The Work Programme is a government flagship policy and can't really be allowed to fail. After all it was only last week that new Justice Secretary Chris Grayling was citing the fantastic success of the payment by results scheme as reason for rolling it out as fast as possible across the whole criminal justice sector.
Unfortunately for him and the government though, Channel 4 News have got wind of the fact that it isn't working. It would appear that A4E have come no where near their minimum target of a 5.5% success rate in getting people into work on the programme. In fact it seems that, despite being paid handsomely with taxpayers money, they actually did worse than if people were just left to their own devices in order to find their own job.
In what can only be described as a disastrous interview on Channel 4 News last Wednesday, former managing director Emma Harrison could only repeat endlessly that 'the figures are wrong' without being able to quote any correct ones.
She was clearly unprepared for the interview and I can only assume that the current management team must have been collectively hiding behind the sofa, hoping it was all a bad dream. In what was a public relations nightmare, as majority shareholder, it turns out that she has rewarded herself a further £250,000 dividend payment since stepping down.
Now there is a very well-known saying that 'bad figures always take longer to add up' so I think it can be safely assumed that much midnight oil is being burnt at DWP HQ in order to put as much positive spin as possible on some very crap numbers due for release shortly.
Payment by results...it occurred to me the other day that the Government, in their push to secure the services of local, right minded care giving groups and organisations, to tackle the problem of crime - don't actually care if they actually work or not. (I have serious doubts as to whether they will, based on current projects struggling to get their positive outcomes, by whatever means possible) because, the Government, will be able to state that although they did not and do not work, they did not cost anything.....Me, cynical???? only on Mondays.
ReplyDeletePayment by results . . . formerly known as obtain pecuniary advantage by deception.
ReplyDelete"The figures are wrong" - love it - almost as good as "A big boy did it and ran away".
"A big boy did it and ran away" - love it! lol
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