Latest stats from the Restart Scheme

Government have released their latest stats for the Restart Scheme. This includes data from July 2021 to the end of April 2023.

This release of statistics has data from July 2021 to the end of April 2023 on:

• referrals to the Restart Scheme
• starts to the Restart Scheme
• first earnings from employment
• job outcome rates and performance by contract area, month, and cohort
• participant demographics – gender, age

The Restart Scheme is part of the government’s Plan for jobs and was announced at the Spending Review on 25 November 2020.

The Restart Scheme will give Universal Credit claimants who have been out of work for at least 9 months enhanced support to find jobs in their local area.

The Restart Scheme launched in June 2021, with the first cohort of starts from July 2021, in England and Wales and aims to provide tailored and intensive support to participants to achieve sustained work. It is currently aimed at those who have claimed UC continuously for at least 9 months and are currently under the IWSR. Participants may also come from those in receipt of JSA IB for at least 9 months.

Providers

The Restart scheme is delivered across England and Wales by 8 providers across 12 areas, known as Contract Package Areas (CPAs). These CPAs represent 12 geographic areas of England and Wales, with Wales as a single area (CPA 6).

Restart has run alongside 2 other ‘Plan for Jobs’ schemes that were announced in July 2020:

• Kickstart aimed at young people with referrals between October 2020 and March 2022
• Job Entry Targeted Support aimed at shorter duration unemployed with referrals between October 2020 and September 2022

The latest stats

The statistics show that by the end of April 2023 (numbers rounded to the nearest 1000):

• 530,000 individuals had been referred to the programme since its launch, with 450,000 of these having started on the programme
• 150,000 of these participants have achieved first earnings from employment since starting on the scheme. Note that many participants have received less than 12 months of support so far
• 84,000 participants have subsequently achieved a job outcome. This is against a tender performance level (TPL) contractual expectation of 84,000 job outcomes by this point in the programme, representing 100% of the TPL
• the minimum performance level for the scheme (MPL) at this point is 62,000 job outcomes. The current number of job outcomes therefore represents 136% of the MPL
• 230,000 people have had the opportunity of 12 months of support on the programme by April 2023. Of these people, 42% have achieved first earnings from employment so far. 25% have achieved a job outcome so far, against an MPL expectation of 15% and a TPL expectation of 20%
• of the 450,000 starts on the scheme, 57% were recorded as male, and 43% recorded as female. 10% are aged between 18 and 24 years old, with 63% aged between 25 and 49 years old and 27% aged 50 years or over

Joining the Restart Scheme

Since June 2021, to the end of April 2023, across England and Wales, there have been a total of:

• 530,000 individuals referred (individuals can have multiple referrals but are only counted once)
• 450,000 starts on the programme

Read more about the stats here.