Crime and Justice

Prison Break:Tackling recidivism, reducing costs

Crime costs the UK some £72bn each year. The failure to crack re-offending among prisoners serving short-term sentences is a key driver of these costs. Offenders with short prison terms comprise the large majority of those handed sentences each year, and more than 70% are back behind bars within two years of release. Each time they return to prison, the cost to the criminal justice system is around £60,000 per person.

Returning to its Roots: A new role for the third sector in probation

This publication gives a voice to a range of commentators from the third sector, academia, government and others operating in the criminal justice system. Their contributions highlight several reasons why prisons and probation services might benefit from volunteers and partnerships with the voluntary sector.

Economic Policy

The Social Market Economy Revisited

In The Social Market Economy Revisited, former Chairman of the SMF, Lord Skidelsky, returns to the themes of his seminal 1989 essay that marked launched the Foundation. In the wake of the biggest financial crisis in history, he examines how markets address different types of uncertainty, the role of convention in determining economic behaviour and the limits to the use of econometric analysis in forecasting the future.

The Market Economy: Twenty-one years after the fall of the Berlin Wall

In the second of a series of essays to mark the 21st anniversary of the Social Market Foundation, John Kay looks back at the triumph of the market economy since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Kay attributes this triumph to the role of the price mechanism, 'markets as a process of discovery', and the diffusion of political and economic power with which markets are associated.

Axing and Taxing: How to cut the deficit

The UK's debt crisis is mounting. This year's borrowing is likely to be bigger even than last year's record £156bn deficit. With bond markets getting jittery about sovereign debt, the coalition has one shot at cutting the unprecedented deficit. The Government's emergency budget and spending review in the coming months must not shrink from the challenge. If it fails to take decisive measures, the cost of borrowing will balloon, and ultimately much more draconian cuts and taxes will be required. It's time to act.

Early Access to Pension Saving

Discussion of enabling early access to pension saving has been a feature of UK pension policy debate for some years. However, this discussion has come into sharper focus in light of the global financial crisis, and its potential impact on the attitude of UK households to locking away saving for many years. This report examines the evidence that current pension rules, associated with the UK ‘annuities deal', deter pension saving. The report also explores in detail the practical considerations and problems that would be confronted by the multiple ‘early access' models of pension saving that have been proposed.

Forecasting Independence: Taking the politics out of fiscal projections

Arrangements for fiscal policymaking ultimately come down to a set of choices around: who should take fiscal decisions and how? Who should carry out the projections of revenue and spending on which those decisions are based? In the UK, fiscal policymaking has traditionally been highly centralised and discretionary, with all fiscal projections and decisions emanating from HM Treasury. The self-imposed fiscal rules of the 1997 Labour government represented an important experiment in the evolution of fiscal policy institutions. The rules sought to articulate formal standards by which fiscal policymaking could be judged thereby increasing political accountability, even if the rules themselves amounted to nothing more than statements of intent. However, the fiscal crisis that confronted the UK in 2009 showed that even if the government's fiscal framework was an improvement on what went before, it clearly wasn't good enough.

Anglo-Flexicurity II: Insuring against Unemployment in the UK

This report outlines a fresh approach to national unemployment insurance, in which people can insure themselves against loss of income due to unemployment. It builds on the conceptual framework set out in the Social Market Foundation's earlier report Anglo-flexicurity: A safety net for UK workers.


Angloflexicurity: A safety net for the UK workers

Despite the sustained success of the British labour market, workers feel increasingly insecure. This is partly due to the increased financial consequences of losing employment today. At present, neither the state nor the private market provides an adequate response to this. This report argues that government, in cooperation with the private sector, can and should provide a safety net for the vulnerable middle class to counteract this trend.

The Social Market and its Enemies: A new philosophy for Brown?

The Social Market and its Enemies: A new philosophy for Brown? explores the origins of the social market; how the social market view of the world has evolved since the foundation of the SMF; the enemies of the social market; and the characteristics that distinguish social marketeers.

Economic Nationalism or Progressive Globalisation? The choice for modern government

This essay argues that those who benefit from globalisation need to contribute much more positively to the life chances of those who do not. If such social relations are to be expressed through government, politicians will have to undertake a significant and difficult re-evaluation of existing public institutions and spending priorities.

The New Demographics: Reshaping the world of work and retirement

The New Demographics: Reshaping the world of work and retirement analyses a number of false assumptions which underlie our thinking about retirement and calls for a radical overhaul of employment and leadership models that will allow people to continue working past retirement age.

Poverty pay: How public sector pay fails deprived areas

This publication examines the next steps in modernising public sector pay. A major finding of the paper is that greater equity of service provision will rely on increased local variation in public sector pay within a national pay bargaining framework. Private firms with large numbers of outlets have sophisticated gradations of regional pay. The public sector should adopt a similar model if London and the South East are to avoid a serious shortage of key public sector workers.

Regulating by Values: Is a sustainable responsible lending policy required?

This publication is a result of a seminar held in December 2006, which brought together some of the most important minds from within the sector to discuss whether a sustainable responsible lending policy is required in response to the difficulties over personal debt.

The Social Market Economy

In this paper, the Social Market Foundation’s first publication from 1989, Robert Sidelsky discusses the use of the phrase ‘social market economy’. It signifies a choice in favour of the market economy. The author stated that it means we turn to the market as a first resort and the government as a last resort, not the other way round.

The role of property in financing infrastructure

This paper outlines the findings of an SMF seminar, held in July 2003, and includes a restatement of the presentations given, a summary of the main points that emerged from discussion, and an attempt to draw all of this together to make some tentative conclusions.

A New Regulatory Agenda

The growth of regulation in Britain since the 1980s has been haphazard but immense, spawning a profession of its own. Criticisms about costs and excessive ‘red tape’ are familiar. However, recently, broader concerns have been expressed about service failures, particularly in railways and energy networks.

Health and Social Care

The commission on long-term care funding – A roundtable summary

Reforming the system for funding older people’s long-term care is one of the biggest public policy challenges confronting the UK. Following the 2010 general election, the new Coalition Government announced in its Programme for Government document that it would: “establish a commission on long-term care, to report within a year. This short brief summarises a roundtable convened by the Social Market Foundation to draw lessons for the new body from previous commissions on both long-term care funding and other policy challenges.

From Feast to Famine: Reforming the NHS for an age of austerity

Over the next decade, an unprecedented funding squeeze and demographic challenges will threaten the existing model of healthcare provision in the UK. Difficult choices will need to be made if we are not to se a return to rationing by waiting list, crumbling infrastructure and a decline in the quality of care – all of which would hit the poor and the sick hardest. This report concludes that the NHS must focus on two activities: securing better value for money, and constraining the inexorable rise in demand for care.

Local Control and Local Variation in the NHS: What do the Public Think?

The move towards greater local autonomy in the NHS offers new possibilities for services that are specifically targeted at local needs. Locally varied services will be necessary to make the health service more effective and efficient in the years ahead. But there are fears that greater local spending and decision-making power will undermine the national character of the NHS, amid public concern about ‘postcode lotteries’. This study presents the findings of a piece of original research carried out in conjunction with Ipsos MORI examining public views about variation in the NHS.

The Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease

The Social Market Foundation brought together a range of experts to discuss the challenges and opportunities of the new cardiovascular disease screening programme. The discussion was led by Professor Roger Boyle, the National Director for Heart Disease. This report includes Professor Boyle's remarks, and a thematic account of the ensuing discussion.

SMF Health Project Background Papers

These background papers provide an extensive review of the literature on different aspects of health policy – from the implications of ageing to the reformed provider market in the NHS. Intended as an introduction for the general reader these papers also identify the key challenges facing the health system and suggest areas for further research. The SMF Health Project will be building on these background papers and publishing a series of reports on key aspects of health policy before a final publication in 2009.

60th anniversary of the NHS

At the 60th anniversary of the NHS, the SMF has brought together a range of stakeholders in the health service

The Future of Healthcare

Demand for health services has outstripped the capacity available to meet it since the foundation of the National Health Service (NHS). Each new generation of politicians discovers this afresh – although their response is conditioned by their own particular ideological standpoint. However, in reality, the increase in funding has only allowed the NHS to ‘catch up’, in Wanless’ phrase, raising health spending to a level of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) similar to that of our European neighbours.

Finding a NICEr way to value health: From hypothetical preferences to real experiences

Following recent controversies over the availability of expensive drugs on the NHS, NICE’s work in allocating the NHS’s spending on medical treatments is coming under increasing scrutiny. In this essay, Professor Paul Dolan challenges the methodology used by NICE to determine the cost-effectiveness of different treatments.

Putting Patients In Control: The case for extending self-direction into the NHS

Putting patients In Control argues that it is time to end the institutional divide between health and social care that currently prevents self-direction being introduced into the NHS. It proposes the use of individual budgets for patients with long-term chronic conditions, such as mental illness and diabetes. This would give patients greater choice of treatment and allow them to develop their own package of care, mixing clinical and alternative therapies to meet their individual needs.

Do hospitals need to own their buildings?

General Health Co-operative (GHC) in Seattle has sold its last hospital. In future GHC will provide healthcare to over 600,000 people by using hospitals belonging to other organisations. Outside healthcare this would not be seen as a radical idea; airlines often do not own the aircraft they use and department stores lease space to other retailers. But in hospital care the buildings and the history associated with them have been seen as inseparable from the service.

Generating Cultural Change in Public Health: Evidence and Effectiveness

This publication, the result of a conference convened by the Social Market Foundation in June 2006, brings together some of the most expert and considered voices in the field to explore the contentious issues around the major themes dominating the health policy debate.

Implementing the 10-Year Childcare Strategy

In 2005, the Social Market Foundation, in partnership with Bright Horizons Family Solutions, hosted two seminars exploring the implications of the government’s 10 Year Strategy for childcare in the UK. This publication summarises the discussions which took place, representing an important contribution to the ongoing discussions around the Strategy.

Charging Ahead? Spreading the costs of modern public services

This report outlines the current pattern of co-payment in the UK and debates whether there is a case for introducing or extending co-payment into new areas of public service provision. It considers the economic rationale and the principles that should underpin the use of co-payment in UK public services, in particular the impact on equity.

Choice and Contestability in Primary Care

This paper examines the case for introducing certain kinds of choice into the primary care sector of the NHS.

Constraints of the State: the public good and the NHS

In this essay, published in January 2005, Secretary of State for Health Dr John Reid MP sets out the case for extending patient choice within the NHS.

Supporting Choice

This publication reviews the arguments presented by experts during a seminar held by the SMF in October 2004 on the promotion of public choice amongst those with special needs or limited capabilities.

Registering Choice: how primary care should change to meet patient needs

Patients have had the right to choose a GP since 1948. Yet for most of us, this right is little more than hypothetical. In this report, Professor Paul Corrigan, former Special Adviser to the Secretary of State for Health, explains why our primary care sector has reached this point and what reforms the Government should implement to address the problem.

Professionally-led regulation in healthcare - just a cosy club?

Written in the light of the fifth report of the Shipman enquiry, the essays tackle the question of whether the regulatory bodies for health care professionals have been reformed sufficiently or whether they still require a lot of change before they generate trust and confidence.

Introducing Social Insurance to the UK

In this report, the Health Commission reviews the main attractions of social insurance schemes, including greater consumer responsiveness, choice and transparency.

Whose responsibility is it anyway? Perspectives on public health, the state and the individual

This collection of essays brings together different perspectives on the public health debate, seeking to find the balance between state intervention and individual responsibility.

User charges for health

This paper, presented by the SMF Health Commission, reviews the case for user charges in health care.

Defining a core package for the NHS

This paper addresses the challenge of constructing and justifying a ‘core package’ of NHS services that would bring significant benefits.

Private Payment for Health: Boone or Bane?

This report argues that the analysis of the role private payments could play in UK health care has often been hindered by over-simplistic ideological views.

Direct to Patient Communication: Patient Empowerment or NHS Burden?

This collection of essays puts forward the arguments for and against relaxing the rules on direct to patient communication, with contributions from David Colin-Thome, Nicholas Bosanquet and Angela Coulter.

A fairer prescription for NHS charges

This publication explores user charges, revealing a system lacking all logic. It argues that the current cluster of systems perpetuates injustice, distorts medical priorities and hinders access to vital treatment.

Housing and Communities

Disconnected Citizens: Is Community Empowerment the Solution?

Community empowerment is a defining agenda of the Brown Government, and likely to feature heavily in the manifestos of all the three main parties at the next election. The Communities and Local Government White Paper on the same topic, which is due for launch in July 2008, is therefore eagerly anticipated, by the local government community at least. In this context, this essay discusses how, despite community empowerment being presented as a panacea for many social ills, the evidence in relation to some outcomes is relatively patchy.

Should the Green Belt be preserved?

Average house prices have doubled in the last decade. Demand for housing has outstripped supply to such an extent that housing has become a national policy priority for the Brown government, as well as a staple topic of conversation at dinner parties.

Giving something back: Business, volunteering and healthy communities

In this publication, all parties consider the role that government and business can play in pushing forward employee volunteering.

The future of private renting in the UK

This report argues that the growth of the privately rented sector over the previous fifteen years has been a major success and that success has been driven primarily by market forces.

Permission to engage?

In this essay, published in 2004, Paul Richards observes that voter disengagement, particularly among the urban working class, is effectively bringing about the reversal of the Reform Acts.

Culture, Media and Technology

Public Service Broadcasting in the UK: A Longer Term View

What is the future of public service broadcasting? Historically, UK broadcasting has been characterised by a high degree of public intervention. But the transition to digital TV and the arrival of high-speed broadband, with its multitude of viewing options, are having a profound impact on the industry. These changes create the possibility of more effective delivery of content but also threaten to erode existing commercial and public broadcaster models and to fragment audiences and funding. This paper, with a foreword by Gavyn Davies, explores what this changing context will mean for public service broadcasting in the UK some ten years from now.

Science, Risk and the Media: Do the front pages reflect reality?

As scientific discovery and technology, from vaccines and GM crops to the internet and mobile phones, drive forward our society, policy makers are confronted with the increasingly difficult issue of how to communicate scientific ideas, and the benefits and risks associated with them, to the public. This collection of transcripts highlights the main issues surrounding this debate, as well as making recommendations for improving communication for policy makers, the media, scientists and the public.

News Broadcasting in the Digital age - The need for PSB genre licences

This publication sets out the argument for the introduction of ‘genre’ licences, providing commercial broadcasters with the opportunity to bid for financial support to provide specific public service broadcasting (PSB) programming, specifically news programmes, paid for by ‘top-slicing’ the BBC licence fee.

The BBC and Public Value

In this publication Gavyn Davies argues, from an economic standpoint that the BBC should be retained in its standard form after its Charter renewal of 2006 despite changes in the broadcasting market brought about by digital technology.

Education and Skills

More Than CV Points: The Benefits of Employee Volunteering for Business and Individuals

In a difficult economic climate, there has never been a better time to explore the potential of employee volunteering schemes to furnish the UK workforce with both soft and hardskills. Although employee volunteering schemes have become increasingly widespread in recent years, employers often fail to differentiate between different kinds of volunteering schemes, conflating those that offer one day team-building exercises with those that involve accredited training and longer term career development. The result is that both employers and employees often fail to see the full potential benefits that workplace volunteering can bring.

Staying the Course: Changes to the Participation Age and Qualifications

The education of 14-19 year-olds is one of the biggest political debates of our time. The Brown government is legislating to raise the age at which young people leave compulsory education or training.

Disability, Skills and Work: Raising our ambitions

Disabled people represent one-fifth of the working age population, but are far more likely to be out of work and to lack skills than the population as a whole. Improving skills and employment for disabled people matters not just for equality, but also for national prosperity and delivering world-class skills and employment.

Practice Makes Perfect: The Importance of Practical Learning

Practical learning is central to transforming the life chances of young people and adults, and to the prosperity of the nation. This collection of essays bring together some of the foremost thinkers in this field to look at the evidence and the challenges facing policymakers.

Looked After or Overlooked? Good parenting and school choice for looked after children

This publication explores educational reforms that aim to place greater control in the hands of parents and increase choice within the school system, arguing they risk overlooking Looked After Children, or even increasing current disadvantage. This paper addresses this issue by setting out a system of financial incentives that give “corporate parents” the same power and interest in their children's education as any other parent.

Fade or Flourish: How primary schools can build on children's early progress

The government has rightly invested a significant amount of resources into improving the early years’ experiences of the most socio-economically disadvantaged children in the country. Yet evidence suggests that some of the benefits of preschool can be lost during later childhood if they are not consolidated. In this research, we explain how primary schools can play a crucial role in sustaining the social and academic gains provided by early years’ interventions.

Charging Ahead? Spreading the costs of modern public services

This report outlines the current pattern of co-payment in the UK and debates whether there is a case for introducing or extending co-payment into new areas of public service provision. It considers the economic rationale and the principles that should underpin the use of co-payment in UK public services, in particular the impact on equity.

Making Choice a Reality in Secondary Education

This publication presents an examination of how choice might work in secondary education. Importantly, the case it presents considers what might be achieved in terms of increased quality, but also considers what the impact might be in terms of equity.

A 2020 Vision for the Early Years

This paper formed part of an extensive project at the Social Market Foundation, which explored the contribution of early years to improving the life chances of disadvantaged children and their families.

School Admissions

This report, produced by an internal SMF Commission, proposes ballots as a means of allocating places in oversubscribed schools.

Too much too late: Life Chances and Spending on Education and Training

Despite unprecedented levels of investments, education has failed to break the link between attainment and family background. Too Much, Too Late argues that this will not change significantly as long as the pattern of spending on education and training continues to offer a far greater public subsidy to tertiary than preschool education.

Environment and Energy

Trading Emissions - Full global potential

An essay by Simon Linnett, Executive Vice Chairman of Rothschild. The essay asserts that carbon trading will be one of the most effective methods to combat climate change, since it allows the private sector to play a major role. The author argues that a global authority will be required to regulate carbon trading schemes, and that national governments must necessarily cede some of their sovreignity to this body. Finally, Mr Linnett suggests that as a global financial centre, London would be the natural choice to house a newly constituted World Environment Agency.

From Review to Reality: The search for a credible energy policy

This paper provides a critique of the government’s 2006 Energy Review, focusing on the continuing gaps between the current position as represented by the Review and the requirements of a credible energy policy.

Turning Business Green: How to make the Unifrom Business Rate fit for the future

This report calls on the government to introduce a new 'Green Buildings' property tax relief to encourage businesses to cut the carbon footprint of their properties.

A New British Energy Policy

In this publication Dr Dieter Helm argues that energy policy should adapt to reflect the new security priorities of supply and climate change.

Public Service Reform

Assertive Citizens: New Relationships in the Public Services

People demand more from their public services than ever before. the rising prosperity and greater social freedoms of the post-war period have led to the rise of the 'assertive citizen'. Public service users are now more aware of their rights, expect a better service, and defer less to established sources of advice such as professional opinion.


Generating Cultural Change in Public Health: Evidence and Effectiveness

This publication, the result of a conference convened by the Social Market Foundation in June 2006, brings together some of the most expert and considered voices in the field to explore the contentious issues around the major themes dominating the health policy debate.

Who Shares Wins? Transforming the public services with intelligent information

Without effective use of information, public service delivery is slow, inefficient and expensive. Yet, until recently, improving the government’s use of information had not been a priority. However, with increasing expectations among the public for more convenient and joined up public services, the government has realised that more and better information sharing is the key to efficient and cost effective government.

Charging Ahead? Spreading the costs of modern public services

This report outlines the current pattern of co-payment in the UK and debates whether there is a case for introducing or extending co-payment into new areas of public service provision. It considers the economic rationale and the principles that should underpin the use of co-payment in UK public services, in particular the impact on equity.

Registering Choice: How primary care should change to meet patient needs

Patients have had the right to choose a GP since 1948. Yet for most of us, this right is little more than hypothetical. In this report, Professor Paul Corrigan, former Special Adviser to the Secretary of State for Health, explains why our primary care sector has reached this point and what reforms the Government should implement to address the problem.

To the point: A Blueprint for Good Targets

This report is a thorough examination of the government’s use of targets in four public services: education, health, housing and the criminal justice system.

Reform Works

In this volume, several junior ministers argue that reform of public services is the natural concomitant of equity and efficiency and set out the direction of future travel.

Reinventing Government Again

Ten years has passed since the publication of Osborne and Gaebler’s landmark book Reinventing Government. Thus, in 2004, the Social Market Foundation published a reflection on the ten principles for entrepreneurial government that were set out in the original.

Choice: The evidence

This report provides an evidence-based analysis of the effects of choice systems in public services.

Poverty and Social Mobility

Childcare Vouchers: Who Benefits? An Assessment of Evidence from the Family Resources Survey

The Government introduced tax relief on childcare vouchers in 2005 to provide greater childcare support for parents. In recent months, the role of childcare vouchers has come under intense scrutiny, and the Government has pledged to reduce the tax relief available to higher rate taxpayers from 2011. But the debate around this issue has been characterized by a lack of evidence on who actually uses childcare vouchers. How do vouchers fit in with other forms of childcare support that are available? How many people claim them in the UK? Are they typically rich professionals,or are voucher users representative of all socio-economic groups? How much does the policy cost the Government and how much will the recently proposed reforms save? All these questions and more are answered in this important and timely evidence paper.

AntiSocial Britain and the Challenge of Citizenship

AntiSocial Britain is critical of politicians of all parties for attempting - and failing - to appease consumerism instead of arguing for citizenship, and for accepting a range of social responsibilities which they cannot fulfil.

The Politics of Aspiration

The Politics of Aspiration brings together valuable contributions from Jim Murphy MP, Trevor Phillips, Chair, Commission for Equality and Human Rights, Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks and several other commentators and academics o¬n the importance of aspiration as a driving force in ending poverty and increasing social mobility in the UK.

Delivering Full Employment: From the New Deal to personal employment accounts

To achieve full employment over the next decade requires a fresh approach to welfare to work. This paper recommends that workless people be given a virtual budget – a personal employment account – instead of being enrolled in the current New Deal. This account, based on a similar initiative being piloted in seven states in the US, would be used far more flexibly for a far wider range of support.

The Regional Casinos Debate: Regeneration and responsible gambling in the UK

This publication, the result of a conference convened by the Social Market Foundation in July 2006, brings together some of the most expert and considered voices in the field to explore the contentious issues around the major themes dominating the regional casino debate: regeneration and responsible gambling.

A 2020 Vision for the Early Years

This paper formed part of an extensive project at the Social Market Foundation, which explored the contribution of early years to improving the life chances of disadvantaged children and their families.

A Modern Agenda for Prosperity and Social Reform: Opportunity, Security, Prosperity

This pamphlet is a speech delivered to the Social Market Foundation on February 3rd 2003 by Gordon Brown, in which he sets out his agenda for prosperity and social reform.

Transport

Roads to Recovery: Reducing congestion through shared ownership

The current political debate is largely centred around the balance between public spending cuts and tax rises. But the importance of economic growth in dealing with the crisis in public finances should not be forgotten. The congestion that clogs up the road network is a major impediment to economic recovery as British employees and companies labour under the huge hidden costs of a creaking transport infrastructure.

Road User Charging: A Road Map

Road User Charging: A road map, sets out the important decisions government will have to take if it chooses to implement road user charging. It highlights the trade-offs between efficiency, public acceptability and equity, and provides a road map for moving the debate on road pricing from the why to the how.

No More School Run

Nearly 20 per cent of traffic on UK roads during the morning rush hour is on the school run and it is increasing every year. To tackle this problem, this paper argues that we should introduce a dedicated school bus network of the type used in North America.

Integrating Transport

In this pamphlet, Professor Begg reviews how far the Government has come, what has really been achieved and what can be done in the future to revive our transport network.

Welfare Reform

Better But Cheaper? Reforming the Child Trust Fund

The Child Trust Fund, tax-incentivised universal children's savings accounts launched in 2002, was arguably the most innovative social policy implemented under the post-1997 Labour governments. The objectives of the Child Trust Fund range widely across savings policy, financial engagement and asset-based welfare, and are notable for seeking to change the behaviour of both children and their parents. However, the Child Trust Fund today is at a crossroads: it is not achieving its aims as well as was hoped, and it is no longer affordable in its current state.

Vicious Cycles: Sustained employment and welfare reform for the next decade

SMF’s latest report "Vicious Cycles: sustained employment and welfare reform for the next decade" focuses on the direction of welfare reform for the next decade. Within six months of leaving Jobseeker’s Allowance for work, 40% of claimants are back on benefits. This vicious cycle is costly to both the individuals themselves and to the taxpayer. Rising unemployment will make these problems still more pressing.

The jobs crisis and what to do about it

This report uses data from two previous recessions and the latest Ernst & Young ITEM Club economic growth forecasts to estimate what might happen to claimant count unemployment and the number of long-term unemployed in particular. SMF analysis suggests that the claimant count will peak at over 2.7 million in 2011-12, while the number of long-term unemployed people (those without work for more than one year) will rise to a peak of around 1.1 million by 2012. While in recent years long-term unemployment has been a minor part of total unemployment, this is set to change radically with important implications for how policy should respond.

Shifting Responsibilities, Sharing Costs: The Mental Health Challenge for Welfare Reform

With a long way to go to meet the government target of one million fewer claimants on Incapacity Benefit by 2015, there is an increasing recognition that efforts must focus not only on returning people from welfare to work, but also on preventing the slide from employment towards benefits in the first place.

Flexible New Deal: Making it Work

In this report, the authors examine how likely the implementation of FND will be to succeed in four key areas: cost-effective commissioning; helping all jobseekers; preventing ‘revolving door’ employment; and stimulating innovation in welfare-to-work provision. In each area, FND in practice promises not to be as effective as it could or should be. The authors argue that this is the result of a failure to design the programme in a way that aligns incentives between contractors and government. The authors describe practical approaches to resolve the tensions between procurer and contractor. In doing so, they suggest the blueprint for a 21st century a welfare-to-work programme that offers the step-change in performance that the government seeks.

Delivering Full Employment: From the New Deal to personal employment accounts

To achieve full employment over the next decade requires a fresh approach to welfare to work. This paper recommends that workless people be given a virtual budget – a personal employment account – instead of being enrolled in the current New Deal. This account, based on a similar initiative being piloted in seven states in the US, would be used far more flexibly for a far wider range of support.

What if? A UK model for compulsory pensions

Published just before the long awaited Pensions Commission report on the future of pensions, this publication explores how pension compulsion might have been best implemented in order to meet the challenges facing the UK pension system.

The Incapacity Trap: Report of the SMF Commission on Incapacity Benefit Reform

This report is a product of the 2005 SMF Internal Commission examining the UK's system of Incapacity Benefit.

Increased Pension Compulsion in the UK

This paper sets out the 2005 SMF working group on pension compulsion's initial discussions and preliminary agendas.

Private Sector Provision of Employment Services for Young Adults at Risk

Evidence suggest that experiencing some form of employment or work experience is the most effective way of getting low skilled young people into permanent employment. This report analyses the effectiveness of work experience, training and employment schemes provided by the private sector for a particularly vulnerable group of low skilled youth: young offenders and young people at risk of offending.

Save our pensions

In this publication, Peter Lilley argues that compulsion is the only real solution to Britain’s pension’s crisis.

Other

EU Social Market and Social Policy

Lord David Owen, one of the founders of the SDP, played a key role in the establishment of the Social Market Foundation. In this publication, Lord Owen looks at the social market today. This publication, part of the ongoing celebrations of the SMF at Twenty-One, looks back at the intellectual history of the Social Market Foundation to show how social market ideas can influence policy and politics into the future.

Well-being: How to lead the good life and what government should do to help

Why are we are no happier than we once were? Should raising well-being be the aim of government? This book brings together celebrated academics and commentators to look for answers in the work of earlier thinkers, from JS Mill to JK Galbraith. Richard Reeves, Liam Halligan, Will Hutton, Kevin Hickson and Marina Bianchi examine the arguments of their chosen theorists. Lord Richard Layard, the best known contemporary advocate for government action in this area, concludes by giving his own take on why government should put well-being at the centre of its agenda.

The New Blue: Conservative candidates on new UK policy challenges

In The New Blue, the Social Market Foundation brings together leading Conservative parliamentary candidates to address the challenges faced by government and society. How can we raise aspirations and prevent the “marginalization” of deprived communities? What policies should we introduce to help protect women and address violent crime? Can we stop the loss of faith in politics and politicians? Could the answer lie in a more compassionate economic policy? How can we meet the needs of cities while moving away from an urban bias in politics? What is the role of education in promoting our sense of community? As well as addressing key policy challenges, this collection provides an insight into the ideas of the next generation of Conservative thinkers that may well dominate politics in the years ahead.

Creatures of Habit? The Art of Behavioural Change

Many of the major challenges facing society today require that individuals change their behaviour. However, policies introduced so far have had mixed results. The proportion of the population classified as obese continues to grow, despite the significant provision of information on the health risks this brings and the diet and activity needed to avoid it. People continue to save too little for their old age, although numerous financial and other incentives have been deployed to promote saving. Despite high-profile campaigns on the harmful effects of human activity on the environment, individual behaviour to address climate change has not shifted as quickly as policymakers have hoped.

AntiSocial Britain and the Challenge of Citizenship

AntiSocial Britain is critical of politicians of all parties for attempting - and failing - to appease consumerism instead of arguing for citizenship, and for accepting a range of social responsibilities which they cannot fulfil.

What's Right Now?

Writing on topics as diverse as the future of the EU, welfare reform, direct democracy, and social markets, the contributors address head on the questions which will define the future direction of the Party: the appropriate role of the state; the strengths and limitations of markets; and strengthening civil society.

Accountable Government

This report outlines the findings of the Business Forum: Regulatory Best Practice Group, which canvassed views from the business community on the difficulties they face in dealing with the institutions of the government.

Financial Education and Personal Debt: The role of the state, the market and the individual

This paper outlines three perspectives on what role the state should play where the management of personal finances is concerned.