Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+

Latest NewsEconomics, government & businessFlexible workingRecruitment & retentionPart-time working

Emergency Budget: Welfare reforms welcomed but success could be limited due to lack of job opportunities

by Personnel Today 23 Jun 2010
by Personnel Today 23 Jun 2010

Welfare reforms announced in yesterday’s Emergency Budget could have limited success in getting people off benefits and into work, due to high unemployment and a shortage of affordable flexible working, employment experts have warned.

Presenting his first Budget yesterday, chancellor George Osborne said lone parents would be required to look for work when their youngest child turns five, rather than the current age of 10.

Osborne also announced the government would force those on Disability Living Allowance (DLA) to undergo medical tests to assess their right to claim the benefit. Around three million people in the UK are currently eligible for the DLA.

But employment experts told Personnel Today that although they supported the welfare reforms, they feared some of the changes were unrealistic and could be heavy-handed.

Elizabeth Gardiner, policy and political officer at the charity Working Families, warned the high-cost of childcare and the shortage of jobs with flexible hours made it hard for lone parents to find suitable work.

“It isn’t fair to expect lone parents to take low-paid full-time jobs that do little more than cover the cost of looking after their children,” Gardiner said. “And if they’d rather look after their children themselves, they should have a choice to do so,” she said.

“Until we have a good supply of jobs that fit around school hours, and flexible, affordable childcare, then it may be a futile [job] search for many lone parents.”

Gardiner called on the government to lead by example by requiring all public sector jobs to be advertised on a flexible-hours or part-time basis unless there were good reasons not to do so.

But John Philpott, chief economic adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, said the lone parent welfare reform made sense, adding that employers were often keen to employ single parents, perceiving them as loyal and organised.

Ian Brinkley, associate director of The Work Foundation, said the welfare reforms announced in the Budget were “broadly right” but cautioned that getting inactive people back into work would be a challenge with rising unemployment.

The number of unemployed rose to 2.47 million in the three months to April.

Brinkley said: “A worry is that people will move from long-term benefit to less generous JSA [Jobseekers Allowance] and then be recycled through special schemes and short-term, low-wage jobs that offer no chance of escape. This is most likely in areas where inactivity is high and potential job growth in the private sector is weak.”

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Meanwhile, other experts warned the DLA medical assessment could cause unnecessary stress to benefit claimants with severe disabilities.

“The government is saying that it wants to reduce DLA claimants by about 600,000 but where is the evidence that 600,000 who are getting the benefit will fail the test?” said Nigel Meager, director at the Institute for Employment Studies.

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Emergency Budget: Regional Development Agencies to be scrapped and replaced by Local Enterprise Partnerships
next post
Harrods to offer in-store sales degree to shop-floor staff

You may also like

Fire and rehire: the relocation question

22 May 2025

Public sector workers gain pay rises of up...

22 May 2025

UK net migration slashed by half in one...

22 May 2025

How neuroscience can unlock employee recognition

22 May 2025

UK universities fret over fall in international students

22 May 2025

HSBC employees warned of office attendance link to...

22 May 2025

The Law Society: Navigating the new world of...

22 May 2025

Workplace stress: Why it’s time to rebrand resilience

22 May 2025

Restaurant tips should be included in holiday pay

21 May 2025

Fewer workers would comply with a return-to-office mandate

21 May 2025

  • 2025 Employee Communications Report PROMOTED | HR and leadership...Read more
  • The Majority of Employees Have Their Eyes on Their Next Move PROMOTED | A staggering 65%...Read more
  • Prioritising performance management: Strategies for success (webinar) WEBINAR | In today’s fast-paced...Read more
  • Self-Leadership: The Key to Successful Organisations PROMOTED | Eletive is helping businesses...Read more
  • Retaining Female Talent: Four Ways to Reduce Workplace Drop Out PROMOTED | International Women’s Day...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
OHW+
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Wellbeing
    • Recruitment & retention
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise
  • OHW+