In September 2023 the UK experienced an economic inactivity rate of 21.1% and an estimated unemployment rate of 4.3%, both of which have increased compared to previous data. Economic inactivity has surpassed pre-pandemic levels, prompting government efforts to integrate this group into the workforce.
Historically, policies under Universal Credit and legacy benefits emphasised pushing people into employment through conditionality and short term measures. Today, both major political parties are exploring ways to facilitate return to work and eliminate barriers to employment. However, the government is also extending conditionality and adopting a tougher stance on sanctions for a broader range of people.
Haringey is home to a young, ethnically diverse population. In June 2023, almost one fifth of those between 16 to 65 were on Universal Credit. Nearly 7% of residents over 16 were claiming unemployment related benefits, a figure above the London average of 4.7% and the 3rd highest rate of all UK councils
Haringey Council wanted to find ways to overcome barriers to employment for young people and families with children and has used data to achieve success with its employment support programmes.
Listen back to hear
- The new carrot and stick policy changes designed to break down barriers to work and reduce economic inactivity
- What Haringey Council did to increase take up of free childcare for two year olds to 70%
- How Haringey Council successfully helped 95 NEETs on their employment journey
- How data analysis can drive smart targeting
Guest speakers:
- Richard Kaufman, Performance and Data Manager, Haringey Council
- Faridun Kurbonmamadov, Business Manager, Haringey Council
View the webinar
From April, working parents of two year olds can get 15 hours of free childcare and then from September, this will be expanded to children over nine months. From September 2025 working families can go up to 30 hours of free childcare per week and then also Universal Credit. The amounts that you can get for Universal Credit for childcare is going up by around 50% and it's also being paid upfront rather than in arrears.
We've been using LIFT data to improve the the take up percentages of the two year old free entitlement. We combine the DWP list of potential eligible families with LIFT data and it's often not the same families on both lists. It's increased the number of families that we can do outreach work to. In June 2021 we had about 72 potentially eligible families just using the DWP list but now we look at June 23 we've got a far larger number and that's combining LIFT and DWP data.
Before we started using LIFT data as a source of finding NEETs, the standard methods of partnership and working referral pathways yielded between 24 and 30 registrations. LIFT allowed us to identify not only the household but also the phone numbers and emails of the residents in question so we were able to make our offer directly to them. In the space of about 6 to 7 months, we took our total referrals up to about 160 coming into our programme.
Debt can quickly snowball and once you go into those issues, employment, which is often the long term sustainability plan, can move further and further away from people. I'm glad we've done a webinar on employment today because employment can have a huge positive impact in terms of people's ability to pay back their debts. Using data led approach really allows you to target barriers such as childcare to enable them to get into work.