Observation (CEACR) - adoptée 2011, publiée 101ème session CIT (2012)

Convention (n° 122) sur la politique de l'emploi, 1964 - Royaume-Uni de Grande-Bretagne et d'Irlande du Nord (Ratification: 1966)

Articles 1, 2 and 3 of the Convention. Employment trends and active labour market measures. The Committee notes the comprehensive and detailed Government’s report received in September 2010 for the period from June 2008 to May 2010, including the 2008–11 Corporate Plan of the Department for Employment and Learning, and information for Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. The Government states that it remains committed to the idea that work is the best route out of poverty and, despite the recession, has objectives to: (a) provide employment opportunities for all; (b) prevent poverty and provide security for those who cannot work; and (c) ensure that the welfare system is affordable for the State. The Government indicates that the labour market performed well during the recession, despite record falls in GDP and large rises in the number of people being made redundant. While unemployment increased by 383,000 people in January 2010 when compared to the previous year, it fell in the last quarter of 2009. The number of people in employment in the United Kingdom for the three months ending January 2010 was 28.86 million, down 54,000 over the quarter, and down 483,000 over the year. This relatively strong performance was reportedly driven by £5 billon investment to maintain an active labour market regime and extend support to people to help them move back into work. The Government reports that, even at the height of the recession, around half of all people who made a claim to Jobseeker’s Allowance had left benefit within three months, many of them moving straight into employment. The Government also reports that the employment rate for ethnic minorities fell, along with the overall rate in Great Britain, while the gap between the two narrowed to 12.4 per cent. The 2010 first quarter figures showed that the employment rate in Great Britain stood at 71.9 per cent and the ethnic minority employment rate at 59.9 per cent. The Government indicates that the most urgent task facing the United Kingdom is to implement an accelerated plan to reduce the deficit as a necessary precondition for sustained economic growth. The June 2010 budget set out the action the Government will take to rebalance the economy and provide the conditions for sustainable, private sector-led growth, balanced across regions and industries. The Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts an increase in private sector employment of nearly 2 million by 2015–16 through measures such as reducing the main rate of corporation tax and increasing support to businesses. The Committee invites the Government to provide information in its next report on private and public sector employment outcomes and the labour market impacts of public budget cuts, as well as on the involvement of the social partners in the employment policy formulation and implementation process.

Role of employment services in employment promotion. The Committee notes that Jobcentre Plus is the principal agent of the Government’s active labour market policy. Working with a range of partners, Jobcentre Plus promotes work as the best form of welfare, helping unemployed and economically inactive people of working age to move closer to the labour market and compete effectively for work, while providing appropriate help and support for those without work. The Committee notes that the Government published a consultation paper entitled “21st Century Welfare” in July 2010 on the future of the benefits and tax credit systems. Following consultations, one of the Government’s responses with regard to Jobcentre Plus is to allow it freedom and flexibility to work in partnership at the local level and to respond to local needs, to secure improvement to employment services and achieve the necessary employment outcomes. The Committee invites the Government to include information on the contribution of the employment services and Jobcentre Plus in the implementation of active labour market policies.

Education and training policies. The Government reports that it established a Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES) in April 2008, which funded and managed the performance of the Sector Skills Councils. The Government also indicates that it is committed to bring about a culture and systems change to integrate employment and skills services to help low-skilled unemployed persons to improve their skills, to get and keep a job, and to progress in work through continued training. The white paper “Building Britain’s Recovery, Achieving Full Employment”, published in December 2009, committed the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills to work more closely with Jobcentre Plus and the LSC–SKILLS Funding Agency, to bring employment and skills closer together. The Committee notes the Five Year Strategic Plan 2009–14 which sets out UKCES’ corporate plan and high-level priorities. An important part of the skills strategy is to focus training provision on meeting more accurately the needs of business and local economies. The Committee also notes that in April 2008 the Scottish Government created a new public body, Skills Development Scotland (SDS), to bring a better focus to skills development. The SDS has a key role to play in driving forward the strategic priority on learning, skills and well-being as set out in the Scottish Government Economic Strategy to contribute to increasing sustainable economic growth. It will work with other established bodies to realise the vision set out in the skills strategy to focus on the individual development of skills, improve the economic pull of skills development and create cohesive structures for the delivery of skills development. The Government further reports on the trade unions’ role in raising demand for learning and skills through the Union Learning Fund, which has enabled over 800,000 workers to get back into learning since the Fund was introduced in 1998; and over 220,000 workers during 2008–09. The Committee asks the Government to provide in its next report information on how various existing and newly established bodies are actually streamlining the efforts to make skills development and employment closer.

Youth employment. The Committee notes two major specific measures targeting youth employment. Firstly, the Young Persons’ Guarantee (YPG) offers a guarantee of an offer of a job, training or work experience to jobseekers aged 18–24 who reached the six-month point of their claim to Jobseeker’s Allowance. Under this programme, the young unemployed were given a number of options to choose, from applying to existing vacancies to taking up an internship. However, due to the austerity measures, the Government planned to end the YPG programme during the first half of 2011. Another programme called Backing Young Britain (BYB) supported young people aged 18–24 in obtaining work experience. Work experience was available from week 13 of a young person’s Jobseeker’s Allowance claim. However, as part of the public expenditure savings announced in the May 2010 budget, the Future Jobs Fund was scaled back and the recruitment subsidy ceased in June 2010. The Government indicates that it will replace the employment measures with a coherent single programme, the Work Programme. The Committee asks the Government to provide information on the impact of the measures taken to meet the needs of young people in order to increase their access to lasting employment.

Persons with disabilities. The Government indicates that it is important that everybody, and in particular health-care professionals and employers, understand the links between work and health and the role they can play in helping people to stay in or return in employment. It is working to take this agenda forward, in partnership with key stakeholders like employers, the National Health Service, health-care professionals, trade unions and insurers. The Government reports an increase in the labour participation rate for persons with disabilities from 39 per cent in 1998 to 48 per cent in 2008, thanks to specific targeted measures, such as the New Deal for Disabled People and Pathways to Work provision, alongside a strengthening of the legal rights of persons with disabilities. The Committee asks the Government to continue to provide information on the results of the implementation of the measures designed to address the needs of persons with disabilities in the open labour market.

Older workers. As many people wanted to remain in the labour market beyond the age of 65, the Government indicates that it issued a public consultation paper in July 2010 outlining proposals to phase out the Default Retirement Age (DRA). The Government also indicates that the Age Positive initiative is working with business leaders in nine key sectors – manufacturing, transport, construction, health, retail, hospitality, local authorities, education and finance – to align their respective priorities to the business case for older workers, the value of flexible working and the value to employers of retaining skills and experience by working without a fixed retirement age. The Committee invites the Government to provide information on the impact of measures promoting the participation of older workers in the labour market.

Long-term unemployed. The Government indicates that it recognizes the continuing need to provide strong employment support to people out of work. In this regard, the Committee notes that the Government will introduce a single Work Programme for the long-term unemployed to deliver coherent, integrated support more capable of dealing with complex and overlapping barriers to work. The Work Programme will be an integrated package of support providing personalized help for people who find themselves out of work, based on need rather than benefit claimed. The Committee invites the Government to include information on the implementation of the Work Programme and the achievements in promoting the return of long-term unemployed persons to the labour market.