Benefit Caps Have 'No Impact on Rates of Employment'

The government's benefit cap has had no discernable impact on encouraging residents to find work, according to a council involved in one of the project's pilot schemes.  Phil Harris, deputy director for community housing services at Haringey council, one of four local authorities involved in the benefit cap pilot schemes, said the cap had not changed residents' behaviour. He suggested that problems with the accuracy and maintenance of data held the DWP could have led to misleading messages from the department. The DWP recently released figures showing that the number of people affected by the benefit cap had dropped from 56,000 to 40,000, with 8,000 finding employment through JobCentre Plus. Iain Duncan Smith used the figures to state the benefit cap has encouraged people into work but the claim was disputed by former DWP chief economist Jonathan Portes.  Read more on the Guardian website.