Unemployed ethnic minorities urgently need more help

Government attempts to help ethnic minorities close their employment gap on Whites need a better focus and more one-to-one support for unemployed people in Jobcentres, says a new report for Department for Work and Pensions by the Policy Studies Institute.

Most Jobcentre customers struggle in their search for work, whatever their origin. They feel dissatisfied and frustrated when first engaging with the system, especially before being given a Personal Adviser to help them.

Ethnic minority women and men have additional needs that are not being met:

• Customers who meet employment discrimination are unaware of Jobcentre procedures to challenge firms and have little faith that the system will intervene to help them overcome it.
• Difficulties with language are addressed too slowly. Too many New Deal courses are unsupervised and young ethnic minority customers become disillusioned and drop out.
• Language and other training should be better aligned with minority needs, including women-only classes for older Bangladeshi women.

One of the authors of the report, Dr. Maria Hudson said: “Recent Jobcentre Plus initiatives have strengthened rules and procedures to help ethnic minority applicants achieve a better rate of entry to work. There remains a gulf in practice and understanding that can be closed by new staff training, particularly in multilingual services, and wider recruitment. This will require the injection of new resources”

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