Urgent help needed for young unemployed

23 April 2009

Britain's training providers have welcomed measures in the Budget which will specifically help young people being hit by the recession, but remain deeply concerned that no assurances were offered on funding urgently needed now for unemployed youngsters wanting to join a key government training programme.

Last week the providers' trade body, the Association of Learning Providers (ALP), wrote to Ed Balls saying that providers were currently cutting off provision to trainees on the Government's Entry to Employment (E2E) programme for people with few or no qualifications because they could not secure funding from the Learning and Skills Council. The programme acts as a stepping stone to apprenticeships for many disadvantaged young people who live in some of most deprived areas of the country.

Providers are reporting an unprecedented demand for E2E and without the funding, the so-called NEET group of unemployed youngsters will expand at an even faster rate than it is now.

Yesterday the Chancellor gave an assurance that funding for next year's programme would be guaranteed for 16-18 year old trainees alongside sixth-formers and college students, but he made no reference to funding for the current year even though these trainees have a statutory right (‘the September guarantee') to it.

Graham Hoyle OBE, ALP's chief executive, said: "Training providers are pleased that apprentices and E2E trainees have received a commitment from the Government that their places will be fully funded for next year and we assume that the same commitment will be forthcoming for the remainder of this year.

"I am urgently seeking confirmation that our understanding is correct. Otherwise some of the country's most vulnerable young people, often with multiple disadvantages, are at risk of facing life on benefits or getting into trouble with all the costs to society which that can entail."

Related to this, ALP welcomed the Chancellor's £2bn jobs and training package which will provide a guarantee of a job or training for all 16- to-24-year-olds unemployed for more than a year. The Association has now asked for assurance that in keeping with the Government's commitment to competitive neutrality for the procurement of public service delivery, the funding for local provision of this programme will be open to public, private and Third Sector providers, whichever is the most appropriate.

Last month, providers called for a return to an 80s-style Community Programme for the jobless but updated to link into the Apprenticeship programme to give young people and adults the skills they need when the upturn comes. Yesterday's recognition that government support should include training rather than rely just on jobs placement was seen as a positive step.

Graham Hoyle said: "The acknowledgement that we need to re-skill unemployed people in the face of a rapid decline of non-skilled jobs is long overdue. The jobs-first strategy that has dominated the government approach to welfare-to-work for decades is no longer appropriate and has to go. Ministers recognise this but we need to see things change on the ground."