News

The Involvement & Participation Association (IPA) and Institute for Employment Studies (IES) are delighted to announce that the two organisations will merge from 1st May. The move will see the IPA team join IES, while continuing to retain their operational independence.

Today’s figures continue the trend of gradual improvement that we’ve seen over the last couple of months. But progress in the labour market is painfully slow.

Yesterday’s Budget leaves three significant challenges – around the scale, breadth and pace of reform; and unanswered questions particularly around benefit conditionality and sanctions.

There are still nearly half a million fewer people in work than before the Covid-19 pandemic, driven by more people out of work due to long-term health conditions and more older people out of work.

IES has signed the Age-friendly Employer Pledge, a nationwide programme run by the Centre for Ageing Better.

Today’s figures are broadly flat overall. Employment remains around three hundred thousand below where it was before the pandemic, while economic inactivity is more than half a million higher.

This webinar introduces our new Commission on the Future of Employment Support, which is being hosted by IES with funding and support from abrdn Financial Fairness Trust.

There are now 630 thousand more people out of work than before the pandemic began and today’s figures show clearly that people aren’t becoming unemployed, they’re leaving the labour force altogether.

The last time unemployment was this low was Christmas 1973 and Slade had just reached Number 1.

We need a proper plan to help people into work and to help employers fill their jobs, otherwise we’ll continue to throttle growth and fuel inflation.