The government’s Way to Work plan is a nightmare for employers and claimants alike

Trying to fit square pegs into round holes is the sort of policymaking you get when you put Boris Johnson, the biggest square peg in the land, into the round hole of the biggest job in the land, writes James Moore

Work and pensions secretary Therese Coffey (PA Wire)

The problem with sanctioning benefits claimants has long been known: it doesn’t work.

Charities with expertise in the sector will tell you that it doesn’t help them find work. It just leads to hardship. Academics have conducted studies which have come to much the same conclusions.

It’s a sad truth, however, that narrative regularly trumps facts, research, and indeed common sense in modern Britain. In this case, it’s the destructive narrative holding that the jobless are all lazy ne’er-do-wells who should get on their bikes and look for work and need kicking up the backside to do that.