants, but this is not information that the Department can aggregate to inform providers or use to ensure it is purchasing the support that claimants most need. Similarly, the Department does not have a vulnerability flag in the UC system, or a flag to denote mental health problems. The Department had expected its work coaches to find 82% of system-suggested claimants to be suitable for Restart and in reality, work coaches have only found 43% to be suitable. The Department did not run trials to test these assumptions about how many people The Restart Scheme for long-term unemployed people 7 would be found suitable as it felt it did not have time, that work coaches did not know their claimants as well because of COVID-19 lockdowns, and because claimant circumstances would change between it running a trial and launching the scheme. Recommendation 4: • The Department should set out how it will improve its record keeping so that barriers to work faced by a claimant, such as language difficulties or health conditions, are recorded and can be aggregated in the Universal Credit system to understand the type and scale of support the Department needs to provide, and so that providers have the best possible understanding of how they can help participants. • The Department should seek to establish the level of capacity
Government Response Summary
The government acknowledges the value of testing assumptions prior to procurement but notes that trials can take up to two years to complete. The department will need to assess and balance the risks and opportunities when determining the right approach.
Government Response
Acknowledged
HM Government
Acknowledged
The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. Recommendation implemented The department agrees it can sometimes do more to test assumptions prior to procurement, for example on suitability, and that pilots and trials can sometimes have a key role in informing policy and delivery alongside evaluation and lessons learned from previous programmes. In determining the right approach, the department needs to assess and balance the risks and opportunities. Trialling new or novel approaches can add value but relies on a risk judgement against the time taken to secure the evidence and the likely value of any new insight. For a reasonably sized trial it could take up to two years to complete the design and procurement, gather evidence and subsequently undertake an evaluation to feed into new policy. This often does not align with the need for government to mobilise an urgent response to an economic shock, meaning a proper trial may not be appropriate in all circumstances. Quicker testing can be undertaken on, for example, confirmation of take-up assumptions for provision that is similar to existing or previous approaches.