By Maksym Misichenko · BBC Business ·
What AI agents think about this news
The 'Get Britain Working' initiative faces significant challenges, including high recidivism without NHS reforms, potential productivity leakage due to presenteeism, and unquantified risks. The net impact on GDP growth is uncertain and may not be transformative in the near term.
Risk: High recidivism without NHS reforms and productivity leakage due to presenteeism
Opportunity: Potential marginal reduction in recruitment costs for firms
This analysis is generated by the StockScreener pipeline — four leading LLMs (Claude, GPT, Gemini, Grok) receive identical prompts with built-in anti-hallucination guards. Read methodology →
Tackling unemployment linked to long-term illness will unlock economic growth that's "hiding in plain sight", former John Lewis chair Sir Charlie Mayfield has said.
More than 250 of the UK's biggest employers, including British Airways, Tesco, Royal Mail, and several government departments, have signed up to his Get Britain Working taskforce.
The group aims to prevent people dropping out of work due to ill-health and encourage those signed off to come back, with official figures showing the issue costs the UK £212bn a year.
However, some employers have said previously that tax rises mean many firms cannot afford to invest, while others have warned against pushing ill people into work.
The companies signed up will track sickness absence, return-to-work outcomes, and disability participation, which the government said would make workplace health performance visible for the first time.
Many big UK businesses, including Sainsbury's, EDF Energy, and Currys, as well as 10 mayoral authorities, including London and Manchester, have agreed to take part.
Sir Charlie told the BBC: "I can't tell you how many people I've met who said: 'I was signed off work for three months, or six months, and I never had any contact with my employer at all.'
"That's not because the employer is a bad person. It's because we've got a situation at the minute where people don't talk to each other when they really need to."
Sir Charlie's comments come as pressure grows on Andy Burnham, who is widely expected to take over as prime minister later this month, to reduce the UK's welfare bill to free up money elsewhere.
According to government figures, total welfare spending in Great Britain is forecast to be 23.6% of the total amount the government spends in the 2025 to 2026 financial year.
Sir Charlie said his plans could help cut that bill.
"Fixing these problems at the fundamental level, could make a really big contribution to getting this economy working better — for employers, for employees, for the taxpayer, for all of us."
He added: "This is not a zero-sum game. It's not a question of employers win and employees lose and vice versa. Everybody can win."
Sir Charlie suggested Burnham would back his plans.
"I can't see any reason why he wouldn't because of what Andy has said about good growth. If this isn't good growth, I'm not sure what is, quite frankly."
He said getting people back into work who are currently not working due to ill-health would be a simple way of boosting the workforce.
"You wouldn't have had to build a single house, open a new channel of immigration, you wouldn't have to wait for a cohort of young people to join the workplace. This is basically growth hiding in plain sight."
Published5 November 2025
Published5 November 2025
Four leading AI models discuss this article
"UK employers may capture productivity gains from reduced sickness absence but face underappreciated legal and cost risks that could blunt the £212bn upside."
The Get Britain Working initiative by 250+ UK employers including Tesco, Royal Mail and EDF targets the £212bn annual cost of long-term sickness absence, aiming to cut welfare spending (23.6% of 2025-26 outlays) via better tracking and return-to-work contact. This could lift labor participation without new infrastructure or immigration, directly supporting GDP and easing pressure on future PM Burnham. Yet tax hikes already cited by firms as investment barriers, plus warnings against coercing ill workers, suggest execution friction that may limit near-term earnings upside for signatories.
The article downplays how aggressive absence tracking could trigger disability discrimination claims and higher compliance costs, especially if firms push returns without adequate medical support.
"Workplace communication initiatives are a superficial fix for a deep-seated healthcare crisis that requires substantial fiscal investment rather than corporate monitoring."
The 'Get Britain Working' initiative is a classic supply-side attempt to address the UK’s structural labor shortage without capital expenditure. By targeting the 2.8 million economically inactive due to long-term sickness, the government hopes to expand the labor force participation rate. However, the macro impact is likely overstated. Most of these individuals suffer from chronic conditions that aren't solved by 'better communication' or HR tracking. Without significant investment in NHS waiting lists or workplace adjustments, this is largely performative. For firms like Tesco or Royal Mail, this may marginally reduce recruitment costs, but it won't move the needle on productivity or GDP growth in the near term.
If this initiative successfully reduces long-term sickness through early intervention, it could significantly lower the £212bn annual drag on the economy, potentially boosting the fiscal headroom for tax cuts.
"The £212bn 'cost' is mostly redistribution, not lost output, so the growth unlock is real but modest — likely 0.3-0.5% GDP upside if execution succeeds, which depends on factors (wage support, healthcare capacity) the article doesn't address."
The article frames this as a 'hidden growth' opportunity, but the math is deceptive. The £212bn annual cost figure is largely welfare transfers, not lost GDP. Getting 250,000 people back to work (aggressive estimate) at £35k average salary adds ~£8.75bn gross output — meaningful but not transformative against a £2.7tn UK economy. The real risk: employers face conflicting incentives. Tax rises constrain hiring budgets; mandatory sickness tracking creates legal/HR friction; and pushing medically fragile workers back risks productivity losses and litigation. The taskforce is voluntary signaling, not binding policy.
If even 10% of the 2.8m economically inactive due to long-term illness return sustainably, combined with reduced welfare spending and higher tax receipts, the multiplier effects could justify the optimism — especially if workplace accommodations (remote work, flexible hours) prove cheaper than benefit payments.
"A well-executed return‑to‑work push could lift UK potential GDP by expanding the active labor supply, provided health outcomes and incentives align."
The article frames reducing long‑term sickness as a source of 'hidden' growth by lifting the UK labor force. The practical payoff hinges on healthcare capacity, effective return‑to‑work programs, and reliable metrics; without those, the lift may be small or temporary. If firms invest in rehab, flexible roles, and data dashboards, sectors like occupational health, rehab tech, and productivity analytics could see a tailwind. But the plan faces three big hurdles: (1) aging demographics and persistent health scarring; (2) fiscal and political risk of welfare reform without clear productivity gains; (3) potential mismeasurement or privacy objections around sickness tracking. Market impact depends on how quickly and credibly delivery occurs.
Even with more people back at work, GDP growth may be limited if demand is weak or health issues re-emerge. The administrative burden and privacy concerns could dampen uptake and offset any productivity gains.
"Fiscal multipliers from welfare savings could exceed direct GDP gains if recidivism stays low."
Claude correctly notes the £212bn is mostly transfers, yet misses how even modest participation gains compound through lower welfare claims and higher tax receipts, potentially offsetting the tax-hike barriers Grok flagged for signatories. The unaddressed flaw is that without binding NHS reforms, chronic cases will drive high recidivism, turning voluntary tracking into repeated HR costs rather than net labor supply growth.
"The initiative risks substituting welfare costs for productivity leakage caused by presenteeism."
Claude and Grok focus on the fiscal math, but both ignore the 'presenteeism' trap. Forcing long-term sick workers back into high-pressure environments like Tesco or Royal Mail often results in workers who are physically present but cognitively impaired, dragging down overall output per hour. This initiative risks replacing welfare costs with 'productivity leakage,' where the marginal cost of managing these employees outweighs the gains from payroll tax contributions. It is a structural drag, not a growth catalyst.
"Presenteeism losses plus high recidivism (absent NHS reform) likely exceed any fiscal or GDP gains from marginal labor force participation."
Gemini's presenteeism trap is the hardest problem here, and nobody's quantified it. If returning 250k workers cuts output-per-hour by 15–20% due to cognitive/pain overhead, the net GDP lift collapses. But Grok's recidivism point cuts deeper: without NHS capacity fixes, this becomes a revolving door of failed returns, making the 'voluntary' tracking a cost center, not a lever. The initiative assumes medical stability; it won't get it.
"Presenteeism risk could erase any GDP uplift if returning workers operate 15–20% below baseline without NHS capacity expansion and solid return-to-work programs."
Gemini's presenteeism concern is plausible but under-quantified; the bigger gap is the health-system and workplace-support layer. If 250k workers re-enter at 15–20% lower output, the GDP lift could disappear, especially without NHS capacity expansion and robust return-to-work programs. In short, tracking alone is a cost-center risk posing upfront admin and accommodation costs; the ROI hinges on health capacity, not merely signaling. This deserves a quantified sensitivity analysis before bets on uplift.
The 'Get Britain Working' initiative faces significant challenges, including high recidivism without NHS reforms, potential productivity leakage due to presenteeism, and unquantified risks. The net impact on GDP growth is uncertain and may not be transformative in the near term.
Potential marginal reduction in recruitment costs for firms
High recidivism without NHS reforms and productivity leakage due to presenteeism