The Government's Get Britain Working White Paper seems at first glance to amount to the square root of nothing much at all.
To those with long memories, it's feeble stuff compared with the Blairite New Deal of the late 1990s. I hold no brief for that series of programmes, but it was an ambitious attempt to grapple with a dysfunctional job market. In a radical break with Labour traditions, it put pressure on inactive people, especially the young, to undertake training, work placements or voluntary work - with the threat of losing benefits if they failed to comply.
It introduced US-style tax credits, the first in-work benefits. It was generously funded, kick-started by Gordon Brown's £5 billion windfall tax (worth over twice that in today's terms), and regularly spent well over a billion pounds a year.
By contrast, today's Labour Government plans to spend (or "invest") just £240 million - though I count £410 million in named commitments: arithmetic seems to be a challenge for this administration. But this is hailed as the "biggest reforms to employment support for a generation". What does this entail?
Money is to be spent employing more staff to cut NHS waiting lists in areas of high inactivity. This can't do any harm, but it is unlikely that a queue for hip replacements is what is holding back employment in Skegness or Blackpool. Mental health support is to be significantly expanded. The extra 8,500 staff planned for this will come out of the NHS budget, not the Get Britain Working pot. Their loyalties will inevitably be with the "patient" rather than the taxpayer and it would be surprising to see many challenges to doubtful claims of stress or anxiety.
Mayors and councils are "to be empowered to join up local work, health and skills needs" though quite how they can do this isn't clear given the complicated funding arrangements. There are to be independent reviews on employing people with disabilities and on promoting a healthy workplace. A "Youth Guarantee" to give every young person access to education or training seems largely to involve rebadging existing provision. In any case it seems unlikely that the one in eight young people who are NEETs - Not in Education, Employment of Training - are there because of a dearth of opportunities.
One good thing is that the Apprenticeship Levy - which for many organisations has just amounted to an extra payroll tax - is to be turned into a more flexible "growth and skills" provision, which should enable more businesses to claim the funding back. It would be better to scrap the whole bureaucratic shebang, though.
The Jobcentre system is, once again, to be "transformed" into a new jobs and career service. New technology will, as is usual with reform programmes, play a major part. Let's hope it's more successful here than it has been elsewhere in the public sector..
Sixteen "trailblazers" will be set up around the country. These hitherto-unknown beasts will mobilise "everyone who wants to work" so they can get "joined-up support". There are also vague "partnerships" planned with glamorous organisations such as the Premier League, the Royal Shakespeare and, er, Channel 4.
That's more or less it. The really important stuff - reforming benefits - is ignored. There is promise of a consultation, to be launched in the Spring, to consider changes to the health and disability benefits system. Presumably any resulting action is years away. There is no mention of proposals to alter the regime for the fit and well - for instance, a time limit to unconditional benefits.
So it's a disappointing package, unlikely to do much to persuade the inactive into work.
Would there be employment for them in any case, given that the budget and minimum wage increases have sharply raised the cost of employing people, especially the young seeking their first job? And new employment rights from Day One won't have helped, either. Employers will now face greater risk in taking on those without a sound employment record, something glossed over in the Employment Rights Bill - which has just been castigated by the Regulatory Policy Committee for slapdash impact assessments which probably underestimate the real costs of the new legislation.
Get Britain Working? Dream on.