Rishi Sunak is absolutely right to face up to the rise of long-term sickness

The prime minister may not be around to see it through, but he is pointing the way, writes John Rentoul

Rishi Sunak pointed out that the total bill for this part of the welfare budget is now more than we spend on schools (Yui Mok/PA Wire)

We may think we have heard it all before. Getting people off welfare into work was a New Labour slogan borrowed from Bill Clinton. Alan Johnson, when he was health secretary in 2007-09, campaigned against Britain’s “sick note culture” and tried to turn it into a “well note culture”.

But the problem has not been solved, and it is getting worse. We should be clear that, overall, the proportion of people of working age who are out of work and on benefits is not as high as it was at its peak in the mid-1990s. It went up during the pandemic, since when the numbers recorded as unemployed have fallen, while the numbers on long-term sickness benefits have risen – and are predicted to carry on rising.

In his speech today, Rishi Sunak pointed out that the total bill for this part of the welfare budget is now more than we spend on schools. With his logical mind, the prime minister broke down the problem into its component parts. The biggest component of the rise is people withdrawing from the labour market because of mental illness; and the biggest part of that increase is among young people.