I WAS delighted to hear the Government finally had a plan to get hundreds of thousands of people back into work.
Half a million living on handouts want to be in gainful employment — and there’s nothing better for your self-esteem than rolling up your sleeves and heading into the workplace.
However, under this grand scheme designed by Work and Pensions Secretary Mel Stride, these people would end up working from home.
And if that wasn’t bad enough, the reforms have now been kicked back for two years.
It’s a massive disappointment — and a total cop-out — that these much-needed changes will be delayed until at least 2025, after the General Election.
Only a million of our 2.4million incapacity claimants are thought to be incapable of doing any work at all, according to one senior Government source.
So the plan is to encourage as many as possible to work from home or risk losing their benefits.
Not only will this cut the UK’s crippling £264billion welfare budget, it will help those classed as too sick to work because of mobility or anxiety problems to rejoin the real world.
But let’s be real — nothing compares to getting back to work in person.
When I was starting out in my career I routinely worked 12-hour days. I felt there was no substitute for hard work and believed that nothing compensates for the actual hours you put in.
The buzz and camaraderie you find at work, the ability to impress the boss and the chance to network are all lost when you work remotely.
But since the Covid pandemic and lockdowns, many people have come to believe that working from home is an unassailable right.
Mr Stride has assured MPs that the changes will not affect the terminally ill or those with severe learning difficulties or disabilities — and rightly so.
But a 2020 DWP study revealed that about 20 per cent of those stuck on sickness benefits would like to have paid employment.
That’s about 500,000 people — and under the planned new rules they would get help to find it.
So it’s a betrayal of those people not to give them the assistance they need for another two years, and a disgraceful waste of taxpayers’ money.
The reasons for this delay amount to the usual deep dive down a bureaucratic rabbit hole — changes to regulations, training for health assessors, consultations, IT upgrades, zzzzz . . .
As former Cabinet minister Sir John Redwood said: “Why on Earth is it going to take so long? This is something we need to be doing now to ease our workplace shortages and to give people earlier support and hope.”
He is absolutely spot on.
Multiple sectors are crying out for workers. Some businesses are operating on restricted hours, others have the chance to grow but can’t without expanding their workforce.
Taking liberties
And while solving those issues would be a shot in the arm for the economy, it’s nothing compared to what it could do for those people condemned to live in the shadows, stuck on the sidelines with little to do but contemplate their own problems.
Anxiety, for example, while upsetting and challenging, should not be an excuse to avoid work, especially work that can be done from home.
Surely the chance to be occupied, distracted, rewarded and valued would actually help someone prone to anxiety.
I believe a benefits system supporting two categories of people is essential for any civilised society.
The first category is those who cannot work — for example, the disabled, terminally ill, full-time carers.
The second is those who need help to get back on their feet.
What our tax money should never be used for is people taking liberties and abusing the system, and we have plenty of those.
So it is right that the system is overhauled every so often to make sure it is truly helping those in the first two categories — while also getting tough with the workshy and lead-swingers.
Having a job gives focus, a reason to get up in the morning, a sense of self-worth and the confidence that comes with that.
Nothing is better than earning your own money.
I often remind people starting at the bottom of the workplace ladder that it’s not about the first job you take, it’s about what that leads to, what you learn and how you begin to value yourself.
As Prime Minister Rishi Sunak pointed out, helping people back into work can “transform lives, providing not just greater financial security, but also providing purpose that has the power to benefit individuals, their families and their communities”.
He’s right. So why has he allowed his minister to put this crucial benefits crackdown on the back-burner?
Jade would be so proud of Bobby – and dad Jeff
MY personal highlight at this week’s National Television Awards was Bobby Brazier taking home the Rising Star gong and giving all the credit to his dad Jeff on the night.
It would be a triumph by any standard.
But it’s especially brilliant considering that Bobby, 20, was just five when he lost his mum Jade Goody to cancer.
Accepting his gong for playing Freddie Slater in EastEnders, he said: “This has very little to do with me and everything to do with my dad.”
It must have been so difficult raising Bobby and his little brother Freddie on his own, but Jeff has done a great job.
I reckon Jade would be very proud of both her son and her ex-partner.
Top guy William
PRINCE William is such an inspiration.
As part of his war on homelessness, he went to Bournemouth to meet representatives from eight firms supporting his five-year Homewards project.
He spent time with staff at Bournemouth AFC, who are helping disadvantaged and vulnerable adults to live independently.
He made sandwiches at Pret, where 500 people experiencing or at risk of homelessness are being supported with jobs.
Most admirable of all, he even endured getting kissed by footballer Paul Gascoigne, who turned up as a surprise visitor.
There’s nothing this man won’t do for a good cause.
Strife ’n’ sole
THE National Television Awards are usually a night for a few laughs on the red carpet, but behind the glitz there’s often a bit of drama, too.
Cue Love Island stars Maura Higgins and Faye Winter having a right old barney at the bar over, err, a shoe.
An insider explained: “Faye’s feet were killing her after a long night of partying. When a fan came over to take a picture with her, she took them off for the shot and flung them to Maura.”
Maura was clearly unimpressed.
In a clip obtained by The Sun, the pair can be seen jabbing fingers at each other and at one point Maura shouts: “Don’t you point your finger at me!”
Girls, a simple apology would have cleared the matter up.
Then instead of spending an hour going at each other, you would have had a far better night out.
At least they can both take comfort in the old saying that time heels all wounds.
Give it a West, guys
HOW much more time do the police investigating the antics of Kanye West and his “wife” Bianca Censori need?
They were caught on camera romping on their water taxi during a holiday in Venice– and it was pretty obvious what was happening “below deck”.
He was snapped exposing his bare buttocks while she knelt in front of him with her head nestled in his lap, which is gross in a busy tourist town full of families.
If that wasn’t bad enough, they were then seen strolling through Venice, with Bianca in another pair of her barely there skin-tight nude pants, holding a pillow over her naked breasts.
To me, this looks like desperate attention- seeking – or maybe she’s just planning to smother him the next time he drops his pants?
Whatever they’re up to, it doesn’t float my boat.
Covid chaos
I VERY much hope the Government does not give up on its attempts to recover the whopping £1.1billion lost to fraud and error through Covid grants.
More than 97 per cent of this money has not yet been paid back, according to a report this week from the House of Commons’ Public Accounts Committee.
This hole in our finances comes out of the £22.6billion distributed by local authorities in grants to businesses between March 2020 and March 2022.
It’s not even clear whether this money did what it was supposed to do – protect firms and jobs during Covid lockdowns.
The report concluded that Whitehall departments had been “slow to take effective action to recover losses”.
You can say that again.
We are now more than three years on since they started splashing the cash.
If the Department for Business and Trade finds it too hard, maybe they need to hire a commercial company to recover the payments for them.