The Department for Work and Pensions Work and Health Trailblazer Programme was targeted at areas of the country with the highest levels of economic inactivity, enabling local leaders to give those furthest from employment the tools to get into work. West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) awarded over £800,000 to Leeds City Council to deliver pre-employment support to people who are economically inactive for health reasons. This funding was managed by the council’s Employment and Skills team.
Employment and Skills awarded grant funding of over £700,000 to 17 Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise (VCSE) organisations to support residents progressing towards employment, by providing integrated health support alongside employment support.
For some of the people who were taking part in the Trailblazer, digital exclusion was identified as an extra barrier to them succeeding on the programme. WYCA worked with 100% Digital Leeds to design a ‘Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives’ initiative to offer additional support to those people. Six organisations in Leeds delivered the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative, supporting 80 people who were already part of the Trailblazer programme.
“I think we’re really missing something in terms of general equity if we don’t consider digital inclusion as part of the Trailblazer. This is a core element of how we’re going to see impact going forwards.”
Ethan Foster, Services Manager – Economic Inclusion, Leeds Mind
Background to the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative
As more services move online, it becomes harder for people who are digitally excluded to manage their health conditions and apply for work. WYCA worked with 100% Digital Leeds to design a ‘Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives’ initiative to offer additional support to those people.
100% Digital Leeds used the principles of the successful Multiply project, which we also delivered in partnership with Employment and Skills, as the basis of the Personal Incentives initiative. Multiply enabled 100% Digital Leeds to award funding to 19 of our VCSE delivery partners so that they could design and deliver personalised digital inclusion interventions for the people they work with. This included gifting a digital device with connectivity to all of the project participants, to increase their digital inclusion and make it easier for them to continue their learning after the project ended.
The overarching objective of the Personal Incentives initiative was to learn from people with lived experience and system partners to co-design an approach to employment support that responds to an individual’s needs and circumstances.
The Digital Inclusion strand of the Personal Incentives initiative aimed to:
- Remove digital barriers to employment and skills provision by providing internet connectivity and free devices, such as mobile phones, laptops and tablets, where a VCSE organisation has identified a need among the people they support.
- Build digital confidence through digital skills training.
- Enable residents to access online health provision and other resources as they make progress towards and into good work.
- Test innovative approaches to digital inclusion support that can be scaled and replicated across West Yorkshire.
- Generate evidence of the effectiveness of digital inclusion support in facilitating transitions to employment.
- Co-design solutions with residents and local authorities to ensure interventions are locally relevant and responsive.
Intended outcomes for the initiative included:
- More people with improved health and wellbeing
- More people with an increased awareness of adult education, skills training, employment support programmes or work
- More people with digital access
- More people with increased confidence in using digital technology
Tracy Brabin, the Mayor of West Yorkshire, launched the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative with £250,000 of funding to increase digital inclusion across West Yorkshire. In partnership with GIPSIL, 100% Digital Leeds arranged the launch at The Old Fire Station in Gipton. GIPSIL also arranged for some of their service users to speak to the Mayor to explain the positive impact of digital inclusion on their employment prospects and their health and wellbeing.
“Too many people in West Yorkshire are locked out of opportunity because they can’t get online or don’t have the skills they need to confidently use the internet. That isn’t fair on people and isn’t healthy for our economy. Today’s funding means more people will get a device and hands-on support to build their confidence – so they can find good jobs, access training, manage their health, and connect with the essential online services that make everyday life easier.”
Tracy Brabin, Mayor of West Yorkshire
Designing the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative
The Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives strand of the Trailblazer proposed a digital inclusion fund for VCSE organisations across West Yorkshire to provide digital inclusion support to residents who are furthest away from the labour market. This West Yorkshire-wide offer was designed and delivered in collaboration with the Digital Inclusion West Yorkshire programme. It was agreed that 100% Digital Leeds would take the lead on this work, sharing our experience and expertise with the other councils in the region.
The agreement with WYCA stated that 100% Digital Leeds would “identify a small number of delivery organisations in their area who are already reaching people from the target audience (i.e. evidenced as having the greatest levels of digital exclusion and economic inactivity), and who can respond rapidly and effectively to this funding opportunity”.
100% Digital Leeds worked with six of the VCSE organisations that were already delivering the wider Trailblazer programme. For the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative, it was important that the organisations already had a strong digital inclusion offer in place so that they could respond quickly to meet the funding requirements.
“We did a home visit to one of the people we were working with. They’ve barely been in school since Year 9 and they don’t have much money – they didn’t even have the central heating on at this time of year. But they’ve got quite a clear goal of wanting to go into midwifery and working towards that with college courses and things. Obviously, they couldn’t afford a computer or anything like that. So the laptop they were given through this project is going to really help them.”
Bill Owen, Operations Director, Employability and Community Health, Barca
VCSE organisations were required to:
- Buy and gift each learner a digital device (phone, tablet or laptop) with 12 months of unlimited data to continue their learning and increase their digital inclusion.
- Design and deliver a minimum of five hours of personalised learning and digital inclusion support to each individual in receipt of equipment. Delivery organisations had to work with individuals from priority groups to understand what their personal barriers are, and work with them on an individual basis, tailoring support to their needs.
- Complete and return all evidence required by WYCA.
- Provide case studies to illustrate the impact of the initiative.
Importantly, the funding was also intended to build capacity and increase provision at community organisations who are not traditional learning providers.
Delivering the initiative
Six organisations in Leeds delivered the Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative, supporting 80 people who were already part of the Trailblazer programme. The organisations were:
Each organisation designed their digital inclusion offer to meet the needs of the people they were supporting. The digital equipment that the organisations bought and gifted to their participants was also tailored to meet individual need.
“Every participant is matched with a volunteer and that volunteer will meet with them on a weekly basis to support them. Quite a few of the people we’re working with have very, very limited English, so one of our strands has been English teaching. Then we’re working with other people who are maybe a little bit closer towards looking for work. For some of them, we’ve been working on CV writing workshops or looking at using LinkedIn and different things like that. One of the gentlemen we’re supporting is registered blind, so we’re taking a bit longer to make sure we get the right equipment for him.”
David Skivington, Senior Project Manager, Leeds Asylum Seekers Support Network
“One of the women we’re working with has been out of work for over 15 years due to her disabilities. She’s got learning disabilities so reading’s quite difficult for her. The digital equipment we got for her has the right software to help her with that. Now she’s managed to complete a safeguarding course and food safety training with our support, and she’s just gone on to be one of the volunteers for our food pantry.”
Eve Maloba, Project Lead, Complete Woman
The Digital Inclusion Personal Incentives initiative runs to the end of March 2026. The VCSE organisations that are delivering the initiative are already seeing the positive impact on the health and wellbeing and employment prospects of the people they support.
“This has been instrumental in supporting people’s employment goals. One individual was borrowing a laptop, and the equipment was just really poor. They found it to be a massive barrier to entry into what they’re able to do. So having equipment that actually works and is theirs has been instrumental with employment goals. It’s been really, really impactful so far.”
Ethan Foster, Services Manager – Economic Inclusion, Leeds Mind
“This has put smiles on people’s faces. They don’t expect this equipment. A lot of the people that we support have been given a rough deal, and the equipment that we’re giving them is massive for us as an organisation. It shows our commitment and our support for them, and then the engagement we get back from that is amazing. It’s been fantastic to give someone that level of investment.”
Louise Forrest, Director of Partnerships & Development, GIPSIL