Saul Cahill, a work coach at a busy job centre in Gateshead and another PCS Union rep, says people with health conditions and disabled people are often the most difficult to support into work.

He says delays in other services like the NHS mean it can take longer to find someone suitable employment.

One person he has been supporting, who he says has been "really engaged" in their search for work - despite having a long-term health condition which means they are not required to do so - has been in his caseload since he started four years ago.

Many employers are simply not able to accommodate some disabilities, Saul says, while time constraints also mean he can not help them as much as he would like.

"I might be sitting with someone who is, on paper, doing all the right things and doesn't seem to be getting any response," he says.

"I'd love to sit down with them [and] go through the job applications together, and that's not necessarily possible.

"People get very frustrated."

Around 1.6 million universal credit claimants are in what's known as the "intensive work search" category.

They are fit and able to work, but are either not working or working with very low earnings.

These claimants require significant support from a work coach, including meeting weekly for the first 13 weeks of their claim, and either weekly or fortnightly after that.

Almost 300,000 intensive work search claimants have been job-seeking for more than five years, 18% of the total.