Project Leader: Stephen Lissenburgh
Sponsor: Employment Service
Period: February 1999 – June 2002
Collaborators: British Market Research Bureau International
Background
The New Deal for long-term unemployed people aged 25 or over (NDLTU) is an important element of the government’s welfare-to-work programme. The objectives of the programme are to help long-term unemployed people into jobs, to improve their prospects of staying in and progressing in employment, and to enhance their employability, thereby contributing positively to sustainable levels of employment. NDLTU was introduced in June 1998 for people aged 25 plus with at least two years of unemployment. It commences with a period of assistance through a personal adviser, which may be followed by subsidised employment or education and training opportunities. Pilot variants of NDLTU are operating in 28 designated areas of Britain, where programme entry can take place after 12 or 18 months unemployment and where a broader range of assistance is provided than is the case nationwide. These Pilots were set up in November 1998. A particularly novel feature of the NDLTU Pilots as they operate in two areas is that access to the programme is assigned randomly amongst eligible unemployed people – a practice common in the US but used rarely in Britain.
Study design
The study is a quantitative evaluation of NDLTU, seeking to determine whether it has achieved the objectives outlined above. It is progressing through descriptive and econometric analysis of both survey and administrative data. The survey data is being obtained by British Market Research Bureau International through interviews with NDLTU participants and also, in the case of the Pilot evaluation, from a matched comparison sample of individuals in non-Pilot areas. The administrative data comes from the New Deal Evaluation Database, a source constructed specifically for the New Deal evaluations, along with other government administrative data files.