UK Inquiry Tracker

DWP Employment Support 2: Kickstart scheme

Public Accounts Committee Closed Inquiry

Opened: 21 Oct 2021 Closed: 26 Apr 2022 Parliament page

In a follow up to its wider inquiry into DWP support for employment during Covid the Committee will question senior DWP officials more closely specifically on the ‘Kickstart scheme’. The ‘Plan for Jobs’ announced in July 2020 included the £1.9 billion Kickstart scheme for young people. At that point, the … Read more

8 Recommendations

14 Conclusions

1 Report

1 Oral session

1 Event

Activity timeline 3 events

28 Apr
2022

Report published

Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirty Ninth report from Session 2021-22

25 Feb
2022

Report published

Thirty-Ninth Report - DWP Employment Support: Kickstart Scheme

6 Dec
2021

Oral evidence

DWP Employment Support 2: Kickstart scheme

Oral evidence sessions 1 session

6 Dec 2021

View on parliament.uk

DWP Employment Support 2: Kickstart scheme

Jonathan Mills · Department for Energy Security and Net Zero Karen Gosden · Department for Work & Pensions Peter Schofield · Department for Work and Pensions

Reports 1 report · click to expand

Title	HC No.	Published	Items	Response
Thirty-Ninth Report - DWP Employment Support: Kickstart Scheme	HC 655	25 Feb 2022	22	Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

2 results

3 Recommendation Not Addressed

Thirty-Ninth Report - DWP Employme…

The Department plans to evaluate Kickstart but has not set out clearly enough the measures...

The Department plans to evaluate Kickstart but has not set out clearly enough the measures of success, or reported regularly enough on how the scheme is progressing. The Department plans to evaluate the impact Kickstart has on participants’ long-term employment … Read more The Department plans to evaluate Kickstart but has not set out clearly enough the measures of success, or reported regularly enough on how the scheme is progressing. The Department plans to evaluate the impact Kickstart has on participants’ long-term employment outcomes, comparing participants’ future employment and time on benefits to similar non-participants. In a job creation scheme like Kickstart there is a risk that some of the jobs funded would be created anyway, or will have other negative effects in the economy, such as job losses elsewhere. The Department does not expect its evaluation to robustly capture Kickstart’s impact on the wider economy, and so it will not know whether its assertion that Kickstart creates genuinely new economic activity is correct. We were surprised by the Department’s apparent lack of curiosity about how much value Kickstart jobs add to the economy and to the employers that participate. Despite our September 2021 recommendation that the Department publish more timely, granular data on its employment support programmes through a quarterly statistical update, it was not until November 2021 that the Department provided detailed, local authority and constituency data on local uptake of Kickstart by employers and participants, and then only in response to a Parliamentary Question. Recommendation: The Department should: • set out how, on all its major employment support programmes, it will report progress as it goes along, beginning with Kickstart. It should publish performance data on its programmes on its website on a regular basis, rather than on an ad hoc basis solely as answers to parliamentary questions; • ensure that plans for frequent and granular reporting are built into the design of future employment support schemes, including any proposals that feature in the ‘recession plan’ recommended earlier; and • ensure its Kickstart evaluation covers as robustly as possible all of the expected impacts of Kickstart that are given in the Show less

Government Response

The government provides the PAC conclusion instead of the government response.

HM Treasury

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18 Conclusion Not Addressed

Thirty-Ninth Report - DWP Employme…

The Department employs Kickstart district account managers to maintain relationships with employers.

The Department employs Kickstart district account managers to maintain relationships with employers. These account managers are expected to keep in touch with employers and to learn about young peoples’ experiences in their Kickstart jobs.74 The 64 Qq 55, 88–89; C&AG’s … Read more

Government Response

The government agrees with the committee's observation regarding the lack of central collation of information from account manager discussions but does not commit to addressing this specific issue. Instead, it states it is reviewing successful features of the Kickstart scheme to incorporate into future programmes.

HM Treasury

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Government Response AI assessment · 22 of 8 classified

Accepted 14

Acknowledged 1

Deferred 2

Not Addressed 2

Rejected 3

Total 8 recs + 14 conclusions