My compliments to Peter Stoyko for his very acute observations... I'ld
like to add a few comments based on my current and direct experience at
the "labour market measures 'coalface'" here in Cape Breton and rural
Atlantic Canada where the needs are the most acute and the options are the
most limited.
On Wed, 22 Apr 1998, peter stoyko wrote:
> Greetings all...
>
> I would like to share my concerns about an apparent contradiction in
> the UK Employment Zones approach.
>
> Reform of active labour market measures in Canada and the UK in the 1990s
> has involved increases in targetting (but not money), by which I mean the
> number of discrete programmes aimed at those with distinctive needs
> (youth, the long term unemployed, older labour force participants, etc).
Most of the current Canadian government labour market measures appear to
be focussed on youth (19-30). There are a variety of internship, job
creation, and employment support programs with that age category as a
stipulated condition.
There are several problems with this from my particular context. The
most notable is that we have a significant lack of unemployed folks in
that age category as most have left the region (and most other rural
areas) seeking education, training and employment opportunities in more
urban areas. That doesn't mean that we don't have unemployment (still at
20% or so, about the worst in the country) but that our unemployed are in
the 30-50 age category--laid off steelworkers, coalminers or fishery
related workers.
The absurdity thus is that we can't "fill our quota" for some of these
programs because we don't have enough unemployed in the right categories.
We received some funds to develop an occupational health and safety (OHS)
web-site. We decided to link it into OHS at Sysco the local steel plant
which continues to verge over the edge of bankruptcy and closure. We
wanted to hire (and train in the technical skills required for the
project) currently unemployed steelworkers (and we had suitable candidates
lined up). We were told that we would be in violation of the contract if
we were to hire these folks (who apart from anything else had the content
skills we were looking for). Rather we had to search around for young
people to put on the contract even though several of them were already
employed at least part-time doing other things. I had half a mind to
pursue this absurdity through the Human Rights (agism) channel and would
still do so if someone wanted to offer some free legal support.
> This creates a rigidity when administered on a regional basis. When
> administered at the local or regional level, the administrators have a
> specific budgetary allotment for, say, youth, and a different allotment
> for the aged, both of which are pretty much set. If one locale (zone) has
> more youth unemployment than unemployment among older workers, too bad;
> they must spend the allotment as budgeted and programmed. In this context,
> the UK Employment Zone proposals (if I'm reading the proposals correctly)
> show promise, for they allow localities the flexibility to reallocate
> funding according to needs - budgetary decentralisation with a
> small measure of local policy discretion.
>
The reality of decentralization is even more dislocating than you are
suggesting. In practise most work support program funding has been
decentralized to local offices and individual case workers. What this
means is that any project or proposal which is broader than the
catchment of a local case officer is almost impossible to pursue and
similarly any project which is more skill intensive than the experience
or training of the individual case officer (viz. anything beyond unskilled
labour for the most part) is almost impossible to get supported. Both of
these limitations has the direct result of eliminating financial support
for employment development for virtually any knowledge or skill intensive
activity (ie. the roughly 40% of the economy where virtually all
new jobs are being created) without the most intensive of lobbying.
> But wait, what about all these other conditions? Those over 25 and are
> classified as long(ish)-term unemployed (over 1 year) are targeted - a
> slight claw-back of decentralization. A minimum amount must be spend on
> certain key targeted programmes - a restiction on policy making
> capacity of the zone. Project success stories will be
> replicated across Britain, whether they are suitable to other regions or
> not - a reduction in local flexibility. And what happens when the central
> governments wants to target another class of labour market participant?
> Budgetary centralisation and a reduction in local policy discretion,
> that's what.
>
> In fact, this is the cycle that has taken place in Canada:
> (1.) demands for more flexibility come from local programme offices of
> the federal ministry; (2.) budgetary allotments between programmes are
> made more flexible; (3.) new demands emerge for another targeted
> programme, such as youth; (4.) central level of government demands
> such-and-such amount spent on the new initiative (or package of
> iniatiatives), and local flexibility is reduced. With the Blair
> government embarking on an on-going redesign of the welfare state, the
> likelihood of new targeting measures seems very high.
>
>From what I can see, in Canada we have the worst of both worlds. We have
national program stipulations which introduce absurd rigidities locally
(for us), and we have almost complete local decentralization which makes
us subject to the training and skill set of case officers and local
managers with no knowledge of or sensitivity towards any of the areas
where new opportunities for employment creation are emerging. (cf. my
recent posting on WiNS2000).
> What this boils down to is one question: are these local
> experiments to create ideas for redesigning of the larger system, or are
> they pilot projects in decentralisation of the entire system? (Surely,
> the maintenance of a small and perminent cadre of priviledged zones is
> politically unsustainable as backbenchers lobby behind the scenes for
> special status for their own constituencies.) This is an either-or
> proposition, each with its own perils, for making compromises between the
> two creates an overly complex system - a state that active measures
> sometimes seem prone to gravitate towards. The Australian scenario would
> be the risk: programme targeting becoming so complex and success so
> difficult to monitor that, eventually, those held accountable get fed up
> with the unwieldliness and chop the system down to size.
>
The labour market in Canada is so regionally specific that national design
and even national standards make little sense. What works or could work
in Cape Breton bares little or no relation to what could work in Southern
Ontario or rural Saskatchewan. In that sense decentralization is useful.
But to have the degree of decentralization which has been recently
introduced while having virtually no capacity for research, analysis,
longer term planning, or staff upgrading is a recipe for disaster.
The Atlantic Groundfish Strategy (TAGS) program is the best example of how
the system has so ill-served those most dependent on it. What should
have been a program with the highest quality of R&D and staff
intervention (they were mandated to recreate the collapsed fishing economy
of an area the size of Western Europe) turned into a program whose highest
achievement was getting the cheques delivered on time.
Regs
Mike Gurstein
> Thank you for your attention. >
> Cheers, Peter Stoyko
>
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Peter Stoyko
>
> Carleton University Tel: (613) 520-2600 ext. 2773
> Department of Political Science Fax: (613) 520-4064
> B640 Loeb Building V-mail: (613) 731-1964
> 1125 Colonel By Drive E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Ottawa, Canada, K1S 5B6 Internet: http://www.carleton.ca/~pstoyko
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Tue, 21 Apr 1998, Michael Gurstein wrote:
>
> >
> > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > Date: Tue, 21 Apr 1998 19:51:41 +0100 GMT
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > Subject: UK Employment zones: will they work?
> >
> > UK Employment zones: will they work?
> > Zones d'Emploi britanniques: marcheront-ils?
> >
> > The Blairite solution to poor prospects for employment is to identify parts
> > of Britain where these problems cluster and then concentrate resources.
> > Smart. Will the policy work?
> >
> > Employment zones are areas where the usual national programmes for
> > the unemployed will be ditched in favour of running trials of local
> > initiatives. The five areas chosen to pilot the scheme all have high
> > concentrations of the long-term jobless.
> >
> > "Employment Zones will give communities the flexibility to devise local
> > solutions which best meet local needs," said the Employment Minister,
> > Andrew Smith, when he invited bids for zone status last September.
> > Plymouth, Liverpool, north-west Wales, south Teeside and Glasgow
> > began running their own programmes in February. The schemes must all
> > include training plans to improve employment prospects, business
> > enterprise to help the jobless move into self-employment, and
> > neighbourhood regeneration - work which improves the wider community.
> >
> > Ideas from the five areas include individual learning accounts, mentors for
> > the jobless, free child-care vouchers, and specialised training for seasonal
> > workers. In some cases benefit rules will be relaxed, like the ban on
> > studying more than 16 hours a week while on Job Seekers Allowance.
> > The Government is hoping that the zones will replicate the success of
> > initiatives like the Wise Group in Glasgow which has a better record than
> > the Employment Service at getting the long-term jobless back into real
> > careers.
> >
> > The schemes will be aimed at people aged 25 and over, who have been
> > out of work for more than a year; a group whom the Government's critics
> > say have been neglected because policies have focused on the young
> > unemployed. Participants on the schemes will be volunteers who will
> > receive their benefit plus a GBP 15 a week top-up. Some 5,000 people
> > will be covered in the five zones.
> >
> > Like the New Deal, programmes will be run by a combination of
> > Government, local businesses and voluntary organisations. The GBP
> > 58m budget is fairly small by New Deal standards, but if the programmes
> > are successful the Government will expand the best features nationally.
> > The inspiration for pouring in resources to specified parts of the country
> > came from Chris Smith when he was opposition spokesman for social
> > security. He suggested consolidating all the resources spent on
> > unemployment through benefits, training programmes, regional
> > assistance budgets and European funds into one budget, and allocating
> > grants directly to individually tailored schemes.
> >
> > Experts are cautiously enthusiastic about the potential of the zones to
> > generate new approaches for tackling unemployment. The biggest
> > danger, according to John Philpott from the Employment Policy Institute,
> > is that the Government could get cold feet when it comes to implementing
> > the ideas across the country. "The previous government would launch
> > pilots and them let them drop regardless of how successful they were. It
> > shouldn't just be about talking up sexy ideas but about seeing them
> > through." Local support is the key, says Paul Convery from the
> > Unemployment Unit. "It demands high levels of local political leadership.'"
> >
> > Source: Charlotte Denny (c) Guardian 21/04/98
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
>
>
Michael Gurstein, Ph.D.
ECBC/NSERC/SSHRC Associate Chair in the Management of Technological Change
Director: Centre for Community and Enterprise Networking (C\CEN)
University College of Cape Breton, POBox 5300, Sydney, NS, CANADA B1P 6L2
Tel. 902-539-4060 (o) 902-562-1055 (h) 902-562-0119 (fax)
[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://ccen.uccb.ns.ca
