Report finds only inner London has returned to pre-recession job creation levels
A report examining employment rates for different groups, including young people, disabled workers, and black and Asian employees, has found that untrained young people are most likely to be jobless.
The report Equitable Full Employment: A jobs recovery for all, by the TUC, revealed that despite the recovering labour market, job prospects for low or unskilled young people are declining.
This is in contrast to other disadvantaged groups such as lone parents and older poorly qualified workers, whose chances of being employed have improved over the past 17 years. But even with these advances, these disadvantaged groups remain far less likely to find work than the rest of the working population.
However, the employment picture is more worrying for untrained young people, the TUC said, because this group has seen no improvement in employment prospects. The report findings show their ability to find work has deteriorated rapidly over the same period.
In 1998, three-quarters of young people who were not in education were in work, which was higher than the employment rate for all workers at the time (71 per cent). However, the level of employment for low skilled young people fell behind that of other workers in mid-2005 and has continued to fall ever since.
The job chances of young people not in full-time education converged with workers aged 50-64 last summer – a remarkable turnaround given that they were 25 per cent more likely to be in work than older workers in 1998.
The TUC said that unless action is taken, the prospects for low-skilled youngsters and unqualified people of all ages will continue to worsen, making it “impossible”.
In addition to these findings, the report showed that inner London is the only area of the UK to have a higher rate of job creation than before the recession.
Outer London, the South East and Eastern England have recovered since the crash but job starts are still 11 per cent, 16 per cent and 21 per cent below pre-recession levels. Job creation across the rest of the country is more mixed with metropolitan areas such as Birmingham and Tyne and Wear recovering faster than their neighbouring rural areas. And while the situation in the West Midlands metropolitan area is improving jobs creation in the rest of the region continues to decline (down 31 per cent), while South and West Yorkshire are both performing far better than the rest of Yorkshire and Humberside.
TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady said: “Over the last two decades, we’ve learnt that strong growth and proper investment in employment programmes can make a huge difference to people’s job chances. But ministers seem keener on kicking struggling youngsters when they’re down and removing the safety net they need to learn new skills and find work.”
She called on the government to back increased funding for employment programmes and guaranteed jobs or training for any young person who’s been out of work for six months or more. “Spending more money on jobs support now will save money in the long run by getting more people in work and paying taxes.”