Direct questions about Pertemps contract have a tendency to meet with disinclination to respond. This is a waste of time by all concerned; therefore, I have tried to pursue indirect answers by making simple requests for information. Below is a copy of the October review made by Jobcentreplus. According to it there has been some consultation with the Home Office about Freedom of Information. I can only speculate about this, but perhaps they were discussing whether there was some legal way to avoid providing me with the information I have asked for? Anyway, off we go.
Whoa! Look at that number. It has grown from what it says in the contract to £2.26 million. I assume that is because it is for 2 years.
A phrase worthy of note is "I have real concerns over poor performance". Well it's nice to know I am not alone. How about "they have not yet attained any job outcomes"? Heehee. If you were under the impression that that was the main point of this exercise in public expenditure you might be disappointed. Pertemps appear to have submitted figures that are way out of line with reality. Is that a mistake or book cooking? 55 job outcomes at £591.90 each is worth £32,554.50 to them. Nice work if you can get it. If I was looking for evidence of serious irregularity, I hit the jackpot immediately.
So we do not have proof positive from this document of default,mainly because it avoids crucial contractual topics such as stating the number of people who were not provided with the occupational area they requested, resulting in weeks on end of expensive boredom under the guise of job search. However, it is good to have some substance after being subjected to all that verbal rubbish, and perhaps it has opened Pandora's Box? The Contract Manager is "not able to asses the performance properly at such an early stage in the contracts life". The review is fairly non committal, but we have other documents coming up and we will see what they say. This doesn't mean that I will let up on my direct "are they or aren't they" questions. One approach they could take is to sit on the fence for the entire two years duration and just report "oh we can't comment on their performance at this stage" indefinitely.