Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables
- Notes on contributors
- one Introduction
- two New Labour and social justice
- three Evaluating New Labour’s accountability reforms
- four Evaluating New Labour’s approach to independent welfare provision
- five Parents, children, families and New Labour: developing family policy?
- six Safe as houses? Housing policy under New Labour
- seven Cheques and checks: New Labour’s record on the NHS
- eight A decent education for all?
- nine New Labour and social care: continuity or change?
- ten New Labour and the redefinition of social security
- eleven Toughing it out: New Labour’s criminal record
- twelve Conclusion
- Index
one - Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2022
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of tables
- Notes on contributors
- one Introduction
- two New Labour and social justice
- three Evaluating New Labour’s accountability reforms
- four Evaluating New Labour’s approach to independent welfare provision
- five Parents, children, families and New Labour: developing family policy?
- six Safe as houses? Housing policy under New Labour
- seven Cheques and checks: New Labour’s record on the NHS
- eight A decent education for all?
- nine New Labour and social care: continuity or change?
- ten New Labour and the redefinition of social security
- eleven Toughing it out: New Labour’s criminal record
- twelve Conclusion
- Index
Summary
Introduction
A central concern of the New Labour government was to modernise the welfarestate. Welfare reform featured heavily in the 1997 Manifesto, and it hasbeen a major feature of government policy ever since (for example, Powell,1999; Burden et al, 2000; Timmins, 2001). The main aim of this text is toevaluate the welfare policies of the first term of the New Labour government(1997-2001). It is concerned with evaluation of policyrather than evaluation for policy. The government hasinvested heavily in the latter, commissioning a significant amount ofresearch with the main aim of improving the policy process. For example, ithas set up many area-based policies such as Action Zones in education,health and employment. Changes in these zones are evaluated in order to‘mainstream’ any improvements to the national level.Similarly, policies such as the New Deal have been subject to evaluation(see Chapters Five and Ten of this volume). Moreover, it has encouragedevidence-based approaches in health, education and social care in order todetermine ‘what works’ (for example, Davies et al, 2000).
However, this text is concerned with evaluation of policy. There is a rapidlygrowing literature that examines the changes that New Labour has made tosocial policy. Some of this literature is implicitly evaluative in that itgives a broadly positive (for example, Glennerster, 1999) or negative (forexample, Hay, 1999; Burden et al, 2000; Critical SocialPolicy, 2001) verdict on the changes. However, there is muchless material that is explicitly evaluative in that it gives a clear verdict(for example, Glennerster, 2001; Toynbee and Walker, 2001; Boyne et al,2003: forthcoming). Toynbee and Walker (2001) is perhaps the most developedand best-known account. In order to answer their question of ‘Didthings get better?’, they:
… tried to strip away the hyperbole, the claims and boasts, tolook as cooly as we could at what Labour has achieved in four years. Weneeded a baseline on which to measure New Labour but none exists, dryand objective, to be taken down from history’s shelf… Thefairest judgements must be made on what New Labour itself promised.(Toynbee and Walker, 2001, p 232)
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Evaluating New Labour's Welfare Reforms , pp. 1 - 18Publisher: Bristol University PressPrint publication year: 2002