Whitewash report claims that there’s no such thing as DWP “league tables” for sanctions

Whilst the Westminster village has been working itself up into a lather over the rise of UKIP and when/if there should be an EU referendum, the DWP snuck out a report on the evidence of DWP league tables that we brought you recently.

It’s a total whitewash.

The report – which you can read here – argues that claims of a league table are entirely down to individual managers at a number of job centres. You could call it the “one rogue manager” defence. Now why does that sound familiar…?

The report also claims that there is “no evidence of a secret national regime of targets” – yet admit that it would be “technically possible” to produce such a league table with “a simple manipulation of excel”. It also appears to blame “junior managers” for the confusion, yet the same report notes that the staff member whose email triggered the investigation is a civil servant with 28 years experience.

Perhaps most spectacularly, the annex of the report features ten different examples where such behaviour is taking place and then argues that these are all unconnected and not about targets for sanctions…

The report also argues that although there are no league tables, that it would be acceptable to  give “an idea of what might be expected in their local labour market and for their size of caseload as an aid in judging whether the law is being properly applied”

Would a target by any other name smell so sweet…?