New setback as DWP is ordered to publish names of businesses and charities hosting unemployed people on work schemes
The Department for Work and Pensions has lost a major court battle to keep the locations of thousands of workfare placements secret.
At the end of a freedom of information challenge that has lasted 15 months, Judge David Marks QC ruled that the DWP must publish the names of businesses and charities hosting hundreds of thousands of unemployed people who, in some cases, must undertake weeks of unpaid work as a condition of receiving benefits.
Marks, sitting with two others in the first-tier tribunal, said the DWP had offered "a paucity of compelling economic evidence" to back its claims that organisations involved would be seriously financially damaged by negative publicity campaigns should their identities become public.
The ruling – which follows a high-profile DWP defeat when appeal court judges ruled that workers had been unlawfully made to work unpaid for organisations including Poundland – applies to all three of the department's main employment programmes: mandatory work activity (MWA); the work experience scheme; and the flagship Work Programme.
While campaigners welcomed the judgment, the DWP said it was "very disappointed" and was considering its next move. That could include an appeal to the high court or deploying a ministerial veto to ban publication.
Fighting against a disclosure order from the information commissioner, the DWP told tribunal judges that it should be exempt from three original FOIs filed by the public because of the damage to commercial interests. Charities, they argued, would lose donations and customers because they would be subject to extremely adverse publicity if their involvement with the programmes was revealed.
They also said that firms paid by the department to organise placements would then be forced to make scores of redundancies if those providing placements withdrew.
During the appeal hearing on 3 May, the tribunal heard that one of those firms, Ingeus, would stand to lose £1m in revenue while another, Seetec, said it would have to sack 53 people if the whereabouts of the workfare placements were disclosed.
Ingeus UK – whose current chief executive, Dean James, is a former senior DWP civil servant and who runs substantial parts of the Work Programme and MWA – also said it would have to sack staff.
In evidence, the department also revealed theimpact of campaigns initiated by unions and grassroots organisations such as Boycott Workfare.
Clare Elliott, joint head of the Work Programme Divisions, told the tribunal that eight national charities had already withdrawn from employment schemes and that they believed hundreds of work experience placements had been lost due to negative press coverage. One organisation estimated that such coverage had lost them 1,200 placements in a year.
The DWP said one charity that had withdrawn from the MWS was now suffering inadequate staffing issues and reduced revenue. Charities still in the MWA scheme include the Salvation Army and YMCA.
In its decision, the tribunal said that "the public interest balance militates strongly in favour of disclosure" and that big commercial organisations "can be expected to have a thick skin should their names be disclosed".
The tribunal also found that blogs and newspaper articles, including those from the Guardian, given to the court by DWP as evidence of an unjustified "media frenzy" were "no more and no less than standard criticism of ... schemes that ... were controversial in any event".
"The tribunal is firmly of the view that in these appeals the scales are weighed appreciably in favour of disclosure," the judgment read.
The DWP said: "Our schemes are helping people back to work but sadly some of those organisations offering jobseekers vital opportunities have been targeted by misguided campaigns. We believe releasing this information in this way will cause placement organisations to be unfairly targeted, harming jobseekers' prospects.
Responding to the ruling Joanna Long, of Boycott Workfare, urged organisations to leave the schemes before the list was made public: "Workfare has meant less paid work for people across the UK, and exploitation for those forced to work for nothing. When the list of those using workfare is revealed, thousands of people will be reconsidering where they spend their money or make donations; hundreds will plan demonstrations.
"Companies and charities using workfare need to urgently reconsider whether they want to risk further involvement in these failing schemes."
Guardian
At the end of a freedom of information challenge that has lasted 15 months, Judge David Marks QC ruled that the DWP must publish the names of businesses and charities hosting hundreds of thousands of unemployed people who, in some cases, must undertake weeks of unpaid work as a condition of receiving benefits.
Marks, sitting with two others in the first-tier tribunal, said the DWP had offered "a paucity of compelling economic evidence" to back its claims that organisations involved would be seriously financially damaged by negative publicity campaigns should their identities become public.
The ruling – which follows a high-profile DWP defeat when appeal court judges ruled that workers had been unlawfully made to work unpaid for organisations including Poundland – applies to all three of the department's main employment programmes: mandatory work activity (MWA); the work experience scheme; and the flagship Work Programme.
While campaigners welcomed the judgment, the DWP said it was "very disappointed" and was considering its next move. That could include an appeal to the high court or deploying a ministerial veto to ban publication.
Fighting against a disclosure order from the information commissioner, the DWP told tribunal judges that it should be exempt from three original FOIs filed by the public because of the damage to commercial interests. Charities, they argued, would lose donations and customers because they would be subject to extremely adverse publicity if their involvement with the programmes was revealed.
They also said that firms paid by the department to organise placements would then be forced to make scores of redundancies if those providing placements withdrew.
During the appeal hearing on 3 May, the tribunal heard that one of those firms, Ingeus, would stand to lose £1m in revenue while another, Seetec, said it would have to sack 53 people if the whereabouts of the workfare placements were disclosed.
Ingeus UK – whose current chief executive, Dean James, is a former senior DWP civil servant and who runs substantial parts of the Work Programme and MWA – also said it would have to sack staff.
In evidence, the department also revealed theimpact of campaigns initiated by unions and grassroots organisations such as Boycott Workfare.
Clare Elliott, joint head of the Work Programme Divisions, told the tribunal that eight national charities had already withdrawn from employment schemes and that they believed hundreds of work experience placements had been lost due to negative press coverage. One organisation estimated that such coverage had lost them 1,200 placements in a year.
The DWP said one charity that had withdrawn from the MWS was now suffering inadequate staffing issues and reduced revenue. Charities still in the MWA scheme include the Salvation Army and YMCA.
In its decision, the tribunal said that "the public interest balance militates strongly in favour of disclosure" and that big commercial organisations "can be expected to have a thick skin should their names be disclosed".
The tribunal also found that blogs and newspaper articles, including those from the Guardian, given to the court by DWP as evidence of an unjustified "media frenzy" were "no more and no less than standard criticism of ... schemes that ... were controversial in any event".
"The tribunal is firmly of the view that in these appeals the scales are weighed appreciably in favour of disclosure," the judgment read.
The DWP said: "Our schemes are helping people back to work but sadly some of those organisations offering jobseekers vital opportunities have been targeted by misguided campaigns. We believe releasing this information in this way will cause placement organisations to be unfairly targeted, harming jobseekers' prospects.
Responding to the ruling Joanna Long, of Boycott Workfare, urged organisations to leave the schemes before the list was made public: "Workfare has meant less paid work for people across the UK, and exploitation for those forced to work for nothing. When the list of those using workfare is revealed, thousands of people will be reconsidering where they spend their money or make donations; hundreds will plan demonstrations.
"Companies and charities using workfare need to urgently reconsider whether they want to risk further involvement in these failing schemes."
Guardian
