Restart Courses (Hansard, 26 October 1994)

§ Ms Short

To ask the Secretary of State for Employment how many unemployed people have been referred to restart courses by employment service counsellors since April 1994 for each region and for Great Britain as a whole; how many of them were unemployed for over two years; how many attended and completed the course; what were the outcomes of the participants; how many had benefit penalties imposed for not attending or

All Restart Course Attenders April 1994—September 1994
	Northern	Yorkshire and Humberside	East Midlands and Eastern	London and South East	South west	Wales	West Midlands	North West	Scotland	Total
1. Referrals to Restart Courses¹	6,936	12,581	11,539	40,210	8,651	7,662	13,263	19,381	11,450	131,673
2. Total Starters	4,217	6,847	6,064	21,236	4,979	3,330	7,684	10,109	5,785	70,251
3. Starters Unemployed 24 months or more	3,768	5,896	5,424	17,646	4,399	2,896	6,826	8,786	5,237	60,878
4. Total completers	3,759	5,812	5,333	19,536	4,370	2,868	6,496	8,667	4,978	61,819
Completers who agreed to follow up:
Jobs	1,384	2,475	2,534	8,831	2,074	1,140	2,483	3,443	3,065	27,429
Training for Work	579	1,235	1,075	3,566	1,119	583	1,693	1,862	944	12,656
Jobclub	240	491	692	3,028	566	406	1,095	938	803	8,259
Other employment, training and related opportunities	2,207	2,995	2,953	11,648	2,479	1,725	3,279	4,583	2,339	34,208
5. Total number of people with an outcome to follow up²	3,374	5,491	5,090	17,619	4,233	2,767	6,112	8,041	4,492	57,219
6. Number of decisions received from the Benefits Agency³	830	1,709	1,322	3,665	685	847	1,050	2,916	1,960	14,984
¹This figure includes people who fail to attend the course(s) they are booked for who are subsequently rebooked on other events.
²Some people will be referred to more than one option at the end of the course
³This figure includes decisions where no reductions have been made (approximately 12 per cent. of decisions). Nationally around 88 per cent. of decisions lead to either a 20 per cent. or 40 per cent. reduction in personal Income Support for a period not exceeding the length of the course.