Youth Employment — Articles

By Nikeeta Phagura

Though a new year begins, the impacts of Covid-19 are far from last year’s news. Amidst its plethora of challenges, the rise in youth unemployment stands amongst the most worrying and longer-term concerns. The current youth unemployment rate is 14.5%, a jump from 12.1% last year and compared to 4.1% nationally. This amounts to a staggering 596,000 young people unemployed as of October 2020 and 14% increase vs. pre-pandemic first quarter. In seeking to address the problem of youth unemployment, this essay puts forward three connected policy proposals - “earlier integration of employment and education”, “a new points-based accreditation system branded the Skills Foundation Scheme” and, finally, “a formal fast-track Youth Employment Pathway” to our heavily affected public sectors. These 3 recommendations align to create a holistic yet innovative set of solutions to youth unemployment, by increasing employability and overcoming the vicious ‘no experience, no job’ cycle so prevalent for young people in today’s pandemic-ridden job market.

Integration of education and employment

In thinking through potential solutions, one could focus solely on reactive means towards job generation - but I believe it essential to start with education. It is after all the Conservative Party’s longstanding notion that education is key to building a child’s potential future. Yet many of our schools only begin introducing jobs and career opportunities at Year 11 (age 15/16) - the same age we expect our youth to think about next steps and choosing between apprenticeships, further education or community work. And in cases where schools do invite employers to discuss career opportunities in advance, it is on an adhoc basis and firmly focused on upper ages. The first proposal is to thus establish a more robust and integrated system between employers and schools, starting from Year 9. Facilitating this need not be complicated, as schools can leverage their existing strong relationships with Local Authorities, and hence work together to encourage local, prominent employers to provide workshops around potential opportunities. By taking a more proactive approach and providing earlier access to employers throughout education, we can encourage, engage and inspire our youth to understand potential job opportunities and pursue ambitions. This also seeks to better support them ahead of making important decisions about next steps and future choices. Whilst not an immediate solution to today’s youth unemployment, education can serve to better prepare and equip tomorrow’s youth for secure employment - in turn reducing longer term increases in unemployment.

The Skills Foundation Scheme

Giving young people earlier access to employers stands as the first step to solving for youth unemployment. The next is to ensure they have sufficient skills to secure a job, overcoming the all-too-familiar and vicious ‘no experience, no job’ cycle after full-time education. This makes way for my proposed Skills Foundation Scheme (hereafter SFS)- a new points-based Accreditation System allowing participants to gain insight into potential jobs, build new skills in interest areas and earn points towards formal qualifications. Young people aged 16-24 and out of work would be given the opportunity to complete short work placements at various registered employers of their choice (private, public or not-for-profit) and earn points of value once complete. These points would be recognised as an official accreditation similar to NVQ status. Participants would be given a Government-funded stipend to cover time and expenses, attractive enough to encourage engagement as opposed to welfare system reliance. Going one step further - and overcoming critiques some may recall of the 1980s’ Youth Training Scheme (YTS) - this initiative will not simply expect young people to complete repetitive training with no prospect of a full-time job upon completion. Young people can choose as many or as few placements across different industries, and continue to earn points of value - giving them the chance to better understand their interests, build upon foundational skills to bolster their CVs and preventing disengagement which led to many dropping out of the YTS early. Not only would the accumulated points be formally recognised towards a qualification, but also hold value in applications for permanent roles within the public sector, as to be discussed subsequently.

The SFS would be positioned as a highly impactful, tangible skills-based solution that builds upon the initial success of our recent Kickstart Scheme, which has generated 19,000+ jobs already. Given that Kickstart requires a more formal ask from the employer through 6-month placements, I believe this Scheme could generate powerful supply and demand across businesses and young people alike. In providing real opportunities to pursue areas of interest, build skills and achieve formal qualifications of value towards a full-time job, we can bring the youth unemployment rate down and shape our future leaders.

Youth Pathway to Public Sector

With new skills acquired, hands-on experience and formal accreditation to show for it, the final solution to youth unemployment is securing and retaining a job. Connected to the SFS, I propose the creation of a fast-track Youth Pathway to Public Sector jobs - even more critical with today’s understaffed and overstretched public sector workforce tackling Covid-19. The Youth Pathway to Public Sector would allow young people exclusive access to certain entry-level public sector roles, as opposed to more temporary positions that become vulnerable during uncertainty. Building this programme will go hand in hand with the SFS, as the hard-earned points from their experience placements would be weighted, recognised and visible across job applications. There could be minimum benchmarks required for certain roles, somewhat similar to the decile system used for graduating doctors. In doing so, we can showcase real merit and a tangible end goal to young people’s participation in the SFS - which was in fact another challenge to the YTS and reason for people not completing. Though this would undoubtedly require heavy investment and administrative prowess to deliver, I believe there is strong rationale and mutual benefit for our young people and public sectors. On the one hand, we can best support the public sector with hardworking, enthusiastic and committed talent who might well choose to invest their longer-term careers there. On the other, we will slowly reduce the disproportionally high representation of young people currently working in the gig economy, which has been most vulnerable to Covid-19 furloughs/redundancies and thus a high instigator for the rapid youth unemployment increase. In establishing the fast-track Youth Pathway to Public Sector, we can truly future-proof youth employment generation and the public sector for years to come - and in the face of other national challenges.

In conclusion, this essay has proposed a set of holistic policy proposals to address the rising youth unemployment rate, taking both short and longer- term approaches. Through the provision of earlier integration with employment and education, the Skills Foundation Scheme to gain further experience, and creating clear routes to employment through the fast-track Youth Pathway to Public Sector - we can effectively reduce youth unemployment and further tackle the growing risk of welfare system dependency at such a young age. As Thatcher’s quote exemplifies, the Conservative party has long committed to setting up foundations for success and supporting people into work. And I believe that the innovative solutions presented here will do just that - for today’s young people as well as tomorrow’s.

Nikeeta won third prize in the CYW inaugural Policy Essay Competition for this article.

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By Nina Watson

Last year nearly 100,000 young people applied to be on reality TV show Love Island. Are they hapless romantics? Possibly. For many, though, it seems the opportunity to appear on a widely viewed television programme is perceived to be a stepping stone to a career of social media influence, fuelled by endorsements. A recent report by the charity Education and Employers showed that nearly 15% of 17-18 year olds wanted to work in the entertainment industry. This is nearly 5 times the economic demand. ONS data from 2018 reveals a similar disconnect: nearly 12% of 16-21 year olds wanting to work as writers/actors or producers with less than 2% of 22-29 year olds actually in those jobs.

So we find ourselves in the UK, not so much with a youth unemployment crisis, but an employment aspiration crisis. Employment demand is increasingly concentrated in areas of low supply. As our culture drifts further and further from its roots in Judeo-Christian tradition, the notion of work as duty or service has faded, replaced by some form of self-actualisation rooted in the pursuit of pleasure.

The first step in addressing youth unemployment is to ‘redirect’. In practical terms this means redirecting our young people to the jobs and industries that need them. There is a deeper cultural shift which I believe needs to take place here too. Although I see less of a role for the state here and believe it needs to be addressed in large part within the family unit and what we as society choose to reward with social currency.

I believe the government should publicly publish data showing national skills-shortages and entry-level job numbers by sector. This could clearly direct young people to where they are needed in the job market. This should be explicit, overt and in addition to being communicated nationally, should be localised for schools, colleges and job centres. The government should also incentivise training for the roles we most need. One in eight nursing roles is empty. We have 5 times as many young people applying to Love Island as we do graduating as nurses. That balance can only be redressed by making the professions we want to fill inexpensive to enter.

The next stage is to reinspire. Many young people will have aspirations that are disconnected from the realities of the job market. Their skills and talents, however, may be perfectly well suited. They need to know what’s out there, and how they might find a profession suited to their interests and abilities.

My recommendation is to run a national media campaign, targeting interest groups, with inspiring messages about potential career direction. Much like we do with the Navy. Like gaming? You could have a bright future in programming. Avid Instagrammer? Agencies are looking for graphic designers. Rapper? You must have a flare for words: copywriting could be a great fit. If you can drive a car you might like driving a bus… or a forklift! The overarching message being that there’s a job for every interest. Let’s reinspire our young people with growth opportunities.

The final step is to reimburse. That’s for the employers. Taking on employees at entry level is costly and involves risk. I have two reimbursement proposals to incentives businesses to take on more young people.

The first is a National Insurance reimbursement. If a young person is employed and passes their probation period to be taken on as a full-time employee the business can apply for a reimbursement for the NI paid during that probation period. This will help business with the cost of creating a new role but also encourage them to keep new employees on.

The second is a reimbursement on corporation tax for creating a new role within an SME. Small business owners will be able to allocate a portion of the cost of a new role (up to £5,000) as an expense, thus reducing their overall corporation tax bill. This will be a very strong incentive for SME’s to take on new employees and grow their businesses. By limiting the availability of this scheme to smaller businesses we are encouraging local-level employment, not giving tax breaks to larger corporations which do not need it.

I believe that the three elements of this proposal will go a long way in helping to address youth unemployment. Redirecting young people to meet the market demand, reinspiring them to create value from their interests and incentivising job creation by reimbursing businesses for investing in our young people.