In anticipation of the Budget, I wrote last week that Alistair Darling would announce an extra £1.5 billion in funding for the Flexible New Deal, the Government’s welfare-to-work programme that is the equivalent of a shiny, new, environmentally friendly car. The scheme is going to use companies to help people on Jobseeker’s Allowance who have been claiming for 12 months or more find work rather than make them keep going to their Jobcentre Plus – i.e. it is set to allow claimants to trade in their old bangers for something much improved. This is good for them, but the recession has wrecked the Government’s financial plan for the scheme.
The prediction of the extra money mattered because the companies who have been bidding for the contracts to run the Flexible New Deal have known for months that the Government needed to announce an increase in funding.
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