Peter Hoskin

More reasons why the Tories should release a second Freud Review

One of the more under-the-radar, but most significant, news stories of the day is Theresa May’s suggestion that the Tories may change the terms of contracts currently being hammered out between the government and welfare-to-work providers:

“‘If contracts have not been signed one of the things I’m looking at is making the changes we want to those contracts quickly, so that we would be operating on our welfare reform proposals rather than the government’s,’ she said.”

The FT adds that one of the changes might be “smaller upfront payments” for the welfare providers.

Why so significant?  Well, because it highlights perhaps the main dilemma that the Tories face on welfare reform.  On the one hand, it’s perfectly understandable why they want to cut costs.  This is the Age of Austerity, after all, and earlier welfare contracts seriously overestimated the ability of welfare-to-work providers to get claimants back into work during an economic downturn. 

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