Pat McFadden, Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, has acknowledged that the Universal Credit benefits system contains fundamental flaws that need to be addressed. Speaking during a visit to the Boots warehouse in Nottingham alongside Juliet Campbell MP, Mr McFadden highlighted how the current design of Universal Credit can result in individuals being signed off work indefinitely.
The visit saw Mr McFadden and Ms Campbell meet several young people who recently started employment through the government’s Jobs Guarantee scheme at Boots. Many of these recruits are engaged in packing and labelling products for dispatch, while others fulfil administrative duties.
Mr McFadden criticised the Universal Credit system for being too “black and white,” particularly in the way it categorises people as either fit for work or unfit for work. He explained that when individuals are deemed unfit for work, the system often leaves them without ongoing support or conditions to aid their return to employment. “There’s a design flaw in Universal Credit,” he stated, “which too readily separates people into fit for work and unfit for work, and when they are unfit for work, leaves them without any support or any conditions. I think that distinction is too black and white in the system as it stands. It’s something that I think they need to change.”
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Statistics from the Department for Work and Pensions show that in May this year, 8.4 million people were on Universal Credit. Of these, 4.27 million were not required to seek employment. Additionally, the number of young people aged 16 to 24 who are not in employment, education, or training (NEET) reached 1.01 million in the three months to March, representing a 9.7% increase compared to the same period in 2025 when 923,000 young people were classified as NEET.
Addressing these challenges, Mr McFadden emphasised the need to change the prevailing “culture of being signed off and written off” to better support individuals in their journey back to work. Reflecting on his visit to Boots, he shared his impressions of the young recruits: “It was just amazing for me to hear their stories. These are young people who have been out of work for one, two, up to four years. Most of them have been working here for a few weeks. And you can already see how it’s changed their confidence in themselves – their sense of belief in themselves.”