The work placement thing is a couple of steps away from being a decent policy.
If it's going to force people to go work for multimillion pound businesses, at least make the business give them a wage of some sort - as it is it's effectively the government broking slave labour for retailers.
It could also do with taking into account what the claimant brings to the table - if you've got a graduate, who isn't going to be aiming for a retail job ultimately, take that into account and get them some office experience which is ultimately going to play to their strengths and also help them more as it will give them experience that is more likely to get them a job. If it's a 16 year old straight out of school who has no aptitude for anything and just needs some work experience of some sort, 'shelf stacking' for a bit and genuinely earning a small amount of money might be more suitable.
This would make it rather more like a government backed work experience program, and actually help the jobseekers, and not what it currently is - a punishment policy designed to discourage claimants, fudge unemployment figures and curry favour with a few choice CEOs no doubt friendly with some choice ministers. In other words, what I think it should be will never happen, it'll be scraped before it even approaches what it should be.