No One Left Behind: employability strategic plan 2024 to 2027

2. Introduction

Our Vision

To deliver an employability system that tackles inequalities in Scotland’s labour market, creating a responsive and aligned approach that helps people of all ages who face the greatest barriers to progress towards, into and to sustain work.

Since devolution of employment support powers, we have been clear on our desire to shape an employability system for Scotland that delivers better outcomes for people who experience barriers to accessing the labour market.

We have been clear that the employability system must centre on the people that access it. This requires support to be tailored to an individual’s circumstances, and a recognition that progress towards employment may not be linear. We want employability services to be seen as an opportunity by those accessing them, which is why participation is entirely voluntary.

At the outset of devolution, we established the need for Scotland’s employability services to treat people with dignity and respect, to have fairness and equality at their heart, and to continuously improve – we remain committed to these values.

Why publish this plan?

Employability services are critical to creating a more inclusive labour market in Scotland, and are well placed to play a role in addressing a range of prevailing labour market challenges:

• Child poverty rates remain too high, with parents continuing to experience barriers to entering and increasing their income from employment^[1]. There is a strong gendered element to this, with women more likely to be employed in low-paid, part time work^[2].
• Despite relatively low unemployment rates, economic inactivity rates remain a concern, with a large contributor of this group being more people reporting as long-term sick or disabled^[3].
• Although there has been steady progress in reducing the disability employment rate gap^[4], there is more to be done to meet our target to at least halve the gap by 2038 (from 2016 baseline) and Scotland continues to lag behind some other countries^[5].
• Significant barriers to accessing fair work in the labour market persist for women, disabled people, unpaid carers, people with convictions and individuals from racialised minorities who continue to experience lower employment rates than others^[6].
• There is local variation with areas of high unemployment also tending to have high economic inactivity^[7].
• It is estimated that unpaid carers leaving employment cost the UK public purse £2.9 billion a year in welfare payments and lost tax revenue. The impact of women reducing hours, not taking or applying for promotions, or leaving the labour market altogether in order to provide unpaid care contributes towards Scotland’s gender pay gap^[8].

These challenges represent lost opportunities for people, for employers, and for Scotland as a whole. Although Scotland’s labour market has been more resilient than anticipated post-Covid-19, addressing these challenges is a central element of creating the Scotland we want to see.

Employability will not be able to do this on its own, and partnership working between organisations and services will be essential. That is why Scottish and Local Government embarked on a programme of transformational change through No One Left Behind – to design and implement a delivery model which has partnership at its heart and that actively drives alignment and integration of the services people may need to support their journey towards and into employment.

This plan is being published at a crucial time for Scotland’s devolved employability services as we move fully to a local delivery model. In supporting this move, we have engaged with partners and stakeholders through a series of national discussion events, and conducted evaluations of previous activity to generate learning. We have also considered broader policy ambitions, including those set out in the National Strategy for Economic Transformation, Fair Work Action Plan, Best Start, Bright Futures, the Verity House Agreement, and those in the COSLA Plan 2022-27, to shape the areas of priority for employability services over the lifetime of this plan.

Throughout this plan, we will:

• Set out the delivery model for Scotland’s employability system, recognising that there have been notable changes since April 2018;
• Establish areas of priorities over the lifetime of this plan, based on evidence of labour market challenges and feedback from partners; and
• Set actions Scottish and Local Government will jointly take to deliver on these priorities

The Journey so far

Employability services in Scotland have been on a journey since devolution of further powers under the Scotland Act 2016. Prior to this, evidence identified an employability landscape which was cluttered, complex for people to navigate, and which contained duplication of effort across a range of key actors.

In 2018, the Scottish Government published No One Left Behind: Next Steps for the Integration and Alignment of Employability Support in Scotland, which set out the evidence for change and the principles that must guide activity moving forward.

Action to deliver on the ambitions of No One Left Behind have been shaped by the Partnership Working Agreement for Employability, signed between Scottish Ministers and COSLA spokespersons in 2018.

We have come a significant distance since. Following the end of referrals to Fair Start Scotland in March 2024, Scottish Government funded employability provision is now commissioned through Local Employability Partnerships, under the No One Left Behind approach. This has seen the consolidation of a variety of national and local funding into a single, all-age offer of support, with delivery shifting from national to local models. Not only has this simplified the landscape for people, but it has created greater scope for partners to inform provision through Local Employability Partnerships (LEPs), supported decisions to be taken closer to participants, and enabled local labour market conditions to shape the focus of services more closely.

However, as we move forward, it is important to recognise the learning from Fair Start Scotland provision over its six years. Some key points noted in the range of evaluations include:

• People accessing Fair Start Scotland were generally positive about the type of support they received, although often this related to wrap-around support rather than traditional employability interventions, such as help with an addiction or specialist support for a mental health condition^[9].
• Support tailored to the individual was highly valued^[10], with the flexible pace of the service noted as a key benefit^[11].
• Specialist employability support varied in terms of availability and quality across Scotland^[12].
• Development of in-work support action plans and on-going engagement with key workers during this time were found to be useful by participants.^[13]

Employability in Scotland today

Participant Experience

• Around 9 out of every 10 service users thought the support they received had met their needs.
• 69% of employability staff thought No One Left Behind had made employability services easier for people to navigate.
• 87% of service users were satisfied with the support they received.
• Around 9 out of every 10 service users agreed the services treated them with dignity and respect.

Reach

• 61930 people have received support through No One Left Behind since April 2019.
• Overall, 19% of participants reported being disabled. This increased from 18% in Year 1 to 25% in Year 5.
• Overall, 3% of participants reported being a refugee.
• Since April 2020, 28% of all people who started to receive support were parents.
• In year 5, 39% of participants reported a Long-term Health Condition, with 23% of all participants reporting a mental health condition.
• Overall, 6% of participants reported a criminal conviction.
• Overall, 23% of participants report having one or more long term health condition.

Outcomes

• Of all parents receiving support since April 2020 – 19% were disabled, 57% lone parents, 12% aged under 25, 24% with 3+ children, 8% had a child under 1 year and 15% had a disabled child or adult within the family.
• A total of 2527 (22%) participants with a disability entered employment, 1710 (15%) gained a qualification, and 1,494 (13%) entered further/higher education and/or training
• From April 2019 to March 2024, of the 61930 people receiving support on No One Left Behind, 19146 (31%) have entered employment.
• Overall, 8783 (14%) entered further or higher education or training.