Employment: Young People

Baroness Tyler of Enfield Excerpts

Thursday 4th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Tyler of Enfield]

My Lords, I, too, add my congratulations to the noble Baroness, Lady Shephard, on securing this vital debate. I pay tribute to her outstanding work in this area. I declare an interest as vice-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Social Mobility, which is relevant to my contribution today.

I am sure we can all agree that current levels of unemployment for young people are simply too high. From February to April this year, some 950,000 young people aged between 16 and 24 suffered unemployment. When young people fail to find work, their prospects can be bleak indeed. It is well documented that long periods of joblessness when young translate into lower lifetime earnings. In the worst cases, youth unemployment can inflict lifelong scars on the individual, as well as increasing costs to the Treasury. Indeed, the recent ACEVO commission on youth unemployment found that current levels of youth unemployment in 2012 would cost the Treasury approximately £28 billion in the next decade alone.

I warmly welcome the strong emphasis that the coalition Government have placed on social mobility as a central plank within their social and economic reforms. I strongly support the Deputy Prime Minister’s social mobility business compact to help to ensure that all young people have fair access to job opportunities, the Government’s commitment to deliver at least 250,000 more apprenticeships during the spending review period and the support that they have pledged for young people seeking work or further education and training through the youth contract. These are positive steps, of course, but today’s debate is an opportunity to think boldly about what more could and should be done.

When I speak to employers, they say that they are looking for several main things: a good grasp of the basics, particularly English and maths; the right attitude towards customer service; and what are sometimes called—although, as I will explain, I think this is misleading—the “soft skills”. I would like to say a little more about that, building on the wise words of the noble Baroness, Lady Massey of Darwen.

The recent report from the all-party group entitled Seven Key Truths about Social Mobility set out the key issues that policy should focus on, looking at the unequal opportunities that start in the earliest years of life and all too often persist and widen in later life. These truths cover the importance of the early years in the home, as we have heard today; the critical importance of education, including both the quality of teaching and extracurricular activities; the pivotal role of access to university; and the need for other pathways to mobility such as apprenticeships, which we have rightly heard a lot about today.

The final key truth, which I want to focus on, is that of character and resilience, something that the all-party group saw as the missing link in the chain. Character and resilience may be viewed by some as a somewhat amorphous term, and some might choose to dismiss it as fluffy or cosmetic soft skills. In fact, the very term “soft skills” strikes me as something of a misnomer. Far from being fluffy, developing character and resilience is about developing the fundamental drive, tenacity and perseverance needed to make the most of opportunities and succeed in life, whatever obstacles stand in the way. It is about self-esteem, self-confidence, self-discipline, aspiration and expectation. In everyday language, it is about believing you can achieve, understanding the relationship between effort and reward, sticking with the task at hand and bouncing back from the knocks life inevitably involves.

A recent survey of evidence from the Prince’s Trust tells us that young people from affluent backgrounds are more likely to be told by their family that they can achieve anything and that more than one in four young people from poorer backgrounds felt that people like them do not succeed in life and that if they have failed an exam or been turned down for a job they are more likely to feel that they have already failed in life. There is a growing body of evidence showing the link between developing these social and emotional skills, and doing well, academically and in the workplace.

Research by the IPPR indicates that social and personal skills have become 33 times more important in determining life chances, while soft skills have become 10 times more important in determining future earnings in a single generation. Paul Tough’s recent book, How Children Succeed, which your Lordships may have seen, also illustrates the ways in which character skills contribute to cognitive ability. In addition, the American Nobel Prize winning economist, James Heckman, has found that character traits are just as predictive of academic or job success as more traditional cognitive skills.

In the light of all of this evidence the all-party group hosted the character and resilience summit earlier this year. We heard from Alan Milburn, chair of the Social Mobility and Child Poverty Commission, who said that it is not ability that is unevenly distributed, but opportunity. That phrase has stuck with me. We heard great things about work going on in schools—both in the state and the independent sector—with examples of volunteering in the local community, out-door activities that push pupils outside their comfort zone and a wide range of imaginative extra-curricular activities.

We heard schools saying that developing traits such as these is now part of their core business and that for employers, who are so relevant to today’s debate, these less tangible skills of sticking at it, not giving up, empathy and teamwork are precisely what they are looking for in potential recruits. Overall, the message we heard from academics, head teachers and employers is that whatever qualifications you might have, where you are on the character scale will have a big impact on what you achieve in life.

What does this mean in practice? A recent Prince’s Trust Feedback from the Frontline survey found that a third of young people apply for more than 100 jobs before getting hired. With odds like this, it is all too clear just how critical resilience is for young people entering the world of work. In addition, recent research from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and York University found that when they sent off fictional CVs that appeared to be from disadvantaged people, they fared worse than those not from disadvantaged backgrounds. I find that scandalous, but it demonstrates clearly how the odds are stacked against too many of our young people. That is why I want to call on the Government to take more account of the growing evidence surrounding the role of character and resilience in improving social mobility and see how we can put some of these ideas into practice.

As other noble Lords have said today, international comparisons can be helpful. I was interested in recent research by the IPPR that suggests that countries with strong transition systems—to use the jargon—are associated with far lower levels of youth unemployment and disengagement. Key features of stronger systems include a wide range of high-quality pathways into skilled jobs, such as apprenticeships, and early exposure to the workplace through high-quality and regular work placements. It is instructive for us to reflect, as my noble friend Lord Roberts and other noble Lords have done, that countries such as Germany which tend to have these features in their education and training systems have been successful in lowering youth unemployment since the economic downturn began.

I have some more practical suggestions. The Prince’s Trust survey had some important suggestions for what the Government should do to help more young people, including the provision of face-to-face careers advice for 16 to 19 year-olds. That is vital and it is an area crying out for reform. Like my noble friend Lady Brinton, who spoke so eloquently on the subject, I would also like to ask my noble friend the Minister whether he can say what steps the Government are taking to improve careers advice for this age group.

In response to its survey findings about the sorts of things that young people want from programmes to help boost their self-esteem, confidence and resilience, the Prince’s Trust has created the Team programme. This is a 12-week personal development programme that focuses on building resilience and encourages young people to pull together as a group. When the programme ends, participants continue to support each other through job clubs, some of which are completely youth led. The Team programme has seen more than 115,000 participants since its launch in 1990. Impressively, it boasts a 70% employment success rate within three months of completion of the programme.

We should also look out into the community, beyond Government, to get thoughtful advice on what more can be done to help prepare young people for work. Last week I had the pleasure and the privilege of hearing about the Campaign for Youth Social Action, which is led by His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales. The campaign aims to provide a long-term vision to drive a real change in culture toward making youth social action, or volunteering, a universal norm. This is based on research demonstrating that meaningful social action improves empathy and that awareness of society around us leads to better engagement in education and, particularly relevant today, increased employability, confidence, problem-solving skills and resilience. I repeat the word “resilience”, but do not apologise for the focus that I am putting on it today.

The focus of today’s debate has been on getting young people prepared for the world of work and getting a job. But once this has happened, if young people are to achieve their aspirations, there must be opportunities for progression. Many employers understand this well and ensure that progression opportunities are available. But to ensure that progression is a reality for all young people, I strongly favour the establishment of a national lifetime careers service, in particular for young people, and for adults on low wages. They should be actively encouraged to engage with such a service and through this be assisted to develop a career or training progression plan.

In conclusion, we have taken time today to reflect on the efforts being made to prepare young people for the world of work. This debate has clearly shown that a number of things are vital. They include improving practical skills training and levels of English and maths attainment and supporting the development of strong character and resilience. These are key to ensuring that all young people are able to make the most of their talents and do well in the world of work. I urge the Government to build on the steps that they have already taken to make a reality of this collective aspiration.