Martin Sime: Sanctions are not the way to get people back in work

What support should unemployed people get? It's a simple question this week's welfare reform proposals attempt to answer. Iain Duncan Smith says welfare should be about getting people into work and that work should always pay. That's commendable, but we all know it's not quite that simple.

First, the benefits system can't possibly be about jobs alone. Those with disabilities, mental health issues or long-term conditions, not to mention the UK's 12 million pensioners, need a safety net to support them to live a full and independent life. This isn't about carrots or sticks, it's about social responsibility.

Secondly, IDS says work should always pay, yet this week we've heard the government's proposal that people who have been unemployed for over a year will be forced to work a 30-hour week for free or face having their benefits removed. Clearly that kind of work doesn't pay.

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In the voluntary sector, we're all for encouraging active citizenship and for helping people to find routes out of unemployment. But that's not what a compulsory programme would do – there's even research from the DWP showing that mandatory community work doesn't help unemployed people or communities. In our experience it will only breed alienation.

Instead, what we need is a programme that focuses on creating meaningful, longer-term paid work that builds work skills and confidence. In one recent approach that's been a great success SCVO leads a consortium of 214 voluntary organisations that has helped nearly 2,000 young and long-term unemployed people into work through the Future Jobs Fund.

But IDS needs to get real about the prospects of finding work, when there may be as many as 18 jobseekers chasing each vacancy. We need to support unemployed people to make a contribution to their communities until the job market recovers. Sanctions and compulsion are the wrong tools for that job.

• Martin Sime is chief executive of the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations.

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