A cross-party Committee of MPs has welcomed the Government's
flagship Connect to Work programme as a positive evolution in
supporting people with disabilities or health conditions into
employment but warned that its success rests on more consistent
national delivery.
The scheme is designed to help people with the most challenging
barriers into work. The Government forecasts it will help 300,000
people over the life of the scheme.
Inconsistent rollout
In its latest report, the Work and Pensions Committee praises the
departure from previous attempts to tackle the disability
employment gap by having it delivered by local authorities.
But the Committee warned that variations in support from
Whitehall and local delivery likely to create inconsistent
experiences for participants and providers and could weaken its
impact.
Witnesses described widely differing experiences of support from
the DWP ranging from positive engagement to experiences that
created uncertainty and administrative burden, causing delays to
the rollout. The DWP was aware of the challenges of delivering a
large programme with devolved delivery and should have
implemented a more proactive approach, the report added.
Given the complexity of delivering a devolved programme of this
scale, the Committee concludes the DWP should have taken a more
proactive approach to managing delivery. It calls on the
Government to set out how it will iron out these inconsistencies.
Work and Pensions Committee Chair said, We need to
recognise that 1 in 4 people are disabled or have a health
condition that can affect them at work. Disability is not a niche
issue.
Connect to Work has the potential to be a gamechanger helping
people often seen as too far from the labour market into safe and
sustainable work.
Its local delivery is a strength, allowing support to reflect the
needs of local businesses, skills, and services often overlooked
when run centrally. Its voluntary nature is a trust-builder.
But we cannot allow trust to be undermined. Without consistent
delivery Connect to Work's strength could become a weakness
leading to patchy post code lottery. The level of support to
local authorities across the country will make or break
programme.
Confidence and funding
The Committee also welcomes the multi-year funding built into the
scheme, saying it gives stakeholders greater confidence and
supports long-term planning. However, current commitments do not
cover its full lifespan.
The Government said it will make further funding decisions at the
2029 spending review citing uncertainty over conditions.
But the report concludes that a programme of this scale requires
clarity over its long-term funding across its full duration to
ensure confidence, particularly where retaining staff in the
long-run is a concern.
Ms Abrahams added, The government has set out
its ambition, but the money has not yet been committed to fulfill
it. We disagree with the Government's view that the funds should
not be committed this early.
Our own research suggests that every £1 investment in supporting
people into work will bear even more in improved lives and
consequent health and benefit savings down the line.
Connect to Work will only be as good as the support it gets and
the people who deliver it. But we've heard that without
long-term funding certainty for businesses and service providers'
to offer assistance to people they will be reluctant to put their
necks on the line. A decision on funding for the entirety
of it will provide reassurances and improve trust and resilience
in the programme.
This report is the second of three planned reports from the
Committee's Employment support for disabled people inquiry. The
first, Disability at Work, called for a two-week
deadline for reasonable adjustment requests from disabled
employees to be answered after finding that many do not receive
any in what it described as a hostile work environment. A
publication date for the third instalment on Access to Work will
be announced in due course.
ENDS
Notes to editors
Disability employment gap: The employment rate
among disabled people was 52.8% in 2025, the most recent set of
figures. The rate for non-disabled people at the time was 82.5%,
making the disability employment gap of 29.7 percentage points.
