Welfare in the future
The Freud Report
On 5 March David Freud, who was asked to contribute to a long term review
of the Government’s Welfare to Work strategy, led by Jim Murphy, Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, delivered his report
to DWP (2.5MB) 
.
The report is a large document. To make access to the PDF version easier, it has been split into a number of separate files.
- Cover, contents and foreword (58KB)
- Executive summary (171KB)
- Chapter 1 UK performance
to date (1.2MB)
- Chapter 2 Towards 80% in
work (165KB)
- Chapter 3 Contracting support
for the hard to help (1.2MB)
- Chapter 4 Modelling outcome
based contracting (287KB)
- Chapter 5 Rights and responsibilities (108KB)
- Chapter 6 Benefit reform – towards
a single system (59KB)
- Chapter 7 The role of Jobcentre
Plus (50KB)
- Chapter 8 Implementation (43KB)
- Appendix 1 Illustrative
individual journeys in proposed system (50KB)
- Appendix 2 Overview of
selected countries’ welfare systems (639KB)
Welfare reform Seminars
In January 2007, Jim Murphy, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform, launched a series of seminars to discuss the development of the welfare state over the next decade. The seminars drew in the views of a broad range of interested people and stimulated wide-ranging and open discussion.You can read or listern to some of the key speeches from the seminars.
- 23 January: Net Gains – Future of Benefit Delivery
- 12 February: Welfare Reform – Challenges for the Next 10 Years
- 19 February: The role of faith based groups in welfare provision
- 21 February: Renewing the welfare contract
- 28 February : London, The labour market and welfare - the future
To hear audio files you need MP3 playing software on your computer.
Download a free player here (other players are available):
23 January: Net Gains – Future of Benefit Delivery
Seminar in partnership with Dods at Portcullis House, London.
Chair: John McFall MP
Speakers:
Jim Murphy MP, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform
- listen to Jim Murphy's speech (MP3, 16.8MB)
- read Jim Murphy's speech
Adrian Carr, SPSS Inc
- listen to Adrian Carr's speech (MP3, 9.9MB)
Alan Marsh, Policy Studies Institute
- listen to Alan Marsh's speech (MP3, 5.9MB)
Roy Sainsbury, University of York
- listen to Roy Sainsbury's speech (MP3, 11.1MB)
Kate Green, Child Poverty Action Group
- listen to Kate Green's speech (MP3, 9.6MB)
Discussion focused on:
- What benefits delivery might look like in the future.
- The concept of a Single Working Age Benefit.
- How IT will simplify and assist benefit processing.
- Is the benefit system too complicated?
- How will any changes affect the Government's commitment to end child poverty?
12 February: Welfare Reform – Challenges for the Next 10 Years
Seminar in partnership with Work Foundation at Peter Runge House, Carlton Terrace.
Chair: Polly Toynbee
Speakers:
Jim Murphy MP, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform
Will Hutton, The Work Foundation
Lord Anthony Giddens, currently Life Fellow of University of Cambridge
Discussion focussed on:
- There are 2.5 million more jobs than 10 years ago but there is further to go towards Government's aim of 80% employment rate.
- If we are to prosper and to further reduce child poverty, we need to focus on improving skills, especially for disadvantaged groups.
- Employment rate for ethnic minority groups is still unacceptably low and greater emphasis needs to be placed on helping people with a poor knowledge of English to help them compete and retain employment. Jobcentre Plus have been asked to put more emphasis on helping people to address their language barriers.
- Growth of knowledge economy in UK offers enormous labour market opportunities. We should make less of any perceived threat of globalisation and build on success.
- The welfare system needs to be preventative not just reactive.
- The responsibilities of people receiving benefit should be accompanied by support to improve skills and find work.
- The value of the private and voluntary sectors and the parts they can play in the welfare system.
- Women who remain in low paid jobs and the position of carers in society are still issues for concern.
- The need to improve public awareness and support for children still living in poverty in the UK.
- Consideration of employment opportunities by those disengaged from the labour market.
19 February: The role of faith based groups in welfare provision
Seminar in partnership with Employment Focus at City of Manchester Stadium
Chair: Rt Hon John Battle MP
Speakers:
Jim Murphy MP, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform
Rt Rev Stephen Lowe, Bishop of Hulme
Dr Husna Ahmad, Chief Executive, Faith Regen
Lt Col Roland Sewell, Director of Employment Services, Salvation Army
Karen Phillips, Chief Executive, Manchester Jewish Federation
Key points in the discussion:
- Over the years, the values and unique strengths of the voluntary sector have been under-appreciated by government. But this is changing.
- Faith groups have a unique position in the relationships they have with their communities. They have the potential to go beyond what the State can do.
- Some groups are already involved in welfare provision. Should faith-based groups role be expanded? And what can government, and the groups themselves, do to unlock the potential?
- DWP’s Commercial Director has been asked to set up a centre of expertise to work with faith-based groups and which will offer a dedicated point of contact.
- Faith groups can bring their strengths to bear in delivery of welfare services.
These include:
- Reaching out to their communities effectively and credibly;
- Having a cost effective impact; and
- Involvement of faith groups can promote citizenship and break down language barriers.
- But before faith groups move down the delivery road, they need to ask themselves
some important questions, such as:
- Are they ready to take on that level of delivery;
- How do they retain their identity and distinctiveness;
- Are they comfortable with the idea of ‘competition’ and being more ‘business’ rather than ‘mission’ orientated; and
- Could it change the nature of their relationship with their community?
- Government can do more to facilitate faith groups’ involvement in provision,
including:
- Taking account of the risks and costs for small organisations in bidding for and providing services, e.g. time lag in cash flow, short term contracts, sub-contracting from larger providers means they bear more risk; and
- Addressing the ‘poor faith literacy’ in public authorities.
Other key points raised included:
- The distinction needs to be made between local groups and large faith-based organisations – they have different strengths and face different barriers.
- Faith-based groups providing welfare services should not be allowed to discriminate on religious grounds.
21 February: Renewing the welfare contract
Seminar in partnership with the Institute for public policy research (ippr) at the British Academy, Carlton House Terrace, London.
Chair: Nick Pearce, Director of ippr
Speakers:
Jim Murphy MP, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform
- Read Jim Murphy’s speech (13KB)
Dr Paul Gregg, Professor of Economics at the University of Bristol
- View Dr Gregg’s presentation
(64KB)
Dan Finn, Professor of Social Policy at the University of Portsmouth and associate director of research at the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion.
- View
Dan Finn’s slides (24KB)
Kate Bell, head of policy and research at One Parent Families
Key points in the discussion:
- There has been a change of focus over the last decade for Department for Work and Pensions customers from passive dependency to active engagement with the state. Throughout this period the ‘contract’ between citizen and state has evolved.
- There are three key elements which will need to underpin the ‘contract’ as it develops:
- Government must promote and protect the right to work for all. The citizen’s responsibility should be to take advantage of that right, with the default position being an assumption of the ability to engage with the labour market.
- Government should not necessarily deliver all welfare to work provision and should make use of the skills of local providers. However, it still has a responsibility to monitor contracts to ensure provision is underpinned by the right values and priorities.
- We should not forget the citizen is also a taxpayer, and we should therefore promote a sense of progressive self-interest, and reinvigorate the sense of social contract- that what happens to our neighbours, matters to us.
- From an international perspective, there has been a redefinition of the welfare contract, from a notion of entitlement to something which is more conditional and depends upon engagement with the labour market.
- There is an emerging ‘work first’ strategy, and some countries now require pre-claim job-search activity.
- Lone parents feel their first responsibility is getting the best start for their children, but this can be difficult especially when they are below the poverty line or caring for a disabled child. Nine out of ten lone parents want to work, but this has to be balanced with their caring responsibilities and the availability of childcare.
- There is also a problem of low skills among lone parents which perhaps helps to explain why job retention rates are half that of other groups.
- Other key points raised
- Government needs to think strategically across Departments to ensure timely and appropriate support for individuals.
- If a Single Working-Age Benefit was introduced it would need to take account of the extra costs of disability.
- The personal adviser relationship is very important and from an external providers view it was felt that longer contracts would help maintain good relationships.
28 February: London, the labour market and welfare – the future
Seminar in partnership with London Development Association at The Resource Centre, 356 Holloway Road, London, N76 6PA
Chair: Joshua Rey, London Employer Coalition
Speakers:
Jim Murphy MP, Minister of State for Employment and Welfare Reform
Carey Oppenheim, London Child Poverty Commission
Tunde Banjoko, Chief Executive of LEAP
Tom Travers, head of Olympic opportunities, London Development Agency.
- View Toms Traver’s presentation (717KB)
Key points in the discussion:
- London is one of the greatest cities in the world, but it faces great challenges with areas of poverty, disadvantage and social exclusion.
- Raising London to the national employment rate would mean an extra two hundred and fifty thousand people in work. There are jobs are available but there is a lot of competition. There is a clear case for London to develop local solutions to local problems.
- Two key areas to focus on are making work pay – a problem in London given the high costs of housing, childcare and travel - and addressing problems faced by some ethnic minorities in accessing and progressing in the labour market.
- Research carried out for the London Child Poverty Commission suggests that solutions to child poverty in London should focus on: increasing employment for low-income parents; increasing child benefit and tax credits especially to help larger families; and London-specific solutions like increasing Working Tax Credits and Housing Benefit taper rates.
- Barriers to employment which are particular to the ethnic minority group can include: lack of UK work experience/qualifications and poor understanding of how other countries’ qualifications translate; lack of knowledge of the UK labour market; poor English language skills; mismatch between job availability and employer perceptions of candidate ability to do the job; and employer discrimination.
- Tunde Banjoko talked about his personal experiences outlined and what he thought could be done to help tackle the problems faced by ethnic minorities in gaining employment.
- The London Employment and Skills Taskforce has been established with the objective of using the Olympic Games to reduce worklessness. Their three main areas of focus are: working with employers; linking people to work and training; and engagement and communication.
- Key actions’ which underpin these, in particular are: the ‘Employer Accord’ – a ‘deal’ with key employers to help disadvantaged people into sustained jobs; volunteer programme, offering an NVQ qualification and further opportunities; sector based training which is industry-relevant (in construction, tourism etc.); outreach to communities with the help of the third sector and an £11m Opportunities Fund; and the Local Employment and Training Framework.
- Other key points raised:
- Resources should go to help children regardless of their family structure, but it is important to think about work incentives for couples as well as lone parents.
- We must not forget the Paralympics and the opportunity to engage with disabled people.