Universal Credit chiefs have made a humiliating U-turn after telling benefit claimants they could work as strippers.
A government web page listed “dances in adult entertainment establishments” as one option for jobseekers with “no formal academic” skills.
The Department for Work and Pensions site - titled "work you could do" - suggested claimants could search the phrase “striptease artist” online to find vacancies.
The career was included as part of a list of "elementary services occupations" for people on Universal Credit.
Other job suggestions on the same page included becoming a fortune-teller or loading a Bingo machine.
The Mirror was able to browse the page on Tuesday but it has since been taken offline, hours after concerns were raised on an online welfare forum.
A DWP spokesman admitted: “This is inappropriate and we will immediately review this to determine why it is mistakenly listed.
"This is not the type of employment our work coaches help people into, and since 2010 more than 75% of all new jobs created are high-skilled and full-time."
A Whitehall source suggested the information had been sourced from a list of professions on the Office for National Statistics.
Paul Morrison, a policy advisor to the Methodist Church who spotted the adverts, said: “Suggesting that people perform in strip clubs is clearly unacceptable.”
He added it was part of a wider picture of Universal Credit “pushing people towards low paid, insecure jobs that exploit and trap families in poverty.”
The Daily Mirror is campaigning to stop the rollout of Universal Credit and replace it with a fairer system.
We say it should either be redesigned to be fit for purpose, replaced by a brand new system, or axed in favour of the old system if it is unfixable.
Almost 2.2million people are on Universal Credit as of June 2019, more than double the total a year earlier.
The gaffe comes weeks after DWP ministers U-turned and indicated there could be a link between Universal Credit and 'survival sex'.
In June ministers said there was "little reliable data" to suggest the six-in-one benefit was pushing people towards sex work.
But after watching testimony by women who said they were, DWP minister Will Quince said the previous memo did not reflect his thinking and "we need to better understand this area".
Mr Morrison said he accepted women have freedom of choice - and that stripping and sex work are different - but argued the DWP adverts were being aimed at vulnerable people.
He said: "People trapped in poverty with few qualifications and limited options should not be pushed towards sex work. It is shocking that the DWP needs to be told that.
"The belief that any work is good work runs through Universal Credit. It has been designed to push and threaten people into the first job that comes along."
A DWP spokesman added: "More than two million households are now in receipt of Universal Credit and it is working for the vast majority of people, replacing an outdated benefit system that trapped people on welfare."
