Former John Lewis boss visits pioneering Barnsley scheme helping people into work
The former head of John Lewis has visited Barnsley to see first hand the work being done to help more people into employment, as he continues a review into how people with health problems can be helped to continue working.
Sir Charlie Mayfield has been tasked by the Government to produce an independent report entitled Keep Britain Working, looking at how the Government and businesses can work together to support ill and disabled people to stay in work.
As part of the research ahead of the report’s publication, which is expected to be in October, Sir Charlie visited the Pathways to Work scheme in Barnsley.
The project started as a pilot , in part became of higher than average levels of economic inactivity in Barnsley , and has since been rolled out by the Government to nine areas with similarly high levels of stagnatio n.
The Pathways to Work commission, chaired by former Health Secretary Alan Milburn, found there has been a misguided focus on toughening up benefit rules instead of tackling root causes of why people are out of work, such as ill-health.
Now, as part of a nationwide tour looking at success stories, Sir Charlie visited South Yorkshire, meeting with business leaders and some of the people whose lives and job prospects have been improved through the programme
Speaking to the Yorkshire Post after his visit, he said: “I've been very impressed by what I've seen in Barnsley, in the pathways team and more generally with Sir Stephen (Houghton, leader of Barnsley Council) and his leadership team.
“I think they're doing some really excellent work around regeneration generally and dealing with what is in effect a national issue in a very effective way locally, which is probably the only way to tackle some of these issues."
When asked about what lessons could be learned from the Barnsley scheme, Sir Charlie said: “We spent some time with a range of employers across the Barnesley area, and what you very clearly hear is that firstly, they are really facing significant challenges around ill health and disability.
“But also, some of them are finding some quite good solutions to that, and those solutions centre around first of all, recognising this is very much about individuals and those relationships are important.
“Other things that have stood out are the focus on mental health and having mental health first aiders, the recognition that mental health is a difficult issue to deal with.
“If somebody has a bad back, you can use machinery and equipment and assistance devices to alleviate the cause of that problem by meaning that people don't have to lift everything.
“If somebody has a mental health issue, there isn't the same toolkit of assistance to v take away the cause of the strain.
“And often the cause of that strain can be not something to do with working, it can be outside of work, but it can impact on work in a pretty significant way.
“So it’s really helpful t o hear from e mp l o yers w h o are f inding what those ideas are, bec ause I think our great belief is that the best place to find the ideas is not for us to dream them up from an ivory tower.
"It's to actually visit people on the ground who are dealing with these issues and listen to what they've got to say.”