Unemployment

Baroness Turner of Camden Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I think that it is important that we do not get cheap on the movements: this is, as always, a very complicated set of movements. During the last month, for instance, the claimant count went down a little for the youngsters. It went up by 30,000 or so, but has been broadly flat since 2009. There will be reasons for the figure being up a bit, but I do not think that is the point. The point is that we have a serious underlying structural problem. We have about 600,000 youngsters who have not managed to get sustained employment after education. Within that figure, I do not have the exact number about whom we should be seriously worried. Of the 16 to 17 year-olds, it is about 50,000. These are youngsters who may never make the transition into proper economic activity. It is vital that we have structures to help them make that transition.

[Baroness Turner of Camden]

My Lords—

[Lord Martin of Springburn]

My Lords—

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that question. Essentially, we are going to rely on the work programme and differential pricing to help the hardest to help.

[Baroness Turner of Camden]

My Lords—

[Noble Lords]

Time!