Joint Initiative to tackle welfare to work problem

Two of the UK’s most successful welfare to work employment specialists are joining forces to find new ways of helping even more people make the break.

As politicians continue to debate the dilemma of having 2.4 million Incapacity Benefits claimants costing taxpayers 7.1 billion a year, Job Broking experts Shaw Trust and West Country Training and Consultancy Service (WTCS) are taking action by organising the fact-finding Welfare to Work Conference.

The two-day event, on October 25 and 26 at the De Vere Belfry near Birmingham in Warwickshire, will bring together disability and employment experts and spotlight how providers operate in other countries.

The main part of the conference will be devoted to Shaw Trust and WTCS colleagues working together to make their welfare to work programmes even more successful.

Clearly the number of IB claimants is a big issue for the government, but it is an even bigger issue for the people trapped on benefits, says Ian Charlesworth, Managing Director of Shaw Trust, which is the UK’s leading provider of employment services for people with disabilities.

Between Shaw Trust and WTCS, we help thousands of people into work, but we want to reach even more. By joining forces, we are taking positive action to make that happen.
Shaw Trust, which recently launched its hard-hitting Break the Chains campaign to fuel the drive to get people off welfare and into work, will help 5,000 people find employment this year, representing a saving to government of 10 million over two years.

Sarah Burnett, Director of WTCS, says: We are very keen to develop our close working relationship with Shaw Trust, so that between us we can help more benefit recipients find suitable jobs, enable the economy to develop by overcoming skills shortages and provide employers with the workers they require.

Speakers at the conference will include Kate Stanley of the Institute for Public Policy Research, DRC Commissioner Stephen Alambritis from the Federation of Small Businesses, businessman Richard Duvall who founded digital bank Egg, and Jonathan Portes, Deputy Director Work Welfare and Poverty of the Department of Work and Pensions.