Raw deal for economic blackspot?

At the end of June 2010 just 15 unemployed people from Londonderry had participated in the new Steps to Work programme whilst across Northern Ireland over 10,000 had taken part.

The Department of Employment and Learning (DEL) has hailed Steps to Work as a more flexible alternative to the controversial New Deal programme which was criticised last year for providing a "poor return for taxpayers' money."

The Stormont Public Accounts Committee slammed the mandatory element of the New Deal programme for over 25s when it emerged fewer than 20 per cent of participants had secured employment on leaving the programme, despite 69 million spent on implementation from 1998 to 2007.

DEL describes Steps to Work as a new and fresh approach offering different choices around work related activities to help people find employment but not yet in Londonderry, it now emerges.

A spokesperson for the DEL said: "Steps to Work offers, to a wider group of customers, a more flexible, menu-based, modular approach which better targets individuals' barriers to employment. In addition to those in receipt of Job Seekers Allowance (JSA) it is available to claimants of Incapacity Benefit/Employment & Support Allowance (ESA), Income Support, customers in receipt of other benefits and economically inactive customers who are not in receipt of benefits.

"Like New Deal, JSA claimants must participate after a defined time in receipt of benefit (6 months for those aged 18 to 24, 18 months for those aged 25 or over) or face benefit sanctions. Others participate on a voluntary basis."

Since it was introduced in September 2008 to phase out New Deal the Steps to Work programme has found work for more than 5,100 people in Northern Ireland.

4,371 of these found unsubsidised work; 636 found work with subsidised employers and a further 147 found work through "Step Ahead" in the voluntary and community sector.

But in Londonderry - where unemployment and economic inactivity is higher than anywhere else in Northern Ireland - just 15 people have even accessed the new and improved scheme, with New Deal continuing to operate in the Lisnagelvin and Foyle offices until the procurement process is complete.

Critics of Steps to Work say it allows employers take on workers without having to pay a full wage with an employer subsidy funded by the taxpayer available for up to 26 weeks.

But a DEL spokesperson said it hoped the new scheme would be available within the first six months of 2011.

The spokesperson said: "Steps to Work replaced New Deal as the Department's main adult return-to-work programme from September 2008.

"It has been rolled-out across Northern Ireland with the exception of the Foyle contract area. The existing New Deal contracts in the Foyle area have been extended until 31 March 2011.

"Arrangements have been put in place to ensure, as far as possible, provision replicates what is available in Steps to Work. The Department hopes to be in a position to have the Steps to Work provision available in the Foyle Area during the first six months of 2011."