- People who are long-term unemployed or who have never worked are between two and three times more likely to have poor health than those in work.

- If you've been off sick for six months, you have an 80% chance of being off for five years.

- 90% of people beginning a claim for incapacity benefits expect to return to work, but once someone has been claiming for two years or more, they are more likely to retire or die than return to work.

Being in the right type of work is good for your health. It improves self esteem, quality of life and well-being. Being out of work is bad for both mind and body. Unemployment progressively damages health and results in more sickness, disability, mental illness, obesity, use of medication and medical services and decreased life expectancy. When people return to work from unemployment their health improves. Returning to work from unemployment improves health by as much as unemployment damages it.

Furthermore all Social Firms report health improvement amongst those individuals who have moved into work. Recent Social Return on Investment (SROI) research supports this further by placing an economic value on annual health cost savings of up to £21K per person working at Six Marys Place, an award winning Social Firm in Edinburgh.