It is part of the social security benefits system and is intended to cover living expenses while the claimant is out of work.
In February 1922 a means test was introduced which excluded some, such as single adults who lived with relatives, from receiving benefit payments.
[13][14] Previously, on 11 September 1996, the Social Security (Credits and Contributions) (Jobseeker's Allowance Consequential and Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 1996[15] were created, brought before parliament five days later and subsequently made policy coming into force also on 7 October.
One part of the scheme required the long-term unemployed to participate in unpaid work activity for a maximum of six-months.
[23] The DWP for England and Wales showed one third of the total number of claimants for JSA were persons having been convicted of a crime resulting in their act(s) having been recorded by the police authorities.
[26] According to a report in 2008 by the Social Market Foundation there were approximately 100,000 long-term unemployed persons claiming JSA, at any given time.
[33][failed verification][34][verification needed] at the heart of the new state will be a contract between citizen and government based on responsibilities and right[35]Applicants qualified by conforming to all of the following requirements: New-style (contribution-based) Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA(C)) entitlement is based on Class 1 National Insurance contributions in the two complete tax years preceding the benefit year of claim.
Many older citizens seeking work could not receive payments, despite qualifying through NI contributions, because they had pension income.
This scheme was administered by the Department for Employment and Learning which operates Jobs & Benefits Offices jointly with the Social Security Agency.
[39] On 6 March 2012 the UK Government announced benefits changes for prisoners at the end of their sentence and those claiming JSA.
[40] Unlike New Deal there was no choice of training or help setting up a business, nor could the job seeker choose what type of unpaid work they did.
In both cases, the amount of benefit paid was the same (an additional Pensioner Premium was added to Income-based JSA).
National Insurance credits were paid by the Government on his behalf, even if he claimed another benefit; this came to an end in 2016, with the new State Pension.
A special part-week payment of State Pension is paid for the benefit week including the customer's birthday, making the claim continuous.
A person choosing to remain out of employment should a vacancy be available is obliged to give a "good reason" for the choice or their monies are to be withheld.
[32] The Work and Pensions Committee of the House of Commons discovered single parents, care leavers and claimants with health problems and disabilities were "disproportionately vulnerable" to, and impacted by, sanctions.
Examples of "extreme hardship and distress" included a wheelchair user who "sofa-surfed" or slept in a college library for a year when her whole benefit was wrongly withdrawn.
A man was sanctioned because he missed a job centre appointment three days after he went to hospital with severe epileptic seizures.
[45]The Guardian has listed ten cases of stopped benefits which it regards as either for "trivial reasons" or due to DWP "administrative errors".
The latter included letters sent by the DWP to the wrong address and people who arrived on time at the job centre but found an unusually long queue.
[49] Two cases show reasonably foreseeable consequences for sanctioned diabetic claimants: one resorted to begging for food,[50] whilst another who was apparently unable to afford to keep his insulin properly refrigerated was found dead, leading to a parliamentary select committee investigation of sanctions.
[53] Paul Jenkins, chief executive of the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, who previously worked for Rethink Mental Illness, criticised the reintroduction of sanctions, which were suspended in March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom.
[54] According to Patrick Wintour in The Guardian, job centre staff were threatened they would be disciplined and given targets because it was felt too few claimants were sanctioned.
There was reportedly a 'climate of fear' at job centres with staff under pressure to sanction innocent people to meet targets.
James Bolton of Mencap said: Learning disability is often misunderstood or ignored by advisors and, as a result, essential simple adjustments aren't made to help individuals complete the tasks they are often unfairly set, or even help them understand what sanctions are.