Jobcentre Plus
Encyclopedia
Jobcentre Plus was a government agency for working-age people in Great Britain
Great Britain
Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

. The agency was formed when the Employment Service, which operated Jobcentres, merged with the Benefits Agency
Benefits Agency
The Benefits Agency was an executive agency of the United Kingdom Department of Social Security which was set up in 1991 to "help create and deliver an active modern social security service, which encourages and enables independence and aims to pay the right money at the right time"...

, which ran social security
Social security
Social security is primarily a social insurance program providing social protection or protection against socially recognized conditions, including poverty, old age, disability, unemployment and others. Social security may refer to:...

 offices, and was re-named Jobcentre Plus on 1 April 2002. It was an executive agency
Executive agency
An executive agency, also known as a next-step agency, is a part of a government department that is treated as managerially and budgetarily separate in order to carry out some part of the executive functions of the United Kingdom government, Scottish Government, Welsh Assembly or Northern Ireland...

 of the Department for Work and Pensions
Department for Work and Pensions
The Department for Work and Pensions is the largest government department in the United Kingdom, created on June 8, 2001 from the merger of the employment part of the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of Social Security and headed by the Secretary of State for Work and...

 (DWP) and reported directly to the Minister of State
Minister of State
Minister of State is a title borne by politicians or officials in certain countries governed under a parliamentary system. In some countries a "minister of state" is a junior minister, who is assigned to assist a specific cabinet minister...

 for Employment..

Role of Jobcentre Plus

Jobcentre Plus advertised job vacancies for employers by using a computer system called LMS (Labour Market System) which could be accessed by customers through Jobpoints (touch-screen computer terminals) and via the Jobcentre Plus website and the telephone service Jobseeker Direct (0845 60 60 234). It also administered claims for benefits such as Jobseeker's Allowance
Jobseeker's Allowance
Jobseeker's Allowance is a United Kingdom benefit, colloquially known as the dole . It is a form of unemployment benefit paid by the government to people who are unemployed and seeking work. It is part of the social security benefits system and is intended to cover living expenses while the...

, Incapacity Benefit
Incapacity benefit
Incapacity Benefit is a United Kingdom state benefit that is paid to those below the State Pension age who cannot work because of illness or disability and have made National Insurance contributions. It is administered by Jobcentre Plus...

, Employment and Support Allowance
Employment and Support Allowance
Employment and Support Allowance is a UK Government State Benefit which replaced new claims for Incapacity Benefit and Income Support on the basis of incapacity for work for most claimants from 27 October 2008. Initially, claimants already receiving Incapacity Benefit continued to receive it as...

 and Income Support
Income Support
Income support is an income-related means-tested benefit in the United Kingdom for people who are on a low income. Claimants of Income Support may be entitled to certain other benefits, for example, Housing Benefit, Council Tax Benefit and help with health costs...

.

History

The forerunners of the Jobcentre Plus were the government-run Labour Exchanges, originally the vision of Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...

, President of the Board of Trade and William Beveridge
William Beveridge
William Henry Beveridge, 1st Baron Beveridge KCB was a British economist and social reformer. He is best known for his 1942 report Social Insurance and Allied Services which served as the basis for the post-World War II welfare state put in place by the Labour government elected in 1945.Lord...

, who had worked for a more efficient labour system in the early years of the 20th century. This was intended to address the chaos of the labour market and the problems of casual employment.

In 1908 Beveridge was commissioned to devise a scheme which would combine labour exchanges with a new government-funded unemployment benefit
Unemployment benefit
Unemployment benefits are payments made by the state or other authorized bodies to unemployed people. Benefits may be based on a compulsory para-governmental insurance system...

. The Labour Exchanges Bill was rushed through Parliament
Parliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the supreme legislative body in the United Kingdom, British Crown dependencies and British overseas territories, located in London...

 and passed in September 1909 and, after months of planning and recruitment of clerks, 62 Labour Exchanges were opened on February 1, 1910. The number of offices rose to 430 within four years. At the suggestion of the Prime Minister
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the Head of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Sovereign, to Parliament, to their political party and...

 David Lloyd-George, from January 1917 the Labour Exchanges came under the new Ministry of Labour
Ministry of Labour
The Ministry of Labour was a British civil service department established by the New Ministries and Secretaries Act 1916. It was renamed the Employment Department in 1988, and finally abolished in 1995...

 and were renamed Employment Exchanges, so as to more accurately reflect their purpose and function.

The National Insurance Act
National Insurance Act 1911
The National Insurance Act 1911 is an Act of Parliament of the United Kingdom. The Act is often regarded as one of the foundations of modern social welfare in the United Kingdom and forms part of the wider social welfare reforms of the Liberal Government of 1906-1914...

 was passed in 1911 and the first payments were made at Exchanges in January 1913. Initially this covered only elected trades, such as building
Building
In architecture, construction, engineering, real estate development and technology the word building may refer to one of the following:...

, engineering
Engineering
Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...

 and shipbuilding
Shipbuilding
Shipbuilding is the construction of ships and floating vessels. It normally takes place in a specialized facility known as a shipyard. Shipbuilders, also called shipwrights, follow a specialized occupation that traces its roots to before recorded history.Shipbuilding and ship repairs, both...

. Weekly contributions were paid by workers, employers and the State in the form of stamps which were affixed to an Unemployment Book (later called the National Insurance card). When no work was available, benefit was payable.

The basic rules and administration regarding claims and the disallowance of benefit remain unaltered today. From 1918, payments were also made to unemployed ex-soldiers and their dependants, as well as to civilians who found themselves unemployed due to the decline of war production industries. The out-of-work donation scheme (the original "dole") was originally only a temporary measure.

As unemployment benefit
Unemployment benefit
Unemployment benefits are payments made by the state or other authorized bodies to unemployed people. Benefits may be based on a compulsory para-governmental insurance system...

 was payable only for those with a contributions record, and even then for only twelve months for each claim, there remained a group on long-term low incomes, without access to benefit. That was relieved after the enactment of the National Assistance Act 1946, when payments began to be made to jobseekers on low incomes regardless of contributions.

Initially benefits were paid weekly, in cash, at the Employment Exchange. From 1973, a new network of Jobcentres began to be opened throughout Britain.

In the 1990s, the Employment Service introduced a dress code which required male staff to wear ties. The code was later held to be in breach of the Sex Discrimination Act
Sex Discrimination Act 1975
The Sex Discrimination Act 1975 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom which protected men and women from discrimination on the grounds of sex or marriage. The Act concerned employment, training, education, harassment, the provision of goods and services, and the disposal of premises...

.

Changes to the service

Private organisations are now under contract with the government to provide services to benefit claimants through initiatives such as Employment Zones and Pathways to Work. Staff of the Department for Work and Pensions
Department for Work and Pensions
The Department for Work and Pensions is the largest government department in the United Kingdom, created on June 8, 2001 from the merger of the employment part of the Department for Education and Employment and the Department of Social Security and headed by the Secretary of State for Work and...

 give help only to those in so-called "high priority groups", that is, those who are long-term claimants of Jobseekers Allowance, lone parents
Single parent
Single parent is a term that is mostly used to suggest that one parent has most of the day to day responsibilities in the raising of the child or children, which would categorize them as the dominant caregiver...

 or those receiving other benefits
Employee benefit
Employee benefits and benefits in kind are various non-wage compensations provided to employees in addition to their normal wages or salaries...

 such as Income Support
Income Support
Income support is an income-related means-tested benefit in the United Kingdom for people who are on a low income. Claimants of Income Support may be entitled to certain other benefits, for example, Housing Benefit, Council Tax Benefit and help with health costs...

 or Incapacity Benefit
Incapacity benefit
Incapacity Benefit is a United Kingdom state benefit that is paid to those below the State Pension age who cannot work because of illness or disability and have made National Insurance contributions. It is administered by Jobcentre Plus...

.

However, jobsearch facilities are available to anyone via the Jobcentre Plus website, through touch screen interactive jobpoints in local Jobcentres and over the phone via Jobseeker Direct (0845 60 60 234). The Jobcentre Plus website is the UK's most visited recruitment website with over a million visitors each week. Vacancy information is also available through the UK government's direct.gov.uk portal. As of spring 2010, the Jobcentre Plus website no longer contains job posts itself, and redirects all jobseeker enquiries to run through the Directgov
Directgov
Directgov is the UK government's digital service for people in the United Kingdom, providing a single point of access to public sector information and services.The content is developed by government departments, working with a central Directgov team...

 jobs portal, which lists job posts sourced from the JCP network.

Jobcentre Plus also offered services to employers and employment agencies - who can register their vacancies online through the online service or by calling Employer Direct. Vacancies are available immediately through the channels above - (online, phone, and interactive jobpoints).

Alongside these changes, Jobcentre Plus also changed the way in which claims to benefits are processed. In the past, claimants contacted their local benefits office, were asked to manually complete the appropriate forms, and then booked an interview with an adviser in order to discuss work related issues (as appropriate) and submit the benefits claim for processing. The new system instead asks individuals to call a Jobcentre Plus call centre
Call centre
A call centre or call center is a centralised office used for the purpose of receiving and transmitting a large volume of requests by telephone. A call centre is operated by a company to administer incoming product support or information inquiries from consumers. Outgoing calls for telemarketing,...

, where claim details are taken over the phone and entered directly to the computer system by the call agent. Customers are then asked to attend an interview at their local jobcentre to discuss work issues with an adviser, and finalise their claim, provide relevant signatures and proof of ID and address.

In addition, the actual processing of claims to benefits is also changing, with benefits claims being processed at a smaller number of larger Benefit Centres rather than local benefit offices and jobcentres.

JSAPS

JSAPS (Jobseeker's Allowance Payment System) is a legacy computer system used by Jobcentre Plus to maintain and pay Jobseeker's Allowance
Jobseeker's Allowance
Jobseeker's Allowance is a United Kingdom benefit, colloquially known as the dole . It is a form of unemployment benefit paid by the government to people who are unemployed and seeking work. It is part of the social security benefits system and is intended to cover living expenses while the...

, and more recently Employment and Support Allowance
Employment and Support Allowance
Employment and Support Allowance is a UK Government State Benefit which replaced new claims for Incapacity Benefit and Income Support on the basis of incapacity for work for most claimants from 27 October 2008. Initially, claimants already receiving Incapacity Benefit continued to receive it as...

, benefit claims.

Popular culture

The Jobcentre Plus service (and its forerunners the Social Security office, Unemployment Benefit office and Jobcentre/Labour Exchange) have featured in all forms of popular culture, often depicted in a general way to suggest poverty or unemployment. In the 1980s in particular, the Social Security office was frequently used as shorthand for the British recession
Recession
In economics, a recession is a business cycle contraction, a general slowdown in economic activity. During recessions, many macroeconomic indicators vary in a similar way...

.

Dramatic representations have included the sitcoms Hancock's Half Hour
Hancock's Half Hour
Hancock's Half Hour was a BBC radio comedy, and later television comedy, series of the 1950s and 60s written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson. The series starred Tony Hancock, with Sid James; the radio version also co-starred, at various times, Moira Lister, Andrée Melly, Hattie Jacques, Bill Kerr...

, Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em
Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em
Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em was a BBC situation comedy, written by Raymond Allen and starring Michael Crawford and Michele Dotrice.The series followed the accident-prone Frank Spencer and his tolerant wife Betty through Frank's various attempts to hold down a job, which frequently end in...

, Shelley
Shelley (TV series)
Shelley is a British sitcom made by Thames Television and originally broadcast on ITV from 1979 to 1984 and from 1988 to 1992, with occasional hiatuses. Hywel Bennett starred as James Shelley, a sardonic, 28-year-old, anti-establishment postgraduate and career income tax dodger...

, Bread
Bread (TV series)
Bread was a British television sitcom, written by Carla Lane, produced by the BBC and screened on BBC1 from 1 May 1986 to 3 November 1991....

, Rab C. Nesbitt
Rab C. Nesbitt
Rab C. Nesbitt is a Scottish sitcom which began in 1988. Produced by BBC Scotland, it stars Gregor Fisher as an alcoholic Glaswegian who believed unemployment was the life for him...

, the drama series Boys from the Blackstuff
Boys from the Blackstuff
Boys from the Blackstuff is a British television drama series of five episodes, originally transmitted from 10 October to 7 November 1982 on BBC2....

and the films Made in Britain
Made in Britain
Made in Britain is a 1982 British drama film directed by Alan Clarke, and written by David Leland, about a 16-year-old white power skinhead named Trevor, and his constant confrontations with authority figures. It was originally broadcast on ITV as the fourth in an untitled series of works by...

and The Full Monty
The Full Monty
The Full Monty is a 1997 British comedy film directed by Peter Cattaneo, starring Robert Carlyle, Mark Addy, William Snape, Steve Huison, Tom Wilkinson, Paul Barber, and Hugo Speer. The screenplay was written by Simon Beaufoy...

.

In the black comedy
Black comedy
A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...

 series The League of Gentlemen
The League of Gentlemen
The League of Gentlemen are a group of British comedians formed in 1995, best known for their radio and television series.The League of Gentlemen may also refer to:* The League of Gentlemen ,...

, a recurring character is Pauline Campbell-Jones (played by Steve Pemberton
Steve Pemberton
Steve James Pemberton is an English actor, comedian, writer and performer, most famous as a member of The League of Gentlemen along with fellow performers Reece Shearsmith, Mark Gatiss and co-writer Jeremy Dyson.-Early life:...

), the demented leader of a Restart course for a group of unemployed people.

Love on the Dole
Love on the Dole
Love on the Dole is a novel by Walter Greenwood, about working class poverty in 1930s Northern England. It has been made into both a play and a film.-The novel:...

is a novel by Walter Greenwood
Walter Greenwood
Walter Greenwood was an English novelist, best known for the socially influential novel Love on the Dole .-Biography:...

, about working class poverty in 1930s northern England. It has been made into both a play and film.

In music, the reggae
Reggae
Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.Reggae is based...

 group UB40
UB40
UB40 are a British reggae/pop band formed in 1978 in Birmingham. The band has placed more than 50 singles in the UK Singles Chart, and has also achieved considerable international success. One of the world's best-selling music artists, UB40 have sold over 70 million records.Their hit singles...

 took their name from the form used to 'sign on' at the Unemployment Benefit office (the form is now designated ES40JP). The initials "DHSS" are recited several times by singer George Michael
George Michael
George Michael is a British musician, singer, songwriter and record producer who rose to fame in the 1980s when he formed the pop duo Wham! with his school friend, Andrew Ridgeley...

 in Wham!
WHAM!
Wham! were a short-lived British musical duo formed by George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley in the early 1980s. They were briefly known in the United States as Wham! UK due to a naming conflict with an American band....

's 1983 hit single Wham Rap!
Wham Rap! (Enjoy What You Do)
"Wham Rap! "' is a 1982 song by British pop duo Wham! on Innervision Records. It was written by Wham! members George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley....

, a tongue-in-cheek
Tongue-in-cheek
Tongue-in-cheek is a phrase used as a figure of speech to imply that a statement or other production is humorously intended and it should not be taken at face value. The facial expression typically indicates that one is joking or making a mental effort. In the past, it may also have indicated...

 celebration of wilful unemployment. The first album by Half Man Half Biscuit
Half Man Half Biscuit
Half Man Half Biscuit, often "HMHB", are an English rock band from Birkenhead, Merseyside, active since the mid-1980s, known for satirical, sardonic, and sometimes surreal songs. The group comprises Nigel Blackwell , Neil Crossley , Ken Hancock , and Carl Henry...

 was called Back in the DHSS
Back in the DHSS
-2003 Rerelease:# "Busy Little Market Town"# "God Gave Us Life"# "Fuckin' 'Ell It's Fred Titmus"# "Sealclubbing"# "99% Of Gargoyles Look Like Bob Todd"# "Time Flies By "# "I Hate Nerys Hughes "...

, a play on The Beatles
The Beatles
The Beatles were an English rock band, active throughout the 1960s and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. Formed in Liverpool, by 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon , Paul McCartney , George Harrison and Ringo Starr...

 song "Back in the U.S.S.R.".

Winding up of Jobcentre Plus

Jobcentre Plus as an executive agency ceased to exist as of 4th October 2011. Services offered by Jobcentre Plus are now offered directly by the Department for Work and Pensions, although the Jobcentre Plus corporate brand remains in place at the present time, functioning as a public brand of the Department rather than a separate entity.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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