At a world jobs conference in America, Employment Minister Tessa Jowell set out independent new research findings which underline the success of the New Deal.
Speaking in Los Angeles, California, she said: "These exciting new findings, to be published shortly, show more young people have moved off benefits and into jobs than would have done without the New Deal. In addition, thanks to the additional economic activity generated, the survey shows that the New Deal is close to self-financing."
The independent report, on the macro-economic effect of the New Deal, was compiled by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) and revealed that the UK and the US enjoy roughly comparable job creation records since 1987, with 700,000 additional jobs in the UK economy alone.
Tessa Jowell added: "In fact, researchers stress that roughly half those leaving unemployment would not have done so without the New Deal - clear evidence that the New Deal is proving more effective than the programmes it replaced. In addition, there is no evidence that younger workers are replacing older ones in the labour force."
At the Los Angeles seminar, the Employment Minister stressed the importance of the UK government commitment, the dedication of the personal advisers and the support of over 60,000 companies for the success of the New Deal, which has helped more than 156,000 long-termed unemployed young people off benefits and into work.
She added: "There are challenges ahead to improve on the New Deal and our other welfare-to-work programmes. We are strengthening the role of personal advisers, entering into more sustained work with employers and inspiring their confidence by providing more intensive support to job seekers.
"One of the ways we can move forward is to share experience and best practice with colleagues and experts from other nations. This helps achieve even better ways of getting people back into work and making them more employable in order to compete really effectively in the jobs market.
"The independent NIESR research has shown how effective New Deal is in getting young long-term unemployed people into jobs. Yet welfare-to-work policy has not yet run its full course or shown its full potential; it will not have realised that potential or completed its course until we have found ways of helping the most disadvantaged members of our societies to compete effectively for jobs."
