As we head into 2025, the UK is facing persistent challenges, including high public debt, a strained labour market, and inflationary pressures, all culminating in increased pressures on the country’s public services.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that traditional approaches to employment support are no longer sufficient. If we are serious about creating opportunities for people furthest from the labour market, we must rethink how we deliver support to ensure it addresses people’s needs in a more holistic way – that is why I am supportive of the government’s aim to unite employment, skills, and health support in a truly integrated way.

This is not just about jobs and it’s not just about the UK. Many of the challenges the UK is facing are global, and around the world, employment support needs to address the real, often complex, barriers that people face—whether it’s mental health challenges, housing instability, or a lack of skills and confidence.

Without a joined-up approach, vulnerable individuals and families will continue to slip through the cracks, just as my own family did.

The Cost of Disjointed Services

Growing up in a declining mining town, I saw firsthand what happens when public services fail to communicate or collaborate. My family faced multiple challenges after my mother’s severe mental illness left her unable to cope. Despite many red flags, no one stepped in to provide the coordinated support we needed. It was luck, not intervention, that kept us safe.

This experience drives my belief that no one should have to rely on luck. Yet today, disjointed services remain a reality for many. People who are unemployed often face multiple barriers simultaneously, but these are rarely addressed holistically. Housing issues, health needs, and skills gaps are treated as separate problems when they are deeply interconnected.

For example, a person facing homelessness may find it impossible to focus on a training course or maintain a job. Addressing their housing needs is not secondary to employment—it’s foundational. Likewise, long health services waiting lists to access appropriate support mean that mental and physical health conditions continue to be a major barrier to employment for way longer than they should.

If these barriers aren’t tackled together, efforts to move people into work will fail, and the cycle of poverty continues.

A Holistic Approach

The solution lies in place-based, integrated services that respond to the unique needs of individuals and communities. It requires collaboration across sectors, meaningful investment, and a shared vision for change.

Programs that embrace this model are already making a difference. For instance, employment programs that prioritise housing support have helped thousands of participants secure stable accommodation—a critical first step toward re-entering the workforce.

Similarly, embedding mental health support into employability services ensures that individuals can address emotional and psychological barriers alongside developing job-ready skills.

Tackling Economic Inactivity

The need for this integrated approach has never been more urgent. In the UK, years of austerity have left the NHS and wider public services threadbare; which combined with the impact of COVID-19, and the loss of funding streams that traditionally focused on those furthest from the labour market (such as the European Social Fund), means that it is no surprise that economic inactivity has risen sharply.

At the same time, employment services themselves are often undervalued and misunderstood. The recent ‘Get Britain Working White Paper’ criticised the current system for failing to support those furthest from the labour market, an assertion I would counter, and I would caution the government not to dismiss the significant lessons the employability sector has learned in delivering employment support at scale to increasingly complex caseloads.

Outsourced Department of Work and Pension programs have become one of the few places people can currently find meaningful support – and this often goes way beyond helping someone to find a job. This has meant that as a sector we have had to enable our advisors to support people experiencing wide ranging and complex barriers through programs not originally designed to address such complexity.

To achieve this our services (by necessity) are heavily embedded within their local communities - we work closely with local community organisations and services, most of our employment advisors are from those communities and often have lived experience of the barriers our service users face.

The Role of Devolution

Devolution, or the transfer of delegation from a central to more local administration or government, offers an opportunity to deliver better, more integrated support at a local level – something that is desperately needed. But devolution alone is not enough. Essential public services must be properly funded; otherwise, Combined and Local Authorities could face the same resource constraints that have plagued our current heavily centralised system.

True place-based working is about more than where funding sits. It’s about aligning services, building partnerships, and putting individuals at the centre. It’s about ensuring that economically inactive people can access the support they need and when they need it, whether that be housing, health, and/or skills support, without having to navigate a maze of confusing and disconnected agencies.

Building an Inclusive Future

As a sector, we have made progress. Employment programs now prioritise local engagement and holistic support. But we must go further. We need to advocate for properly funded, integrated services that address the full spectrum of challenges people face.

Economic inactivity is not just an employment problem; it’s a societal challenge. Solving it requires a bold, collaborative approach that brings together employment, skills, and health interventions into a unified framework.

This is not just about improving job outcomes. It’s about giving people the confidence, stability, and hope they need to move forward. It’s about creating communities where no one is left behind. And it’s about ensuring that everyone, no matter their circumstances, has the opportunity to achieve their full potential.

The stakes are too high to settle for anything less. Let’s work together to build a system that truly supports people, families, and communities—and delivers the transformative change that’s long overdue.