Pathways to Work

Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions how many professionals are involved in condition management programmes in each of the Pathways to Work pilots, broken down by profession; what the annual cost of the work of healthcare professionals has been in each pilot; how many people in each pilot have been receiving incapacity benefit for (a) less than six months, (b) between six and 12 months and (c) 12 months or longer; and what assessment he has made of the implications for the number of healthcare workers needed if Pathways to Work is extended to all areas.

Answer

Condition management programmes (CMPs) are jointly delivered by Jobcentre Plus and the NHS. Actual spend figures for the provision of services via health care professionals are not available. The funding agreed between individual districts and primary care trusts (PCTs) is set out in the following table:

District	2004–05 (£)	2005–06 (£)
Renfrewshire, Inverclyde, Argyll and Bute	1,526,079	1,845,027
Bridgend, Rhondda, Cynon and Taff	767,979	1,209,800
Derbyshire	1,380,000	1,921,621
Essex	2,126,516	3,029,072
Gateshead	929,260	1,267,528
East Lancashire	504,627	1,215,946
Somerset	640,500	870,515

Information on how many people in each pilot have been receiving incapacity benefit for (a) less than six months (b) between six months and 12 months and (c) 12 months or longer, is in the following table.

IB/SDA Claimaints in Pathways to Work areas, by duration May 2005
District	Less than6 months	6 monthsto 1 year	1 yearor over	Total
Renfrewshire, Inverclyde, Argyll and Bute	2.5	1.6	22.5	26.6
Bridgend, Rhondda, Cynon and Taff	2.7	1.8	30.0	34.5
Derbyshire	3.9	2.7	39.7	46.3
Essex	5.8	3.7	47.0	56.5
Gateshead	2.3	1.4	21.0	24.7
East Lancashire	3.2	2.1	29.0	34.2
Somerset	1.4	1.0	12.4	14.8
Notes: 1. Figures are shown in thousands and rounded to the nearest 100. 2. Pathways to Work areas are assigned by matching postcodes against the relevant postcode directory. Source: DWP Information Directorate Work and Pensions Longitudinal Study, 100 per cent. data.

Delivery is not standardised in the pilot areas. The services within the CMPs are provided by a range of healthcare professionals, including: occupational therapists, mental health practitioners, GPs, physiotherapists, speech therapists, health psychologists, and nurses. The number and type of healthcare professionals varies between each pilot and is set locally.We will continue to work with the NHS to deliver this vital element of our Pathways to Work initiative. We will also seek to ensure our proposals deliver the pilots in innovative and more cost-effective ways as we roll out to the rest of the country. We have set out our proposals in the Green Paper ““A new deal for welfare: Empowering people to work”” (Cm 6730) published on 24 January 2006.