Objectives This study investigated sustainability and multimorbidity alongside barriers to employment including health and policy to demonstrate intersectional impact on return-to-work success within a UK welfare-to-work programme.Design Cohort study design: The study calculated the proportion of time spent employed after experiencing a job start and the proportion retaining work over 6 months. Employment/unemployment periods were calculated, sequence-index plots were produced and visualisations were explored by benefit type and age.Setting This study used confidential access to deidentified data from unemployed Work Programme clients operated by Ingeus on behalf of the UK Government in Scotland between 1 April 2013 and 31 July 2014.Participants 13 318 unemployed clients aged 18–64 years were randomly allocated to a Work Programme provider and monitored over 2 years.Results This study has two distinct groupings. ‘Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)’ corresponding to those with work-limiting disability in receipt of related state financial support, and ‘Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA)’ corresponding to unemployment claimants. Despite fewer and later job starts for ESA clients, those that gained employment spend relatively more subsequent time in employment when compared with individuals without work-limiting conditions (ESA clients under 50, 0.73; ESA clients over 50, 0.79; JSA clients under 50, 0.67 and JSA clients over 50, 0.68). Proportion in permanent jobs was higher among ESA than JSA clients (JSA under 50, 92%; JSA over 50, 92%; ESA under 50, 95% and ESA over 50, 97%).Conclusion The research demonstrated that returning to paid employment after a reliance on welfare benefits is challenging for people aged over 50 and those with disability. The study found that although fewer older ESA claimants entered employment, they typically remained in employment more than JSA clients who did not leave the Work Programme early. This indicates the importance of identifying risk factors for job loss in ageing workers and the development of interventions for extension of working lives.

Hussar Trooper John Flood, Private C. Niblett and Private Jamie Benjafield are three British soldiers who had similar bullying experiences during their service in the British Army. All three men were antagonised by a fellow serviceman, were punished by the institution they served and felt aggrieved at their treatment. The only particular difference between them is that they served separately between a 150-year span from the 1860s through 2017. Bullying is a complicated and contentious issue that is as important today as it was a century ago. Within the military, the act of bullying demands particular attention as coercive and humiliating tactics, common within cases of bullying, have been actively employed by and within the ranks of the British Military for various reasons ranging from training and indoctrination to hazing and targeted abuse. Using the experiences of the three men and many other accounts, this article considers in detail the role of bullying within the experience and transformation of British servicemen during World War I by examining core areas where this behaviour was evident. This research interweaves the commonly identified aspects of bullying behaviour with enthusiastic civilian encouragement for recruitment, overzealous training regimes, enforced military discipline and barrack-room horseplay that were all visible during World War I. This focus remains central to the argument as the article concludes how British men were targeted, abused and humiliated by their officers, their compatriots and the public as part and parcel of the military experience between 1914-1918.

As the First World War progressed, rates of typhoid diminished. This was heralded as a triumph of sanitary improvement and disease protection; yet as to how the British military achieved this remains a contentious issue. Objections arose around the danger of inoculation and the unpleasant and potentially deadly side effects. Between the unaffected and the sufferers of the vaccine's side effects are the unexplored stories of the refusers. Often bizarre, their accounts include stories of unsanctioned cajoling, arrests, suspension of privileges, and even physically forced inoculation. Soldiers could be encouraged, convinced, and, in rare cases, even forced to undergo inoculation. For others, the opportunity to refuse was often not made clear, as inoculation became part of routine military life. Despite the fact that soldiers were supposed to have complete autonomy over their own inoculation, the reality was often different. Penalties for noncompliance and a lack of clarification about soldiers' rights demonstrated that throughout the war a clash developed between individual autonomy and an authoritarian regime determined to ensure the health of its fighting force.