Unemployment Insurance Benefit
The Labour government is planning to introduce a single, time-limited unemployment insurance (UI) benefit to replace the current contributory benefits: New Style Jobseeker's Allowance (NS JSA) and New Style Employment and Support Allowance (NS ESA).
I was wondering does anyone know how this new benefit will affect existing claimants on ESA (CB) and who are in the support group?
Comments
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Anything out there is only speculation., it's best to wait for official news. We simply don't know.
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Thanks for replying Chris. I knew it was being talked about in the Green Paper.
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The Autumn Budget will be announced on 26th November. We won't have any information until then but we will update the community when we can.
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Actually, we do know, this isn’t speculation. The proposal to replace New Style ESA and New Style JSA with a single time limited Unemployment Insurance benefit is confirmed in the Pathways to Work white paper.
The government’s consultation response, published on 30 October 2025, did not change this direction. It’s already progressing through Parliament.
You can find the official confirmation here Pathways to Work – Green Paper and Consultation Response
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Just so you're aware, they are only consulting on this and the announcement will be made 26th November.
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Thanks for your reply @Rachel_Scope
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Thanks. Just to clarify, this reform is not still at the consultation stage.
The consultation closed in June, and the government published its response on 30 October. The Unemployment Insurance proposal is confirmed and already progressing through Parliament.
If Scope has seen something suggesting it’s still under consultation or awaiting announcement on 26th November, would you be kind enough to share the link?
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You may be correct. I have been told that full details will be announced 26th November.
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Thanks @Rachel_Scope, I appreciate you coming back on this. The reason I found the “wait for the Budget” line a bit odd is that welfare reform isn’t usually announced through fiscal events. The government tends to handle these changes separately through white papers, consultations, and legislative proposals, not as part of the Budget itself.
The Budget might touch on projected savings or give some detail on rollout, but the policy itself has already been confirmed. The proposal to replace New Style ESA and JSA with a single time limited Unemployment Insurance benefit was set out in the Pathways to Work white paper, and the government’s consultation response published on 30 October confirmed it is going ahead.
If you do come across something suggesting otherwise, I’d genuinely be interested in the link.
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Yes, that’s the direction of travel. But just to note, while the proposal is confirmed and progressing, it still has to go through Parliament and be voted on before anything changes for current claimants. So it’s not law yet, even though the policy itself has been announced.
That’s the stage where we can lobby MPs not to vote it through. Personally, I think it’s a terrible idea.
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I'm going to have a read through the link you provided. Thanks for that. When is this new benefit going to start and what impact will it have on existing claimants?
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Once it goes ahead, it will be challenged in court for many reasons. This link provides one:
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I seem to remember DPAC writing something about legal challenges to the proposed unemployment insurance for other reasons. If I find it I’ll post it here.
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I wonder if someone from scope could bring up again the latest threat regarding the Green paper. Seems to be deleted and there was some interesting info there
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Hi @alexroda I'm not sure what thread you mean. Do you know when it was posted?
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it was the very long post about the green paper, I think it had different versions as admin kept creating a new one once it had 100 Pages. I’m interested in the latest one and I can’t find it
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I'll ask the team in the morning as I'm not sure.
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found it
I think somewhere in there there’s an article about possible future challenges to the proposed unemployment insurance
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