Encouraging employment: the UK’s ‘new deal for lone parents’
Jane Millar
Centre for the Analysis of Social Policy, University of Bath
Contact Email:   hssjimbath.ac.uk

Since 1997, the UK government has pursued a vigorous programme of welfare reform, including many provisions both directly and indirectly aimed at lone parents. A number of policy targets have been set, including:

· A target that 70 per cent of lone parents should be employed within ten years;

· A pledge to eliminate child poverty within twenty years, and to halve it within ten years;

· An undertaking to increase the supply of childcare in general and to provide child care places for all employed lone parents living in the poorest areas;

· A commitment to reforming child support to make the system simpler and more effective.

Central to the first of these targets is the New Deal for Lone Parents (NDLP), which was introduced nationally in 1998. This is a voluntary programme that aims to help and support lone parents into paid employment. It offers information and advice to lone parents, with some access to training and other programmes. It is the first time that lone parents in Britain have been targeted for such a programme. About 335,000 lone parents have taken part in the programme since 1998, and overall employment rates for lone parents have risen from 47 per cent in 1998 to 53 per cent in 2002.

This paper will set the NDLP in wider policy context, discuss the evaluation strategy, and summarise the evidence relating to the impact of the programme. It will also consider future policy options, especially in light of the 70 per cent employment target.

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