APPENDIX 35
Memorandum submitted by Progress Recruitment
(se) Ltd. (EDP 46)
EVIDENCE FROM A VOLUNTARY SECTOR PROVIDER
PERSPECTIVE
1. TERMS OF
REFERENCE
A press release dated 7 November invited submissions
of evidence to inform the inquiry into the effectiveness of Government
Policy in achieving employment for all. Written submission to
be submitted in the prescribed format by 6 January 2003.
2. PROCESS
In order to compile a useful response the following
procedure was followed:—
2.1 Consideration was given to the key issues
as detailed in the press release.
2.2 Areas where Progress has had recent
and relevant experience were considered in more detail.
2.3 A brief response was prepared from the
perspective of a voluntary sector employment service provider
Due to operational priorities it was not possible
to respond by the requested date. Despite the late response it
is hoped that it will be possible to filter the information into
the process.
3. SUMMARY
Progress Recruitment is a limited company with
charitable status. Progress Recruitment would like to take this
opportunity to congratulate the Government on making great advances
in the development of an enabling environment: an environment
which is energised by this Government's unquestionable belief
that people with disabilities have skills and are able to work.
Service providers and job seekers have more
support and access to more resources now, than ever before. This
Government has achieved a blanket cover, which is truly inclusive.
This provision does not assume all needs are the same. The cover
is a patchwork quilt embracing a vibrancy of colour and texture,
which matches the infinitely variety of people who share the label
of being disabled or having health problems.
There is no doubt that this Government values
people who are disabled or have health problems; Government policy
supports disabled job seekers and their employers. Organisations
such as Progress Recruitment provide the essential interface between
policy and practice. Progress applies policy and thereby enables
employers and disabled employees to benefit when they work together.
This brief response is based on first hand experience
of working with employers and people with disability. The issues
are confined to those felt to be most relevant and are as follows:—
— What is or should be the role of
Jobcentre Plus. Are they doing enough? Are initiatives such as
work step working?
— The role of the private sector in
delivering employment services for people with disabilities or
health problems.
— Are the needs of particular groups
of people with disability and health problems adequately catered
for? Should employment projects be more inclusive and adapt to
individual need rather than be aimed at people with specific disabilities?
— The tax credit and benefits system:
is it too complex for the circumstances faced by people with disabilities?
Should it be reformed to reduce financial disincentives to find
work?
— What effect does the DDA have?
— What experience do other countries
have in tackling the growth in the numbers claiming incapacity-related
benefits.
4. INFORMATION
4.1 Background to Progress Recruitment
Progress Recruitment is a limited company with
charitable status based on Queen Street in the centre of Blackpool.
The Company was incorporated in November 2001 and formally launched
in November 2002 with the backing of the Prime Minister who described
the initiative as important and the vision as wholly commendable.
Progress has developed from a service that dates
back to February 1989. The CEO of Progress was the founder of
the Blackpool Wyre and Fylde Supported Employment Service (BWFSES),
then part of the Social Services Department of Lancashire County
Council. When Blackpool became a Unitary Authority the Blackpool
element of that District service was detached from Wyre and Fylde.
Progress Recruitment is no longer part of a
Local Authority but works in partnership with, delivering services
from a voluntary sector base. The notion of the Supported Employment
Service being floated off was first discussed in the early 1990s.
The District Purchasing Manager wanted to invest in the service
and believed it would be better placed in the independent sector.
Enthusiasm for this de-merger was fuelled by the opportunities
presented by the introduction of the NHS Community Care Act and
the foresight to appreciate the positive impact this could have
on local people.
The process of developing this Local Authority
service into a viable company started in earnest in January 2000.
The conversion has been much more than meeting the legal requirements
associated with forming a company.
Using agencies such as Business Link, Community
Futures and sources of support from within the Local Authority,
Progress was able to gain charitable status, process VAT registration,
set up payroll and company pensions schemes and deal with TUPE
issues. These were important aspects of developing the company,
however it soon became evident that becoming a viable company
is also about becoming commercial.
Although Progress is a not for profit organisation
it must be financially sound, acutely aware of the customers needs
and adequately skilled and resourced to meet those needs. In many
respects the Supported Employment Service that was part of LCC
has changed beyond recognition in all things except values and
the belief that people with disability should be supported to
apply their skills and have every opportunity to work in valued
paid employment.
Progress has heard and responded to the directions
coming from Government. In doing so the service has developed
into a viable company. Progress now occupies an enviable position
in a broad based partnership close to employers and disabled people
who want to be employed.
4.2 Jobcentre Plus
Locally, Jobcentre Plus has been very supportive
and eager to ensure that Progress Recruitment has the resources
needed in order to deliver people into sustainable employment.
This effective joint working is evidenced through examples of
work with the Disability Employment Advisors, Access to Work Team
(Regional Disability Services), Jobcentre Plus marketing team
(mainly through the Personnel Officer Group) and the Management
of the local offices. Evidence ranges from use of local office
facilities (interview and meeting rooms), access to local employers
and an image of seamless service when working with employers and
job seekers.
A case example
Paul was referred to Progress Recruitment. He
needed more intensive support than the DEA could provide. The
Progress Employment Officer worked with Paul to identify his skills
and abilities and his essential and desirable features in his
ideal job. In cooperation with the DEA Paul, the DEA and the Employment
Officer agreed a job search strategy. The Employment Officer took
a leading role. After some weeks a job was identified. Through
a series of meetings with the employer and a job analysis the
Employment Officer negotiated a working interview. The job analysis
involved the Employment Officer working at the job Paul would
do, documenting the key aspects and conducting an ecology check.
The working interview consisted of Paul working (with support)
at the job. This gave the employer the opportunity to see evidence
of the skills Paul had in relation to the job. Paul was offered
a post providing that the Job Introduction Scheme (JIS) was available.
The Employment Officer called in the DEA who processed the JIS
application. The Employment Officer continued to support Paul
and the Employer. Paul is now working independently.
There are numerous examples of joint working
with the Access to Work Team. This is one initiative that makes
an immediate and meaningful contribution to job success. Access
to work addresses the practical barriers.
A Case Example
Karen had been employed (with support from Progress)
for over three years. Her employer contacted to say that her job
had changed and he did not feel adequately skilled or resourced
to carryout the level of retraining that she would need. Progress
met with the employer. A training strategy was agreed. Progress
staff were needed to be actually on the jobsite for over three
months. Access to Work agreed to pay for this job coach role.
Access to Work made it possible for Progress to provide the required
level of support to retrain Karen.
In addition Progress has received accurate and
timely information from key personnel on the benefits side of
the Jobcentre Plus equation, most notable is the support received
around the Supported Permitted Work regulations. This effective
partnership working has enabled Progress to provide effective
support to assist people through the anxieties associated with
reconcilement benefits and earnings. It must be noted, however,
that the role of the Welfare Rights service is key. Their objective
position and high level of knowledge and expertise inspires confidence
in service users.
Over the past 13 years Progress has observed
the working of the Sheltered Placement Scheme, Supported Employment
Scheme and now Workstep. Progress has not bid for a Workstep contract.
This decision is related to the history and difficult transition
from an initiative that compensates employers for a person's disability
to (as it is now) a resource available to support the stakeholders
(employee and employer). As an initiative it appears to have many
positive applications, however, it can appear to exclude people
with higher support needs. It will also take some time to re-educate
employers who know the old scheme as something that labelled a
person as a percentage of a "normal" employee and paid
a percentage of that persons wage.
Progress has qualified for entry on the Approved
Providers Register. To date no bids have been made for Jobcentre
Plus contracts. This is mainly due to the somewhat restrictive
and prescriptive nature of the tendering process and contract
specification. It is appreciated that due to the requirement for
national uniformity and the sheer scale of the task they must
be uniform, highly prescriptive and inflexible. Unfortunately
this does exclude companies such as Progress from getting involved.
Progress has overcome this by joint working with larger agencies
such as Shaw Trust with NDDP, which is referred to in more detail
below.
4.3 The Role of the Private Sector
For the purpose of this submission Progress
Recruitment is included in the "Private" sector ie not
Public sector. The publication in September of the Role of the
Voluntary Sector in the Delivery of Services reaffirms Governments
loyalty and commitment to ensuring good providers will succeed.
4.3.1 Progress Recruitment plays a key role
in enabling people with significant disabilities to choose, secure
and sustain valued paid employment. The level of expertise required
has been developed and maintained over 13 years. Progress is a
dynamic organisation taking leadership from the needs of employers
and the skills and abilities of people with disability. Progress
is fuelled by the whole ethos of Welfare to Work. From it's new
voluntary sector base Progress is able to draw on resources not
available to providers in the public sector. Progress is not dependent
on restricted funding streams and can look to secure the finance
required to deliver the mission of more quality employment opportunities
for people with disability and quality employees for local employers.
4.3.2 Key features in the success of the
company are:—
— Clear vision and purpose.
— Ability to think globally and act
locally.
— Clearly targeted provision (ie to
the "hardest to help").
— Small numbers and a consistently
high quality of service to jobseekers and employers.
— Ability to harness and apply all
available sources of support.
4.3.3 The people who are eligible to use
Progress tend to have been unsuccessful in gaining access to or
support from mainstream disability service providers such as Disability
Employment Advisors or New Deal Job Brokers. The intensive support
provided through Progress supplements these services it does not
exclude them. Progress supports people in the mainstream.
4.3.4 Progress occupies an enviable position
close to disabled job seekers, local employers, sources of funding
and other resources without being attached to any. From this vantage
point Progress has designed, funded and implemented many creative
solutions to recruitment problems. An example of this is the work
with pupils who attend special school. Through this initiative
Progress has drawn together the work of the various agencies involved
in transition and translated the resources available into real
employment opportunities for young people. Without this intervention
the majority of these young people would be faced with a life
of exclusion through unemployment. (See attached report).
A Case Example
Progress Recruitment has been working with the
local special schools for over 10 years. Through this joint working
the students have (over time) begun to see employment as a realistic
and desirable option for them. Their parents are beginning to
share that view also. Perhaps the most significant factor influencing
the raising of expectations is the development of supported work
experience opportunities.
Initially the notion of the students going out
into ordinary workplaces was felt to be totally unrealistic. In
order to overcome this barrier the Progress team agreed to set
up each placement, facilitate a job/student matching process and
train school staff to enable them to provide on worksite support.
This offer was accepted, the schools have developed their capacity
to support the students and the placements are widely welcomed
and valued.
Highfurlong and Woodlands schools joined forces
with Progress. The Employment Officers identified real work opportunities,
which match to the identified needs, skills and preferences of
the individual students. Supported work placements have been arranged,
and following on from this real paid work opportunities have been
secured. The pupils could not have succeeded at work without quite
intensive support both at and around the workplace. Each stakeholder
has contributed as much as possible eg the schools have provided
support staff, the employment team has provided training for the
staff and secured the jobs.
Marks and Spencer have been true leaders amongst
local employers. Four students worked through their Christmas
season and M and S have agreed to recruit again this year. This
initiative takes more than existing resources can provide. A continuous
stress on the future of this initiative is the lack of secure
funding. The schools struggle to find and fund the support staff
and Progress struggles to provide the coordination and employer
support that this initiative demands.
This year Progress has drawn in support from
Connexions Lancashire Ltd who has provided additional funding
to secure the initiative until March 2003. Progress will continue
to work with the schools and enjoy seeing these young adults grow
and mature as valued employees. Secure long term funding would
provide the necessary specialist support staff and resources to
address this issue of serious inequality faced by young people
with disability as they make the transition to adulthood.
4.3.5 New Deal for Disabled People—Partnership
is the Key
New Deal, like many of contracts delivered on
behalf of Jobcentre Plus require providers to invest in economies
of scale to achieve realistic costs in order to secure the contract.
The people at the margins are therefore often excluded. This is
not a malicious plot to exclude people, rather an economic necessity.
Progress made the decision not to tender to deliver the NDDP in
Blackpool.
At the time of the invitation to tender progress
did not have access to the discreet resources necessary to deliver
the programme without diluting the service to the core client
group.
This has been overcome through a creative and
mutually beneficial partnership with the Shaw Trust.
Shaw Trust has the contract to act as Job Brokers
and deliver the New Deal for Disabled People. The Trust has a
real desire to offer that provision to all disabled people. They
do not, however, have the capacity to provide the level of support
that Progress is designed to deliver. Both could develop the capacity
to meet the needs of all potential clients. Through discussion
it was noted that a more sensible way forward would be to work
in partnership on a type of sub contract arrangement with Shaw
Trust as the contractor. The result is that people are not excluded
and all disabled job seekers have the added value of specialist
provision available through Shaw Trust and Progress.
4.4 Generic v Specialist
The most effective initiatives available at
the present time are those, which are focussed on overcoming the
barriers to employment faced by people with disabilities or health
problems, their carers and their employers. Initiatives such as
Access to Work, New Deal, Job Introduction Scheme, Direct Payments
and new regulations around Supported Permitted Work, all succeed
in removing barriers. On that basis the evidence would suggest
therefore that support is targeted correctly, ie away from particular
client groups within the umbrella of disability and towards the
impact of the disability on job success.
4.5 The tax credit and benefits system
The benefit issue is without doubt complex for
the majority of claimants not least those in the circumstances
faced by people with disabilities. Fear of loss of income has
prevented a number of people referred to Progress from pursuing
the goal of paid employment. The most effective means of overcoming
that fear has been through joint working with the benefits agency
and welfare rights. Rather than reform people tend to express
a desire for reassurance.
A Case Example
Marilyn is severely physically disabled. She
uses an electric wheelchair. She has a carer to support her during
the day and in the night to enable her to use the bathroom. She
is in her early 20s and wants to work. She was referred to Progress
and a job was secured that has not her ideal job but was seen
(by Marilyn) as a start on the ladder. She participated in a working
interview. Arrangements were put in place for her personal care
needs during her time at work. The employer agreed to flexible
hours to accommodate the unpredictable nature of the "Dial
a bus" provision. He also made arrangements for minor adjustments
at the workplace.
Before accepting the offer of employment Progress
staff supported her to obtain a "benefits check" through
Welfare Rights. It was noted that her high rate award of DLA might
be reviewed in the light of her change in circumstance. It was
not possible to give her an assurance that this would not be reviewed.
She decided that she could not afford to take that risk and declined
the job and decided that perhaps work was not for her.
4.6 The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA)
The DDA has had a massive impact on the way
the Progress Team approaches the task of negotiating employment
opportunities for those covered by the Act. In dealings with employers
the DDA is discussed as an enabling piece of legislation. The
Progress team offer to assist employers to stay within the law
whilst at the same time enabling them to develop a diverse and
consequently more effective workforce. Many employers are afraid
of breaking the law and will do the minimum to stay within the
law. This tends to results in no disabled employees. Others will
use the freedom bestowed on them by virtue of the act to develop
more inclusive and creative ways of recruitment and selection.
These enlighten employers understand that equal opportunity does
not mean that everyone gets the same treatment.
A Case Example
Heather has Autism and severe learning disabilities.
She has no verbal communication skills. She expresses her needs
through a range of behaviours that could be described as challenging.
She demonstrates obsessive behaviours and has self injured on
many occasions. Her skills were identified through the development
of a vocational profile and a job identified that would make use
of her talents. It was acknowledged that she would need support
100% of the time. She had this level of support at home and it
was agreed that she should be given the chance to experience work.
The job identified was as a room maid for a national chain of
hotels. The standards demanded required that staff were completely
consistent. Every room must be serviced to the same (almost identical
standard). That level of certainty and predictability suited Heather
totally.
The standard method of recruitment was a traditional
interview. This would not have provided an opportunity for Heather
to show her potential. Using the DDA the Housekeeper justified
this move away from the norm and offered Heather the chance to
show what she could do, with support. She has been employed there
for over five years.
4.7 The experience of other countries
Progress has joined with representatives from
Blackpool Borough Council Economic Development Unit, Jobcentre
Plus and Business Link to form a steering committee for a European
Project looking at raising awareness of the European Employment
Strategy. Through this initiative all participants are learning
about the effectiveness of approaches adopted in each participating
member state. The project is in the early stages, however, there
has been a degree of exchange of good practice. A second visit
to the partners in Finland is scheduled to take place at the end
of January. More information will be available later in the year.
5.0 CONCLUSIONS
From the perspective of a voluntary sector provider
Government Policy is effective in providing a fertile environment,
which will promote the inclusion and support of people with disability
in valued paid employment.
The affect of disability on employment is unique
to the person and the employment situation. There must be, therefore,
an equally varied range of solutions available. All available
support must be harnessed if we are to maximise chances of a sustainable
outcomes.
This Governments multi facetted approach to
addressing the barriers faced by individuals cannot have maximise
impact without some means of linking people with the appropriate
initiative to meet their needs.
The independent sector has a key role to play
in the delivery of services. Locally grounded providers enable
Government to gain access to the people they are eager to serve.
The ability of the independent sector to be
flexible and creative must be nurtured. Less use of standard outcome
measures and an acceptance that all outcomes are unique will prevent
that creativity from being stifled. This is dependent on a shared
vision of the destination. With this shared vision providers can
be allowed to work with jobseekers and employers to design the
route most appropriate for them. This will be further assisted
by a means of rewarding distance travelled and not purely final
outcomes as at present.
Jobseekers and employers crave reassurance.
As a provider of employment support to people
with disability Progress has observed a massive shift in attitude
and expectation. There is no doubt that the aspirations of people
with disability are much more focussed on work than they were
10 years ago. More and more employers want to employ people with
disability because of the contribution the individual can make
to the workforce.
6.0 RECOMMENDATIONS
6.1 Continue to invest in support for "all"
irrespective of degree of disability or perceived level of ability.
6.2 Continue to support the non standard
approaches which work.
6.3 Accept that there is no quick fix and
that sustained employment often requires sustained support.
6.4 Look at ways of promoting the expectation
that all people can work. This must start in childhood including
disabled children in ordinary life experiences so they too are
encouraged to think of what they will be when they grow up.
Deborah Parker
Chief Executive Officer
21 January 2003
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