A significant extension has been anounced to Employment Services Direct, a dial-a-job service launched by the government in 1999. The service received two million calls in its first year. It has found 1,200 jobs every week. Women and rural dwellers have been among its biggest users.
Under the scheme, unemployed people will receive calls each work with details of suitable jobs from a database of 300,000 vacancies. The new extension increases the hours for which the service is available. The system has also been refined in the light of experience to make matching applicants to jobs more appropriate.
The dial-a-job facility is also part of a clampdown on job fraud, signing on as unemployed while working. Other elements of the package announced on 5 April include:
- requiring jobseekers to sign on weekly after six months;
- more help in finding jobs after six months’ unemployment;
- requiring jobseekers suspected of job fraud to sign on more frequently and at varied times from January 2001;
- a new job grant of £100 from April 2001 to help those unemployed for a year take up jobs. The grant will help cover new clothes, fares and similar incidental provisions.
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