Youth Employment

Baroness O'Cathain Excerpts

Wednesday 30th July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freud]

I have written to the noble Lord on this matter. We have not prosecuted in such a case but if we found something egregious we would consider doing so.

[Baroness O’Cathain (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend agree with me that it is about time those on the opposite side celebrated with us that there has been such an increase in youth employment in the last few months? Secondly, the way in which we are doing it is right. As my noble friend Lord Roberts said, the last thing we want is one EU policy. I want to know from my noble friend the Minister whether we are getting down into the local areas to get the local employment partnerships involved in training and giving apprenticeships to unemployed youths, which is what we need to do.

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, it is exactly right that we need to get to the real problems of youth unemployment and the structural level of unemployment—youngsters who are workless. That figure grew through the longest boom in our history and only now are we beginning to see it come down. We are going for the youngsters who have not been looked after properly in recent decades. The figure I always cite in this House is the full number of workless—both unemployed and inactive. In 1997 that figure was 17.7%. It remained flat through the boom and at the peak it was 17.4%—not much difference. At the end of the recession it stood at 19.1% and now it is right down below any of those figures at 16.8%. That shows that our policies are beginning to work on the people who are structurally disadvantaged in this country.