With drugs and alcohol, our research has highlighted three main areas where action is needed:
• Addiction treatment does not, in itself, ensure employment, though it brings other social gains. Work has not hitherto been an integral part of treatment, and it needs to be if progress is to be made.
• The benefits system, which has a central role in helping people enter or return to work, requires significant change. The system is hampered by a severe lack of information on health conditions, poor incentives for staff to tackle difficult or long-term cases, and a patchy offer of support for those who are reached.
• Employers are the gatekeepers to employment and, without their co-operation employment for our cohorts is impossible. Employers are understandably reluctant to hire people with addiction and/or criminal records. They have told us that they need Government, quite simply, to de-risk these recruitment decisions for them.

Part 1 – Drugs and alcohol: employment outcomes, the benefit system and the role of employers p.16
• Chapter 1 Improving the employment outcomes of drug and alcohol dependent people: the role of treatment p.17
• Chapter 2 Improving employment outcomes for drug and alcohol dependent people: the role of the benefits system p.36
• Chapter 3 The role of employers: in recruitment, support and prevention p.46