Shadow Minister shares ambitions for UK employment at Good Work conference

“A day when you felt things moved forward” – Liz Sewell FIEP (Belina Consulting Ltd; Chair, ERSA London Region)

This April, over 100 guests including policymakers, researchers, and employment and business professionals gathered at Manchester Met for an innovative new mini-conference, ‘From Work First to Good Work: Supporting people into good jobs, not just any jobs.’

Led by Dr Katy Jones (Business School) and chaired by Elizabeth Taylor (Chief Executive at ERSA), the conference was jointly organised by MetroPolis and Manchester Met’s Centre for Decent Work and Productivity, in partnership with Employment Related Services Association (ERSA).

The sold-out, interactive event explored how to improve the employment landscape in the UK and allowed attendees to share their ideas on developing a more ambitious approach to supporting people into good jobs, not just any jobs.

A keynote address was delivered by Alison McGovern MP (Shadow Minister for Employment and Social Security and Acting Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions). Championing the conference’s aims, the Shadow Minister laid out in her keynote a vision of a more ambitious Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), supporting people into jobs people feel proud to do.

Following the keynote, Elizabeth Taylor shared reflections on ‘good work’ from her tenure at ERSA, and Dr Jones detailed the cutting-edge research on employment taking place at Manchester Met. A policy pitch panel allowed employment experts including Tom Pollard (New Economics Foundation), Pat Russell (Institute of Employability Professionals), Emilia Quist (Federation of Small Businesses), Matthew Davis (Institute of Place Management), Tendayi Madzunzu (Uncertain Futures) and Anjum Klair (Trades Union Congress) to pitch their proposal for better supporting people into good work to attendees. Tom Pollard’s proposal that, ‘the DWP should be prioritising engagement over compliance,’ received the highest number of votes on the day.

A new policy paper by MetroPolis, ‘A Good Work Revolution: How to improve the UK’s employment landscape and tackle inequality’, was also launched at the conference, which delves further into the day’s themes. Drawing insight from pioneering Manchester Met research, the paper outlines clear steps which could catalyse a good work revolution for the UK.

On the conference and next steps, Dr Jones commented,

“This conference demonstrated a huge demand for a more ambitious, evidence-based approach to employment policy. Policymakers, researchers, businesses, trade unions, employability professionals and those with direct experience of the employment support system highlighted both the need – and the value – of shifting from tired policy approaches focused on moving unemployed people into any job quickly, to one with supporting people into good quality work at its core”.

Scroll through the images below to catch up on the day’s events.