This site is designed to help those who want to investigate questions related to the welfare system. You can start an investigation yourself and let us know about it at paul@helpmeinvestigate.com, join one of the investigations being pursued by members of Help Me Investigate Welfare, or just help get involved by posting useful links (we’ll help point you in their direction).
The categories of this blog are intended to make it easier for you to find useful resources. They are currently:
Some other resources you may find useful include:
- Need to get information from a public body in the UK? Use What Do They Know.
- You can also try to get information through the EU with AskTheEU.
- For curation editors: how to compile a news feed on welfare issues and 5 ways to find Twitter accounts following a field.
- There are ongoing tips and updates on investigating public issues generally at the Help Me Investigate blog.
The following videos from the main Help Me Investigate blog provide some general guidance on starting and focusing an investigation:
With your help I calculated that some 4.9 billion is spent on Employment benefits, less than 5% of total spending on benefits, but only some 111, million are spent on payments to recipients. That leaves some 4.7 billion to pay for Jobcentres and all the new “private sector” jobs being created by companies delivering training and back-to-work schemes. Did I get my math wrong, or is something wrong here?
Do you have a spreadsheet where you did the calculations? I could then answer the question – it would also be good to share that.
Sorry folks, I got the math wrong! I still don’t have a clue how much it costs to give out £71 per week per jobseeker.