Lords Chamber

Thursday 11th June 2026

(began 3 months ago)

Share Debate
Watch Live
Skip to latest contribution
This debate has concluded
11:41
11:41
11:42
11:43
11:44
11:44
11:45
11:46
11:46
11:47
11:48
11:48
11:49
11:51
None Portrait Business of the House
-

>> First reading of a private bill. >> To require.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

To require. That an infant born. Alive after. An attempted termination of pregnancy receives appropriate medical treatment and care to make provision about enforcement of that requirement, and for connected purposes. I beg to move that this bill be now read a first time. The question is that this bill be now read a first time. As many as of that opinion will say content the contrary, not content. The contents have it. First reading of another

**** Possible New Speaker ****

private member's Bill Lord Moynihan of Chelsea. My Lords, I beg to introduce a

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, I beg to introduce a bill to protect the freedom of expression of professionally regulated individuals, to impose regulated individuals, to impose duties of neutrality. On duties of neutrality. On professional regulatory bodies, to restrict the imposition by such bodies of mandatory training or education of a political,

**** Possible New Speaker ****

ideological or social nature. I beg to move that this bill now be read for the first time. The question is that this bill

**** Possible New Speaker ****

The question is that this bill be now read a first time. As many as of that opinion will say content as of that opinion will say content the contrary, not content. The contents have it. Motion for debate. Welfare reforms and youth

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Welfare reforms and youth unemployment. Lord Evans of Rainow. My Lords, may I pay tribute to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lords, may I pay tribute to my noble friend Viscount Younger on. His 15 years service. On the front bench? He was an outstanding public servant and is very much missed in your Lordships House.
11:52
Lord Evans of Rainow Portrait Lord Evans of Rainow (Conservative)
-
-
Amen. Yeah.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

All of us can remember our first job and the moments we got our first paycheque. Or depending on first paycheque. Or depending on how old you are, pay packets, cash paid in a little brown envelope with holes in it. My father was a wages clerk, and he always told me to open it instantly and count how to open it instantly and count how much was in it. My first pay packet was £10 and I bought myself sweets, was £10 and I bought myself sweets, clothes, an Airfix models.

However, I moved on to working in my local pub, The Farmers Arms in Point and as a glass collector and bottle washer. My Lords hospitality and retail high streets and the neat issue are inseparable. Hospitality and retail provides jobs in every high street. In the UK. Hospitality and retail jobs are part of the answer to youth unemployment. Your first job is your first step, with businesses struggling with increased costs and additional taxes, they have been forced to cancel recruitment plans, cut staff hours in the worst cases.

Clothes. This is acutely affected part time jobs, entry level and first jobs, feeding directly into today's Neet crisis. Let us look at some economic data and facts. Nearly a million young people between the age of 16 and 24 in the UK are Neet, not in education, employment or training. This is 1 in 8 young people. At the end of 2025, it was registered as 957,000 young people. If they formed a city, it would be the third largest in the UK, larger than cities like Leeds, Glasgow and Cardiff.

This is a long term issue as the Neet rate has only fallen below 10% in 25 years during the Covid 19 pandemic. But at the end of 2024, it reached the highest level in a decade at 13.2%. The UK has a higher than average rate of young adults who are Neet compared to similar countries in the EU and the OECD. The EU average for 15 to 24 year olds was 9% Neet. The UK used to be around the EU average. Now only Romania has a higher Neet rate.

France has a similar Neet rate. When it entered the Covid pandemic in 2020, but it is now lower. Denmark's Neet rate for 15 to 24 year olds is 24 was 8.4%. The Netherlands is currently around 4.1%. The UK has gone from being average to being an outlier in the early 20 tens, most Neet young people were unemployed, seeking employment and ready to start. Now, only 43% are. The other 57% are economically, economically inactive. This is most driven by an increase in inactivity amongst men since the Covid pandemic.

6 in 10 Neet young people today have never had a job, going up from 4 in 10 in 2005. The the duration that a young person is Neet makes a big difference on returning to employment. 65% of those who are Neet for less than a year return to employment. The following year. Only 25% of those who are Neet for more than a year do so. Whilst there are 7 million more jobs in the UK than in 2000, the number of workers who are under 25 has fallen.

Young people have gone from making up 1 in 7 workers to 1 in 9. At the turn of the millennium, 63% of young people were in work. Now it is barely 50%. In contrast, the employment rate for 25 to 64 year olds rose from 74 to 80% over the same period. Unemployment among young people was 9% in 2022. It is now 16%. More than 250,000 young people have been unemployed for over six months, the highest number since 2015.

The Young People and Work interim report, the Mill Milburn Review, estimated that the Neet rate could increase to over 16%, or more than 1.25 million young people within five years. Over the last decade, the proportion of those who say they are Neet due to a work limiting health condition has gone up by 70%. The proportion of Neet young adults who are inactive due to sickness or disability has gone up from 11% in 2005 to 28%. The proportion of disabled Neet young adults who cite mental health as their main health problem has risen from 24% in 2011 to 42% in 2025.

All of those who fell into ill health related economic inactivity between 2017 and 2019, almost 8 in 10 were still Neet. More than two years later, a young person who first claimed health and disability benefits in 2019 is a third more likely to be neat five years later than someone who first claimed in 2010. Between 2010 and 20, the proportion of young people leaving disability benefits within five years dropped by 40%. Today, around 7 in 10 young people claiming a health and disability benefit are still claiming a decade later.

The Milburn Review found that only 1 in 5 Neet young people in England are getting meaningful employment support from the welfare system. Around half of the young people in the UK don't claim benefits and so are hidden from the system of those who do claim benefits. Only a third get meaningful support in finding employment, and these are often those who face the least barriers to work. Almost half of those who first claimed a health and disability benefit, aged 16 to 24 are not in work or education.

15 years later, a young person who first claimed health and disability benefits in 2019 is 34% more likely to be Neet after five years than someone who first claimed in 2010. But this is different to what those surveyed for the Milburn review claim they wanted. In a survey carried out for the Milburn Review, 64% of Neet young people said they want to find a job or an apprenticeship and 19% wanted to enter education or training of the young people who are claiming disability or health benefits, and were surveyed by the Milburn Review.

90% are working and 49% believe that they could work either. Now if they if there was the right support available or in the future, their health improved. Only 32% feel that they will not be able to work again. This is not what the system supports. Less than half of the total £8 billion currently spent on key benefits for young people aged 16 to 24. Has any participation, support or requirement attached to it? It is an issue which affects the whole system.

More than 4 million people claim Universal Credit, with no requirement to look for work in 2020 425 DWP spent less than point 2 billion funding employment support programmes for young people, plus a share of the 1.4 billion spent on Jobcentres, which support all ages. The Milburn Review estimated that in 2024, 25, £25 was spent on benefits for young people for every one on employment support for young people, the amount of money spent on PIP for young people alone is expected to rise to 3.2 billion to £6.5 billion by 2030 132.

The Milburn Review estimated that if the spend on DWP employment support stays at the current levels currently funded through the Youth Guarantee, then by 2030 31 for every £1 spent on employment support for young people, around £10 will be spent on welfare support for young people. The Milburn Review estimates that the cost to the 45% of today's Neet 24 year olds, who have never had a job, will be almost 300 zero zero £0 of earnings over the course of their lifetime.

Their cost to the state could be up to £240,000. The estimated direct total potential output lost due to Neet 18 to 24 year olds is £38 billion, and the estimated scarring impact on output is 63 billion. The estimated foregone tax revenue for 18 to 24 year olds who are Neet is £3.2 billion, and the estimated scarring foregone revenue is £10.8 billion. The cumulative annual cost to the UK of almost a million Neet young people is £125 billion.

The UK's welfare expenditure is set to rise by £18 billion this year, up to around £333 billion. My Lords, an eye watering figure. Given that we need to spend more on defence spending

**** Possible New Speaker ****

And elsewhere. When I was a member of. Parliament in the other place, during a coalition government working together with the Liberal Democrats, the conservative, the conservative government approach achieved some significant thresholds. Workless households fall to to a record over half a fall to to a record over half a million fewer children growing up in Workless homes, youth unemployment cut in half and £20 unemployment cut in half and £20 billion saved from the annual welfare bill. The OBR analysis concluded that the UK government policy reduced social Security spending by £19.6 billion in 20 1516 alone, relative to the 20 1011 baseline, and that shows together by working together cross-party how savings can be made that is fair to the recipients of welfare, but also fair to those taxpayers that have to pay for it.

What about the employers that will employ young people? Make UK the Manufacturing Representative Association has set out a range of challenges from an employer perspective, which are making it more difficult to recruit, train and retain young workers overall, they cite overall employment costs. This is the most significant survey for manufacturers in 2026 and overall hiring appearing hiring appears to be slowing as a result of higher costs, constraints on apprenticeships, a lack of the right local provision and increasing training and employment costs are limiting employers capacity to offer apprenticeship opportunities.

Wider skills and technical education, insufficient exposure to vocational and technical routes, lack of employer engagement from schools is limiting awareness and understanding of skilled employment opportunities for young people in sectors like manufacturing. The National Living Wage, the national minimum wage consistently high increases in both and age based rates, plus the proposed reduction in the National living wage age threshold to 18, means restricting opportunities for young people. Labour Market Regulation and the Employment Rights Act 2025. These measures, such as the right to guaranteed hours, may limit opportunities for young people to be employed.

Flexibility I mentioned at the beginning of my speech hospitality and retail, and they cite the tax burden that recently fell upon the sector. Since the 2024 budget, the hospitality sector has been battling an increase of £3.4 billion in annual costs and more recently, an existential crisis in business rates. Hospitality has been disproportionately and repeatedly hit by successive budgets. With taxes, hospitality has accounted for nearly half of all job losses in the UK since the budget, confirming the sector is the hardest hit by tax increases.

Hospitality is the biggest employer of young people, with 39% of hospitality workforce being 16 to 24 years old, by far the highest of any sector. Young people have typically been able to rely on a job in their local high street as their first job, and job losses in hospitality sector affect them most acutely. The National Insurance contributions, the changes to employer national Insurance contributions brought in in the 2024 budget are costing the hospitality sector 1 billion annually. Employment costs hit every part of the workforce, but particularly young people.

A student 14 hours at the weekend mean more than 1140 more in employment costs. Last year saw a 25% year on year drop in summer jobs, evidencing the loss of job opportunities for young people. High employment costs have had a knock on effect on a limited job, opportunities for young people and reduce footfall in the high streets. High cost employment is high risk employment. Hospitality offers many people their first job and it is vital first step on a career ladder for many young people.

Government must de-risk businesses employing the least trained and least experienced in the economy by reducing employment costs. Ensuring part time and temporary work is affordable for businesses to offer. Job losses in hospitality and tourism sector are collateral damage to the government's Neet mission. The industry is leading the way, providing 25% of all entry level jobs. Will the government rethink any fiscal measures that threaten further job losses in hospitality and elsewhere? In other words? In other words, to provide accessible jobs for everyone and everywhere? Why was hospitality not included in the government's industrial strategy, which again, would have helped young people gain good quality apprenticeships? Finally, my Lords, we are still awaiting the government's response to the 2025 Lords report on social media.

So social mobility, which was completed in December last year, and the government should have reported back by February this year. Exceptional delays if a response is likely to take longer than two months, the responsible government department must write to the committee explaining the delay and providing a revised timetable with this. With this in mind, could the noble Baroness, the Minister, please take this opportunity to ask her departmental officials to update the Lordships House on the government's response to this important Lords report on social mobility, which is highly relevant to all those NEETs that are no longer or not started in the workplace.

My Lords, I beg to move.
12:07
Lord Walker of Broxton Portrait Lord Walker of Broxton (Labour)
-
-
The question is that this motion be agreed to. >> My Lords. >> It is a pleasure to follow the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Evans, and I congratulate him in securing this debate. I must declare an interest debate. I must declare an interest as the executive chairman of Iceland Foods, now hanging on the wall in our boardroom, there is a framed version of the company's guiding values. It proclaims just four things simplification, focus, urgency and accept reality. There's also another framed picture of a cartoon. It's half a dozen people sitting around a board table, and the chairman is saying, instead of risking anything new, let's continue our slow decline into obsolescence.

Business success is not about being ruthless. We're always on the Sunday Times best companies to work for. It's about being a business that can thrive, grow, adapt, change to circumstances and move quickly to outfox the competition. In doing so, wealth and jobs are created, taxes are paid, and society benefits. As I said in my maiden speech, I support the Labour Party, not the Benefits Party, a party that promised to be pro-growth, pro-business and on the side of the builders, not the blockers.

Yet hard truths must be spoken because we cannot keep kicking the can down the road. We must urgently reform the welfare system so that the safety net catches those who truly need it, not those who choose it as a lifestyle. But let's jettison the worn out stereotype of who it is that constitutes the biggest drain on our benefits system. We should have the courage to challenge the pensions. Triple lock, mathematically unsustainable, politically untouchable and profoundly unfair.

We all know it. As for the epidemic of youth unemployment, it's a tragedy which will be made worse by the challenges of AI, but also because the reality is the incentives to work are diminishing. The bottom line is this we will only cure the problem by growing the economy. It really is that simple. I was happy to support Labour in 2024, precisely because they promised a growth first mission. Yet I have to confess that progress has been slower than I imagined, and in my short time working within number ten as the cost of living champion, I've been disappointed to find out how hard it actually is to get stuff done.

A frustration I know is shared by the Prime Minister. I recently presented a comprehensive report to number ten, setting out practical steps that could be taken immediately to ease the pressures facing many households, including young people. The report focuses on energy debt relief, winter energy affordability, faster support payments, action on consumer rip offs, and reform of punitive debt collection. These recommendations need to be translated into urgent action. Let's see what they do with it. On the broader stage of the national economy, we need to break out of the endless cycle of consultations and procrastination and actually get stuff done.

To grow the economy. Government needs to be more business friendly. It is only business that creates wealth, jobs and pays tax. I repeat, it is only business that can grow the economy. If time permitted, I could list a hundred things government could do today to help businesses prosper, thereby driving down youth unemployment and reducing the need for welfare. But in brief, my recommendation is put those two framed pictures we have at Iceland's HQ in every single office within government simplicity, focus, urgency and accepting reality really are the proven keys to success.

And that really would be trying something new. My Lords, the hour is late. The stakes are high. It is time to jus adapt and thrive or drift and die.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Yeah. Lord, it's a pleasure to follow

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Lord, it's a pleasure to follow the noble Lord Walker of Broxton as he said, he has a huge amount of he said, he has a huge amount of practical advice, but as he said, we can't keep kicking the can down the road and indeed we cannot. the road and indeed we cannot. Youth unemployment, he said, was a tragedy and I want to agree with him, as we've seen it rise in in him, as we've seen it rise in in recent times. Can I thank the noble Lord Evans of Rainow for enabling us to hold this debate, which is timely in the context of the Milburn Review.

But I want to say, first that welfare support should not be removed from young people if there is no work for them to do, and young people do want to work, young people don't prefer to live on benefits. My Lords, I have been a member of two select committees reporting in recent years on youth unemployment. I chaired in November 2021, the Youth Unemployment committee that reported then skills for every young person. It had been. The proposal of the noble Lord Baker, who we shall hear from shortly, and I look forward to that.

But we identified a huge skills mismatch between the needs of employers and the qualifications of young people leaving school. We identified deficiencies in digital skills of young people. We were concerned by the narrowness of the national curriculum. We saw the need for more technical and vocational education and more apprenticeships for school leavers, and we understood the importance of work experience and the capacity of employers to meet demand. And I was then a member of the committee chaired by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, which later in
12:14
Lord Shipley Portrait Lord Shipley (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
2024 produced a report, Think Work first on the transition from education to work for young education to work for young disabled people. And we know from Mencap that of those young people Mencap that of those young people with a learning disability, 86% want a job. Baroness Morris of Yardley said that this report provided a blueprint for the new government to implement its commitment, a manifesto commitment to getting more young disabled people into work and to bridge the gap between education and work for them.

Two key proposals were supported internships and better career support in schools, to which, my Lords, I think we should add more face to face assessments for those being interviewed for personal independence payments and the decisions around that. My Lords, what has happened? As we heard from the noble Lord Evans, those not in education, employment and training and now over a million and its growing youth unemployment today stands at 16.2%. The long term impact of Covid, the rise of AI, the lack of entry level jobs they all add together to make the picture worryingly bleak.

And crucially, half of those not in education, employment and training have never worked. Yet the cost of youth unemployment is £125 billion. That is in benefit payments and in lost tax revenues. Taken together. And DWP statistics show that for every £25 spent on benefits, only £1 is spent by them. On helping young people into work. My Lords, I find those astonishing figures. I have concluded that the DWP is too centralised. We need to devolve now to combined authorities and mayors, and to give them a clear responsibility to deliver a reduction in NEETs and a real increase in youth employment in their areas.

If we compare ourselves to the Netherlands there, there is stronger vocational education, better, more targeted financial support for business. There is a work experience system and a welfare system which promotes engagement by young people and where municipal authorities, not central government, run welfare programmes. I thought the noble Lord Walker of Broxton very helpful about the need to support in employers. The government's youth guarantee is good, but it needs to be part of a package of tax incentives. And the truth is that the National Insurance rise has been a significant disincentive.

My Lords, to conclude, too many young people are leaving school without the skills they need to succeed or in what employers need support through coaching is insufficient. I remember are taking evidence from young people who said that the job centre saw them as a statistics. That is the job centre objective was to get the young person into a job, whether or not that job was suitable for them or might lead them to a career. We have to get coaching of individual young people so much better.
12:18
Lord Cameron of Dillington Portrait Lord Cameron of Dillington (Crossbench)
-
-
My Lords. noble Lord Lord Shipley and particularly pleasure to hear the noble Lord, Lord Walker, speak. I couldn't have agreed more with couldn't have agreed more with almost everything he said. My Lords, I declare my interests as a member of a retired member of a farming family in Somerset, and I want to talk about rural youth unemployment. Our rural youth has special problems, mostly to do with transport and the distances involved. The great question for the rural young is how do I get to a job without a set of wheels? There is no other way to get to a job at 730 in the morning, in a place that is ten miles away, without your own set of wheels.

But then how do I get a set of wheels without the money from my first job? It's a catch 22, my Lords. And of course, the simple answer is that you lend the youngster a moped. And there used to be hundreds of these wheels to work schemes around England that did just that. The youngster, after a short training session, was lent a moped free of charge, and after six months in work they had to give it back and get their own set of wheels.

The scheme was funded by local authorities and the DWP, but then local authorities ran out of money, as we all know, and the urban base DWP simply didn't get it. They didn't get the fact that these schemes cost less per head than the Social Security benefits otherwise payable to these youngsters who, if they had been helped into work, would probably never trouble the welfare state ever again for the rest of their lives. Sadly, nearly all of these wheels to work schemes have died.

These schemes also help youngsters to get to training courses, and that is a problem in itself. Technical colleges can be 15 to 20 miles away, so now most aspiring youngsters have to cadge beds from their fellow pupils living in the town, sofa hopping until their welcome runs out. So sometimes it is easier just to launch yourself into some sort of self-employment. And rural England has twice as many self-employed as a percentage than urban England in some counties. My own county of Cornwall, for instance, have 5 or 6 times as many.

We are an enterprising crowd, but we could really benefit from help, training and advice. I came across a scheme at Loch Lomond and in this scheme which I think should be replicated all around the country, youngsters applied to the National Park Authority, who organised tuition classes, which the youngsters themselves pay for simple stuff like budgets, cash flows and marketing. But really important if you want to earn your own money by mending bikes or computers, or fitting it routers, or just cleaning windows and helping a percentage of the rural workforce to earn their own money rather than draw the dole must make a difference both to them and to the Treasury.

Now, my Lords, small rural family businesses have always tried hard to give local youngsters a start in life. These businesses have always been and felt part of their community. So it is in reigned in their ethos. But whereas in 2020, implying a 21 year old costs £17,000 per annum, now in 2026 it costs £29,600 and no small business can afford to employ an untrained 21 year old at that price. So who loses? Well, the 21 year olds, of course, just when they're on the springboard of a working life, it collapses beneath them.

And the other losers are the Treasury because they have to pay benefits to these now unemployed 21 year olds, as opposed to receiving probably their lifelong payments of tax. Now, my Lords, I will stop there. But just to say that we are an enterprising lot in rural Britain, we have many more businesses per head than the towns, and our youngsters would love to join this world of work, but they just need that extra help to enable them to do so. Thank you.
12:22
Lord Bishop of Leicester Portrait The Lord Bishop of Leicester (Bishops)
-
-
Lords. Lord Evans of Rainow for securing this debate and grateful to all taking part. Noble Lords may differ on the diagnosis, but I think the whole House shames shares the same concern for the young people behind these figures, and I want to begin by noting that none of us likes to be labelled, and the use of acronyms to refer to people is even more disconcerting. Each young person is unique and precious, whatever their circumstances and their dignity, must be at the heart of our concerns.

I also want to push back on the narrative, which we often see in the media, that the rise in young people who are not in education, employment or training reflects a generation that has no appetite for work. My Lords, the evidence simply does not bear that out. In research by the Learning and Work Institute, the vast majority of young people who are not in education or training, 84% had clear career or educational aspirations. Only 6% said they did not want to find work.

Nor is it the case of unrealistic aspirations. Only 4% said they were waiting for an opportunity in a specific sector, whereas 17% said they planned to find any job they could. Similarly, research by the King's Trust showed that 1 in 5 young people who were not in education, employment or training are applying for jobs every single day. Almost a third have applied for jobs they did not even want. Out of sheer desperation to get a foothold on the labour market, 1 in 6 had been rejected from more than 50 positions, and more than half say they feel embarrassed about not having a job.

That, my Lords, is not a picture of idleness. It speaks of a generation knocking on doors that are just not opening for them, because more than half of so-called entry level vacancies now demand prior experience. On average, nearly three years of it. So we should be especially wary of stigmatising young people and suggesting they have a poor work ethic or a lack of unrealistic ambition. Because the more that narrative takes hold, the more reluctant employers will be to take a chance on them.

We will, in other words, perpetuate the problem which we want to solve. So if the problem is not a lack of work ethic, the solution is not necessarily tough love. It is, at least in part, confidence coaching and a community that believes in them. And here, my Lords, I want to recommend a model that does precisely this. The spear programme, run by the charity Resurgo and delivered through local churches, spear, began in 2003 at Saint Paul's Church in Hammersmith as a response to the unemployed young people on its own doorstep.

It has since grown to some 18 centres across the country and works with over a thousand young people each year, all of whom face multiple significant barriers to work from mental health issues, criminal history, adverse childhood trauma. The programme involves six weeks of group work and 1 to 1 coaching that tackles the psychological barriers as much as the practical ones confidence, mindset, resilience alongside CV writing, interview practice, job search skills followed by up to a year of ongoing support as each young person moves into work or education and, crucially, stays there.

Around three quarters of those who complete the programme are in work or training. A year later, a figure I'm sure you will agree, which is remarkable. What I want to draw out for the house from this model is the importance of a supportive community in helping marginalised young people into work, and the importance of a trusted adult to journey with each young person. So as Ministers build out the Youth Guarantee, I would urge them to recognise the availability of placements on its own is not enough for young people who face multiple barriers to work.

Many young people need the intensive, personalised, confidence building support of organisations like spear to provide and help them as they seek then to find placements. The positive ripple effects of this, I believe, will be generational, passed down onto their children, as well as being important for wider society as a whole.
12:27
Baroness Shephard of Northwold Portrait Baroness Shephard of Northwold (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, I congratulate. >> My Lords, I congratulate. >> My noble friend Lord Evans of Rainow for introducing this very important and timely debate. Successive governments have had to deal with rising levels of youth unemployment for a range of reasons. Economic shocks and deindustrialisation, changing patterns of demand and I and no doubt other noble Lords recall from earlier years initiatives like the Youth Training Schemes, training and Enterprise councils and new qualifications like Nvqs. Not perfect solutions but constructive and collaborative.

They involved close working between government, national and local, with employers, with further and higher education and training providers. Today we have the aftermath of Covid, the world economic situation, war, the influence of social media, the implications of AI, uncertainty on all fronts. So the government needs all possible cooperation from business and employers, but it is not what they have provided. Higher national insurance costs, increased national minimum wage and business rates, new workers rights legislation and more regulation.

My Lords, these are disincentives for business stability and expansion employs a reluctant, unable even to take on more staff to provide those vital first job openings for any staff that they may not be able to retain. So there is, as has already been pointed out, a chronic shortage of part time job opportunities for young people like paper rounds, part time work in cafes and shops, making progression to full time work even harder for the young.

My Lords, these issues are difficult enough, but other government policies are exacerbating the grievous situation, especially for NEETs. Exposed by Alan Milburn's recently published report. There is the complete chaos and uncertainty already mentioned in this debate by this government, inflicting an uncertain future for local government. Now, local government is a provider for those with special education needs. A key further education provider, and it is a partner with the business sector in apprenticeship and training schemes.

How can Collaborative partnership proceed with currently no clear future for the whole sector? Pointed out in the Milburn Report, and as has already been mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, there are particular problems for rural communities where there is less visible aspiration. Transport is expensive, often non-existent, and the government's apparent hostility to such communities by loading them with tax after tax on their livelihoods and their very future, provides a bleak landscape for unemployed young people.

Rising youth unemployment, as I've said, has been a problem faced by successive governments. But some of the facts revealed in Alan Milburn's unflinching report on NEETs are mind blowing. They account for a quarter of all pupils, half of all those ending up on benefits in their late 20s. We spend in this country 25 times as much on benefits for NEETs as we do on helping them back in to work that cannot continue.

As the noble Lord, Lord Walker has already pointed out, the situation has been described by Alan Milburn as scandalous, and the report so clearly says this, which is a message to the government. If the government's priority is to create young people's jobs, then it's got to create the right conditions for employers to do so. So far it hasn't.
12:31
Lord Baker of Dorking Portrait Lord Baker of Dorking (Conservative)
-
-
Yeah. >> Yeah, yeah. >> My Lord, I very much welcome the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My Lord, I very much welcome the opportunity in this debate to explore why youth unemployment is explore why youth unemployment is so high in our education system. It is deplorable that we have a million young people from 16 to 24 who have not ever had a work. And as the bishop said, they want to work, they failed. The education system has failed. So this gives the chance to examine what's wrong with our education system and what is wrong with our secondary schools, and what is wrong with our secondary schools, and why unemployment is so much lower in Europe, is due to the fact that in Europe, all of the countries that Lord Burns mentioned teach students below 16 technical and vocational education in our bog standard comprehensives.

They do not teach them at all. They leave school with no employability skills. It's not their fault. And when you want to know what employability skills are, you should look at the information that the Nuffield Foundation has sent to all MPs or peers for this debate, because they list what employability skills the first one is collaboration student at school should have experience of working in teams. Secondly, communication so they can persuade their future employer what they've learned and how it's inspired them.

Thirdly, creative thinking, organising, planning, prioritising problem solving, decision making this isn't done in our secondary schools today, and it's indictment of both conservative governments and Labour governments. Since the century. They have not made any significant change in this, whereas in Europe they have lots of technical education below 16. And that is why, my Lord, some. 15 Lord Sikka Lord Dearing and I created a new type of school, a university technical college, for 14 to 18 year old children, and they have employability skills.

They leave with employability skills. And this is what this country needs in a much greater space, much greater area. And it's very disappointing that it is not developing at all quickly. Just before the government came into power, the unemployment rate in Britain was about 13%. In two and a half years later, it's got up to 16%. And Lord Milburn thinks that it could well be up to double high, much higher than that by the time the next election.

And so it does make sense to consider what changes must be made in our education system. Some 15 years ago, I developed with Lord Dearing a new type of school called a University Technical College. They are for 14 to 18 year old students, and we have 21,000 students. And last September we have to turn 6000 away because so many of our colleges are oversubscribed and our unemployment rate is not 15.8, it is less than 4% because our students, 20% of them become apprentices, whereas in an ordinary school it's only 3%.

And you must realise that heads of schools don't want to encourage apprenticeships because every person they lose from apprenticeships costs them £6,000 in the funding, and so they don't promote apprenticeships at all. And then 50% of our students go to university to study Stem subjects of the humanities, and the rest get local jobs locally because they've worked with the companies that support them. And I believe that we should have many more of these. We had 300 technical schools in 1945, and they would, in fact, abolished by snobbery.

And these technical schools that we have now the best we've ever had. And I would like to see expansion. I'd like 300. I'm not going to have them because no schools are going to be built in this country for about 5 or 10 years. We have. So we've got to then change the existing bog standard comprehensives to include practical technical education. And we have devised a scheme whereby we should insert a sleeve into every comprehensive of technical education from 14 to 18, which we will provide.

We will give them the advice, we'll explain what equipment they have to have, what what subjects they have to study, etc. etc. and if they have a choice, the students have a choice. And we have some schools that now want a sleeve. They choose themselves, whether they follow the technical route or the academic route. And I'm glad to say the first of these is going to happen in September of this year in Barrow in Furness, because a British Aerospace can't recruit from Cumbria any of the students that they want and the quality that they want, but they will have one.

And it costs, I may say, 2.5 million to provide a sleeve, whereas to build a new college will cost 25 million. So it is the cheapest and easiest way of improving technical education in our schools. Now the Minister is replying tonight, this afternoon rather likes you. She's visited three of them. The Secretary of State likes them and so will they. Please support the idea of the UTC sleeve for bog standard comprehensives, because that is the biggest and cheapest way that we can reduce unemployment.
12:37
Baroness Fox of Buckley Portrait Baroness Fox of Buckley (Non-affiliated)
-
-
Many thanks to. >> Many thanks to. >> The noble Lord Evans of Rainow for this debate. Its urgency is for this debate. Its urgency is indeed exemplified by Alan Milburn's important review on young Milburn's important review on young people and work, which is brimming with, as people have said, shocking and scandalous revelations. Not only that, 1 million young people aged 16 to 24 are not in work or education, but that 61% of NEETs are not even looking for a job, or that Britain spends more on health and disability benefits for that age group than it does on apprenticeships.

Of course, there is lots of factors stacked up against the young, some of which we in Parliament are responsible for, whether that counterproductive jobs tax we have heard about or the consequences of uncontrolled mass migration distorting the labour market. But we should be wary of suggesting that these are insurmountable external problems, because that could fuel an exaggerated sense of grievance or fatalism amongst the young, with the sense that there is nothing I can do. I can't get a job, and it's not my fault.

I agree with Alan Milburn that what's at stake is, quote, more than an economic crisis. It is a moral one. But I am a bit disappointed. The review does not dig deeper into reasons and solutions for why so many young people are detached from the world of work. I agree with the review's argument for participation first welfare system, but the barriers to participation are not always external. The moral question is why so many young people are alienated from participating per se.

Why? There is a seeming rejection of the work ethic. And on this I am definitely at odds with the right Reverend prelate, the Bishop of Leicester. Not the first time I've been at odds with the church, but there we go. In another recent report, inside the mind of a young Neet, the authors note many young people told us they wanted to work, but they felt that they just couldn't cope with the 35 to 40 year old 40 hour week. Cue a slew of proposals to offer part time supported work opportunities, trial shifts and so on to help build confidence.

But isn't that pandering to low expectations, creating new dependencies? Don't we need to interrogate why past generations of young people grasped full time work as an opportunity, a rite of passage to adulthood? Yet today, so many, too many at least feel themselves unable to cope. Similarly, employers report that its younger employees, who are most keen to work from home. They cite everything from travelling to and from work as too stressful to anxiety, from being forced to spend so many hours with strangers they've got nothing in common with, otherwise known as fellow workers.

Then there's the boss and work discipline, strict time keeping and the expectation of productive outcomes are characterised as oppressive or even bullying. Rather than challenge such low levels of resilience. HR departments and policy experts attempt to reshape workplaces to accommodate demands. Now, of course, I am generalising and caricaturing a bit at least. And no doubt Alan Milburn would scold me because he worries that it is too easy to tell the neat story as a generation that is less resilient, more snowflakey.

And perhaps I'm victim blaming, but certainly, as I work with young people at the Academy of Ideas who I think are fantastic, they and I share some worries about their generation and rather. I fear that we, the grown ups, are facilitating the internalisation of a victim narrative in the young. Infantilizing them Institutionalising a self-justification for non-participation that they're too fragile to cope with the rigours of working, just too vulnerable to take responsibility for transcending challenges in this climate, it is unsurprising that one growing, normalised explanation for Neet is psychological illness.

There is a well documented huge surge of allegedly debilitating mental health conditions such as depression. Neurodivergence. We accept these accounts of distress uncritically and even without medical diagnosis. So when we heard last year that 63,000 students went straight from university onto long term sickness benefits, we might note that recently Oxford University agreed to give 25% more exam time to students who said that their ADHD without any formal diagnosis. They explained that is, the university that seeking diagnostic documentation is an onerous administrative burden and a barrier to inclusion of disabled students.

I used to work in mental health, and back then we worried about the stigma of disability labels. Now, in an era of identity politics embraced by many politicians, identity labels afford privileges and entitlements, so the young are desperate to acquire medical labels and we reward them. Policy makers have also encouraged pathologizing the ups and downs of everyday life. We have medicalized social media use as addictive, and academics issue trigger warnings on classic texts to prevent students suffering post-traumatic stress disorder from exposure to difficult or offensive content.

In fact, many of the worst habits exhibited by the young in relation to work can be traced back to us. Let us not forget, in lockdown we taught the young that health trumps everything work, school, the economy. So for me, welfare dependency is the tip of the iceberg. I am glad we're examining the tip, but we've got a

**** Possible New Speaker ****

lot further to go. Yeah. I just remind the House that this is a time limited debate. Any this is a time limited debate. Any extra time members take will be taken off. The frontbench response.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

taken off. The frontbench response. My Lords. I'd like to congratulate.
12:43
Lord Liddle Portrait Lord Liddle (Labour)
-
-
>> Lord Evans of Rainow on securing this debate and for the largely non-partisan way in which he non-partisan way in which he explained the problem. I would love to see cross-party consensus on welfare reform, but if we are to get that, I totally agree with my noble friend Lord Walker, that that has to examine the challenge of the ageing society and whether we can continue to support the pension, triple lock and all the costs of NHS and social care, which, if we're not careful, are producing great generational inequality in Britain and something has to be Britain and something has to be done to address that.

Now on the The Milburn Report, first of all, I'd like to say about it that I think it's a brilliant report. And I think the way that Alan Milburn and Pat McFadden are going about trying to get positive change in this policy area, is an example that the rest of our government here should follow. They're making a powerful, really powerful argument for change with compelling clarity. And we want more of this from our government. Now.

It's all also make clear that there aren't simplistic solutions to this problem. It's OK. You know, I think the government I agree with Tony Blair. The government made a mistake in putting up national insurance in the way that it did as a way of raising taxes. We should have done something else, and particularly the way it was done in terms of lowering the threshold at which the National Insurance can pay, of course, hit low paid starter jobs particularly hard.

So we made a mistake there. But it isn't changing. That isn't going to change what is a very complex problem. As the Milburn report has outlined. Now. Part of it is a sort of classic story of school of social exclusion, and I think the government is doing a lot in terms of early years to try and get more children. School ready by five. And the report demonstrates that it's those children who aren't school ready at five were much more likely to be jobless at 18.

We're doing good work there. There's also a problem of poor school attendance among the less able children. And I think that this is a question of education reform. As a Lord Baker explained to us, we have to be better at not just training kids to pass exams, but giving them skills. And the system at the moment isn't well organised for that, but it's much more bigger problem than social exclusion. After all, 30% of NEETs had good GCSEs, 20.1% had level three qualifications and 15% have a degree.

So it isn't just a problem of social exclusion. I thought the most interesting part of the report which which was new to me, was the changing nature of the labour market and how the supply of entry jobs in the labour market has gone down. And this is this isn't something that's happened under the Labour government in the last two years. This is something this is much more of a long term trend. And, you know, remember Norman Tebbit saying you had to get on your bike to find a job? Well, nowadays the Milburn tells the rather pitiful story of of young people who make hundreds of applications on email and often typically don't even get an acknowledgement.

So one that that is an issue. I think that we've got to have more incentives for employers, for apprenticeships. Apprenticeships have fallen by 35% since 2019. So what the government is doing there is, right. We've got to have an extended job guarantee. Yes, as we had in the early 80s with the Manpower Services Commission. I think there's lots of ideas that need to be explored. This is one of the great social

**** Possible New Speaker ****

challenges of our time, and we must address it. In. My Lords. I congratulate.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I congratulate. My noble friend Lord Evans on

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My noble friend Lord Evans on his excellent introduction to this debate. Full of relevant facts and analysis. And indeed, we at the Resolution Foundation I should declare an interest, as Present Resolution Foundation have tried to
12:49
Lord Willetts Portrait Lord Willetts (Conservative)
-
-
contribute to such an analysis. It's absolutely clear that this is a British problem. The Neet rate in Netherlands is 5%. In Britain it is 15%. This is not some pervasive problem of young people affected by social media. Other countries do better and we should be able to raise our game. Part of the problem is simply the cost of employing young people, and we've had some examples of those costs already. But it is worth recalling that wage people this year is going up by 5%, compared with 4.1% generally.

Will the Minister accept that the time has come to halt or pause the process of aligning young persons minimum wage rates with the wider adult population? Because it is one of the factors driving the increase in unemployment. There is there is more that we can also do to lower the cost of employing people. Although there has been many references already to the Milburn Review, an excellent document brilliantly presented. Perhaps I could join draw the House's attention and the Minister's attention to another report which hasn't had quite so much attention.

It's the 16th, no, the 27th. Occasional paper from the Social Security Advisory Committee, which came out in March, is entitled The Influence of the Social Security System on Educational and Vocational Decision Taking at age 16. And it's another very useful contribution to the debate and shows how for households, the cost in terms of benefits foregone of a 16 or 17 year old going into an apprenticeship, a really very considerable. I hope the Minister will can look at that report alongside Alan Milburn's.

There is already one very useful initiative, the Youth Guarantee, which is a guarantees a work placement or an apprenticeship for young people who are on benefits. It does appear to be effective, however. Currently there are only 43,000 young people we got rid of the pensions triple lock and linked pension payments to earnings, not the tough regime on under Margaret Thatcher, who I used to advise when it was linked simply to prices. But if you just said that pensions will rise in earnings, we estimate that that would, by the end of this Parliament, be saving £650 million a year.

And what better use of that saving than instead shifting it towards young people who could gain from the guarantee? When we look at how Britain compares so poorly with continental countries, the main gap, however, is not in employment. The main gap is people who are not participating in education and training. There is clearly a lot more we can do there. The apprenticeship levy really has been captured by older workers and absolutely should be redirected and prioritise young people.

Higher education can also make a contribution. It offers a large amount of vocational and technical education. It's very hard to measure this, but over almost 80% of graduates in work say they are directly using what they learnt in higher education for their work and graduate employment rates at 88%, are significantly higher than employment rates, amongst non-graduates of 68%, although there are. Indeed, as we've heard, graduates who are. They are far less likely to be neat. So can I also ask the Minister, with her wide range of responsibilities, to recognise that higher education can be part of the answer, not part of the problem?
12:54
Lord Young of Cookham Portrait Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative)
-
-
It's a pleasure. >> To follow. In the wake of my noble friend Lord Willetts, and to join others in commending my noble join others in commending my noble friend Lord Evans, for choosing this highly topical subject. For today's debate, he and I both sat on the Social Mobility Committee, which focussed directly on nights and youth unemployment. Only the House of Lords would put three Old Etonians on a social mobility committee. But I challenge anyone reading Hansard to identify who they were.

Our work has been complemented, as others have said, by the Milburn Interim Review. I read all 217 pages over the Whitsun recess. It's actually one of the finest reports I've ever read. Evidence based, balanced, clearly written without any jargon, and with the author's commitment to social justice shining through. I think the difficulty is he's raised enormously high expectations for his final report due in the autumn. But I just contrast for a moment the government's approach to youth unemployment with that of social care.

The Milburn Review was announced in November last year. Final report in the early autumn, less than a year, the Casey Review into social care was announced in January 25th, with a report expected in 2028. Adult social care has been kicked into touch. I just pick up two points from the review, one mentioned by my noble friend Lord Willetts, the Milburn Review said this I quote the apprenticeship levy has been captured by employers upskilling existing workers rather than hiring young entrants, and he made the point that only 2% of apprenticeships actually went to NEETs.

Now that is a a distorted priority, which the government should urgently correct. The second point is just one paragraph of Milburn that I thought encapsulated the whole problem. And again, I quote less than half of the total 8.1 billion currently spent on key benefits for young people aged 16 to 24 year olds. Has any participation, support or requirements attached to it? It is the polar opposite of what a participant participation first welfare system should be, providing a means more and more people are being trapped on benefits.

And he concludes his words this is a catastrophic failure. Now, the Milburn Review and our social committee report all point in the same direction. Tackle youth unemployment locally, Milburn said. This there is a strong case for local leadership to address the need. Crisis. Labour markets are local transporters, local employer relationships are local strategic authorities, the bodies that have huge potential to enact change. Now that reflects the recommendation of the select committee. Again, I quote, we recommend that the government takes note of the successful local partnerships working with those who are Neet, and that they should support local and combined authorities in endeavours to develop the leadership of such local initiatives.

And then we concluded the current local government restructure and the creation of mayoral combined authorities is an opportunity for government to devolve the power and resources needed for those authorities to lead work through local partnerships, schools, colleges, universities and employers, and Skills England to promote social mobility and address the acute Neet problem. End of quotes. Now, actually, we saw that working in practice when we visited Liverpool, so I end with a radical suggestion which take those recommendations to a logical conclusion and builds on the point that Lord Shipley made earlier.

Pick as a pilot a mayoral authority such as Bristol. Work out what the DWP would spend over the next 12 months on benefits for those aged 16 to 24. Give that sum, and it's probably billions as a lump sum to the mayor to work with the universities, the technical colleges, local employers and challenge them to invest that money in a new apprenticeships, work experience, training and voluntary work. Now, every claimant would, of course, keep the benefit to which they were entitled.

But I believe unlocking that budget in that particular way would have a major impact by the end of the year on the solution which we all want, namely more jobs for young people. Does the government have the nerve to do this? Yeah, yeah.
12:59
Lord Storey Portrait Lord Storey (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
Just as the patron of Career Connect. And thank Lord Evans for initiating this debate and welcome initiating this debate and welcome the opportunity to contribute on welfare reform and youth unemployment. Recent analysis from unemployment. Recent analysis from the Health Foundation highlights a significant change in the profile of young people who are not in employment, education or training. A decade ago, around one quarter of these young people reported a work limiting health condition. Today, that figure is almost one half.

Perhaps most strikingly, mental health and neurodevelopmental developmental conditions are now among the principal barriers preventing many young people from participating in education and employment. These findings tell us something important about the challenge we face. Too often, debates about welfare and unemployment focus solely on economic incentives or labour market conditions. Important though these issues are, they only tell part of the story. For a growing number of young people, the challenge is not a lack of aspiration, but a struggle with their health and wellbeing.

As someone who spent many years working in schools, I know that these difficulties rarely emerge overnight. The young person who eventually leaves education without qualifications, confidence or a clear pathway into work often showed signs much earlier. The question for policymakers is whether we recognise those signs and provide support before any disadvantage becomes entrenched. The evidence suggests that employment policy, health policy and welfare policy can no longer be treated as separate conversations. A young person experiencing poor mental health does not encounter these challenges in neat departmental categories.

They experience them as barriers to learning to work and to participation in society. That is why early intervention matters so greatly. Effective mental health support strong pastoral care in schools and colleges, access to mentoring, high quality careers advice and opportunities for training and employment can make the difference between a young person becoming disconnected from society and a young person fulfilling their potential. As we've heard from Lord Shipley and others, perhaps we could learn lessons from others. Young people in the Netherlands report anxiety much the same levels.

Yet the Dutch Neet rate is less than a third of ours. Though vocational education is prized, not patronised. The Dutch call it the foundation of their economy. Employers are involved from the classroom onwards, and by 19 more than half of young Dutch people have a workplace experience. Here it is fewer than 1 in 5. The Resolution Foundation estimates that matching the Dutch rate would mean that 600 000 more of our young people would be earning and learning. I welcome the Youth Guarantee, but it is built around claimants.

Can the Minister tell us how it will reach the far larger group or economically inactive, and the 314 000 young people who claim nothing are known to no service at all? Will it be sustained, or will it be another new initiative funded and then quietly wound down? Will the government give every young person a statutory entitlement to meaningful work experience and face to face careers in guidance, starting early and reaching those who need it most? Will they go further in rebalancing the apprenticeship levy towards young people entering work while easing national insurance and business rate burdens on hospitality and high street employers who give so many of them their first job.

My Lords, we should judge our success not merely by the number of people moved through a system, but by the number of young lives put on a path to opportunity. Welfare reform must be about more than managing need. It must be about creating the conditions in which people can thrive. If we can help young people overcome the barriers that prevent them from participating fully in education and employment, we will not only improve individual lives, but strengthen our communities, reduce inequality and support economic growth.

That is an objective I hope can command the support across this House.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Here. My Lords. Can I start by congratulating my noble friend on today's debate? noble friend on today's debate? This is timely and important. I was employment Minister back in 2010. employment Minister back in 2010. We inherited a country where unemployment was heading to 3 million, where youth unemployment million, where youth unemployment was close to a million, and the system had deep flaws in it. We system had deep flaws in it. We also inherited some good things and things which have been lost over the years, and I want to set out for the House today some of the
13:04
Lord Grayling Portrait Lord Grayling (Conservative)
-
-
things that worked, and my noble friend rightly made the point that over the course of the decade that followed, we saw some significant followed, we saw some significant improvements to the number of children growing up in workless households, the level of youth unemployment. We achieved the unemployment. We achieved the lowest unemployment levels since the 1970s. Now, of course, part of that was down to getting the economy right. Lord Coaker is absolutely right about the need for growth. I hope he will use his growth.

I hope he will use his position on those benches to put pressure on a government with which he clearly doesn't entirely agree to change some of the things that it is doing. But I think there are three key elements that are needed to get to grips with the issues within the welfare system. Clearly, there are big issues around education, as we've heard today, and we've got an education Minister responding today. But I want to focus particularly on the issues within welfare. The first is there's got to be a central element to the system that is face to face.

What we inherited back in 2010 with the disability living allowance was a system where people had largely self-referred. That cannot be right now. We changed that. But I freely admit, under the last government that was significantly lost during the pandemic, that needs to change. We need to get back to a situation where people cannot self-refer for benefits they are subject to, to challenge, to question and to assistance. They shouldn't be able to simply enter the system and stay there.

The second thing that needs to happen is all around activity. And I very much welcome the youth guarantee. But, but I would say that the work programme that we put in place after 2010 made a genuine difference. And if Ministers look back at the official findings when the report was carried out in 2015 2016, to that assessed that the effectiveness of programme, it found that it had been cost effective for taxpayers and highly effective claimants, and it required those who were stranded on benefits to get involved in significant programmes, to do things, to be subject to constant challenge, and we need to make sure that is a central part, that nobody's sitting at home doing nothing.

They are getting out there doing things. The youth guarantee is a positive, but that needs to be spread so that no one is left at home doing nothing. How do you pay for that? Well, actually she needs to have a conversation. This needs to have a conversation with the Treasury about the Dell EMU switch. The way that works. Very simple. The money that was saved by getting people off benefits was used to pay for the programs that help them get there. Because if you keep somebody in work for a couple of years, they're almost certain to stay there.

And at that point, the Treasury generates a genuine saving and it becomes extremely high value for money for the taxpayer. And it deals with a long term social issue. So I would encourage Ministers go back and look at the work programme, look at the switch, look at the kind of innovative things that the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

providers did. And yes, these were private sector providers or voluntary sector providers. They were brought into the network, brought into the system by the previous Labour government. I commend them for that. And there was some first rate organisations, some first rate charities, some of which were quite close to people. Sitting on my front bench did a first rate job. So that's the second. The third piece is that have to be consequences and sanctions for those who will not participate.

It is simply not good enough. And I've sat in meetings, in assessments, in all kinds of processes where people were subject to help and challenge and assessment. And I've seen at first hand how different people respond, how people with mental health challenges respond. And it can be done, it can make a difference, and we can turn those lives around. But if people will not engage, there must be consequences. They cannot simply expect to carry on drawing benefits whilst refusing to engage with the system.

And again, part of that was lost during the pandemic. And I would say to Ministers, it is now time to put some of the sticks back in place alongside the carrots, because without those sticks, there are block of people who will not engage, who would benefit from engaging, and who must be brought into the system to engage. Because ultimately the welfare state should be a ladder up which people climb and not a place in which they live. And all the evidence is if people are on benefits long term, they are less healthy, they die younger and are less happy.

And that can't be good for any of us.
13:08
Lord Austin of Dudley Portrait Lord Austin of Dudley (Non-affiliated)
-
-
Yeah. >> Yeah. >> My Lords, I to congratulate Lord Evans on, on, on securing this important on securing this important on securing this important debate. And I agree with with Lord Shipley and with the Bishop of Leicester when they say Bishop of Leicester when they say that young people do want to work. But as we've seen from Alan Milburn's report, I think young people have been really badly let down. Of course, if young people refuse to engage and refuse to work, there should be sanctions.

But that is very much the minority. And when you've got a million young people out of work because they don't have any opportunities, you've got to deal with that first. That should be the top priority. 1 in 6,000,000 now unemployed, the highest rate in Europe apart from Romania. And it's not because they're sitting at home refusing to engage four times higher than the Netherlands, twice as high as Ireland. And as Alan Milburn says, without urgent action, it will soon be 1.25 million.

And more than half of these young people have not had the opportunity to work at all. The number of entry level jobs in shops, restaurants and pubs has halved in four years, not just over the last two years of this government. Apprenticeships have collapsed in the last in the last decade. A lot of this starts at school. Children who often missed out on school are four times more likely to end up out of work. So a generation of young people, I think, have been let down at school, in college, and now when they can't get an apprenticeship or a job.

I think when people say that young people are unemployed because of mental health problems, I think they've got this the wrong way round. I think it's no wonder they've got mental health problems when they're left sitting at home on their phones all day, bored and with nothing at all to to do. It's absolutely shocking that for every £1 helping a young person into work, £25 is spent on on benefits. Why, my Lords, are we still bringing in so many plumbers, electricians and building workers labourers from abroad when we could be training British young people to do these jobs? Why do we limit the number of nurse training places and import nurses from abroad, when there are plenty of young women in places like Dudley who would love to be training to, to, to, to become nurses? I think the whole country should be furious about youth unemployment, not just because young people's lives are being ruined, but because it's costing us all a fortune and it will cost much more in in the future.

I think this should be the government's number one. What's the government's political problem? Essentially, it's because no one really knows what the government's objective is. What is it for? What's its driving mission? What's its sense of purpose? They're not able to set out this narrative, and nobody really knows as well whose side the government's. I think I think Ministers, starting with the Prime Minister, should be talking about this issue every single day. Every single day. What, after all, is the point of a Labour government if it isn't tackling youth unemployment, making this the central issue, I think.

I mean, this sounds a bit trivial, but if I were the Prime Minister, I'd put one of those massive electronic counters up in Downing Street with the number of young unemployed people or the number of apprenticeships, and if it's not moving in the right, in the right direction, I'd want to know why. And I think that would focus the whole of the government's attention on this issue. How many apprentices are now working in the civil service? I think every Cabinet Minister should double the number of young trainees in their departments straight away.

I think every quango and government agency should do that too. I think every local authority, the number of apprenticeships in local authorities has collapsed, but they could be taking on young people in building trades, parks, leisure centres, finance and admin. The NHS could be doing the same. Police forces. Why? I said to West Midlands Police why have you not got apprentices helping look after your the the fleet of police cars. They said oh we we we we we couldn't possibly do that. I explained to them, well, if you're not helping young people now, you'll be arresting them in, in, in, in a few years time.

I think companies and charities that get government contracts as part of the procurement process should be required to take on apprentices and trainees. Obviously, the government should cut red tape and employment costs that prevent businesses taking on young people. I think the I think Lord Baker is completely right. I've agreed with him for years on this. Of course, we've got to reform technical education so that young people specialise more at 14 and can learn practical skills for careers in construction, engineering and, and and, and other industries.

I think we should improve vocational courses in colleges so that students study full time, like their counterparts do when they're doing A-levels, instead of just half the week, so that they'd be ready for work on apprenticeship when they leave. And my Lords, in conclusion, I just want to say this obviously all of this will cost would, would, would cost money, but it would cost a lot less than we're spending on the benefit system at at the moment. And when we're spending more on benefits than we're spending on education or defence, and when we have a generation of young people having their lives ruined.

My view, my Lords, is it's not that we it's not that we we can't afford to do

**** Possible New Speaker ****

this. It's that we can't afford not to. I congratulate. My.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

My. Noble friend Lord Evans of Rainow for securing this vital and. Timely and very interesting
13:13
Baroness Neville-Rolfe Portrait Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Conservative)
-
-
>> Timely and very interesting debate. Welfare is out of control and risks, I fear, bankrupt in the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

and risks, I fear, bankrupt in the country unless serious action is taken soon. So consider the following figures from the Taxpayers Alliance figures from the Taxpayers Alliance to add to those quoted by Lord Evans and in the excellent library note between 29 2019 and 2015 in England, there was a 106% increase in people claiming Pip. That was up to 3.5 million, and over the same period, there was a 139% increase in claims for the enhanced element of Pip, taking that to 1.7 million people.

And by the way, they're all entitled to claim Motability cars. My Lords, this is unsustainable. I had to say that although my purpose in speaking today is in fact, to give a perspective from my time at Tesco, because retailers are amazing providers of first time jobs, as we've seen recently from the new Marks and Spencer scheme. I also commend the ambition to increase the number of apprenticeships. I welcome the government's decision to reinstate the low level Foundation apprenticeships. These were abandoned some years ago with a devastating impact on apprenticeship numbers.

However, my main concern today is with the job guarantee, for which the Secretary of State this week announced bids for multiyear grants to delivery organisations. Now, in my experience, taking youngsters into retail businesses, whether for job experience, internships or special schemes is difficult. To be successful, it requires exceptional and experienced staff willing to mentor them, and corporate commitment to accept the hanging around and distraction of permanent staff. One sometimes gets the comment never again. The truth is that for success, the scheme needs to reflect the reality of retail life.

The youngsters need to turn up on time. They need to pass their health and safety test and be able to do a full day's work, which is appreciably more than the 25 hours a week reimbursable. Under the new scheme, it needs to be possible to terminate or suspend failing participants. The guaranteed job criteria are for use of 18 to 24 who've been on UC for six months and out of work for 18 months. My Lords, this is not an easy cohort to deal with.

We're also talking about substantial government investment. How many job guarantee placements does the government expect to find over the next three years? And how does that compare to their target of getting 90,000 into paid permanent employment? Bear in mind, as we've heard, the high cost of the minimum wage nicks the demands of the Employment Rights Act thereafter. More specifically, what does the Minister expect to be the cost per participant, and can that be value for money? Or will the beneficiaries, as so often with government schemes, be the consultants who are bidding for the work? My Lords, I fear we have both a supply side problem which I've described and a demand side problem since once they've been on benefits for 18 months, youngsters find it difficult to knuckle down to the kind of jobs that will be made available.

And my noble friend Lord Baker is right that schools are part of the problem. We need a technical stream. I agree in comprehensives, learning from his city technical college. Brilliant experience. I mean, having said that, in my time at Tesco, we pioneered a not dissimilar scheme for our regeneration stores. These were in places like Leeds, Seacroft and Beckton near Newham, you know, tough places. We took a group of long term unemployed. We got them into the new store teams ahead of opening.

DWP helped with the funding and many of them, crucially, not all settled in to fruitful careers in the business. Now the local MP, now Sir Stephen Timms and a DWP Minister, will remember the scheme and it may be that it has some lessons for the new guarantee. My Lords. Helen Dickinson of the British Retail Consortium and an impressive role of retail leaders, yesterday called for a government and retail taskforce to help the government to build credible arrangements for getting young people back into work.

This seems to me a good idea. Does the noble Lord the Minister, agree?
13:18
Baroness Nargund Portrait Baroness Nargund (Labour)
-
-
Yes. >> Yes. >> My Lords. >> It's a pleasure to follow the noble Lady Baroness Neville-Rolfe. noble Lady Baroness Neville-Rolfe. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Evans, for securing this very important debate. And I also thank our government for commissioning the Milburn Report. I declare my interest as a former trustee and vice chair of the British Red cross. My Lords, we do face a profound challenge. Need is simply not a job crisis. It's in fact a health crisis.

It's a job problem. 44% of need. And people report a work limiting health condition among neat young people, 24% cite depression and anxiety, and 70% report loneliness. The review shows these problems often begin long before young people become Neet reduced socialisation, weaker support networks and the pandemic have left many young people less confident, less isolated and more isolated and less connected. My Lords, we haven't got a jobs gap. In fact, in my view, we have got a job readiness gap.

Over half of 18 to 24 year olds say they do not feel prepared when leaving education, despite 84% of Neet young people saying they want a job, education or training. We need to bridge the gap between the education and employment. That is why volunteering matters. Throughout my years in the voluntary sector, which has been decades, including at the British Red cross, I have seen first hand how volunteering transforms lives. I know it from my own personal experience. I have been a volunteer and I have spoken to thousands of volunteers across our country.

The evidence is compelling. Research shows that one third of volunteers aged 16 to 19 said volunteering helped them secure their first job. 84% of young volunteers report gaining skills and confidence, while 77% said it reduced their feelings of isolation and loneliness. This matters because poor mental health and unemployment reinforce one another. Volunteering tackles both. It helps young people develop skills and qualities. Employers value, reliability, responsibility, communication, resilience and problem solving. It also provides structure, experience and purpose.

Yet too few young people volunteer. Schools and universities should work with the local voluntary sector so that volunteering becomes part of their education. Job centres should actively promote volunteering pathways backed by the government's right to try guarantee, so participation does not risk reassessment, benefit reassessment. Without these actions, my Lords, one in young people could be Neet by 2030 and that is something we cannot afford economically or socially. As such, I welcome our government's Youth Jobs grant and other initiatives when it comes to hiring apprenticeships.

Several initiatives that the DWP has come up with and in fact, it has proactively come up with these policies before the Milburn report has been published. In order to support Neet young people. If we are serious about tackling youth economic inactivity in our country and get them back into work, we must stop seeing volunteering as an optional extra. But as a practical, proven tool for tackling youth inactivity and start recognising it as a vital pathway into work. Many young people for for many, many young people, volunteering is simply not something good to do.

It has been the bridge to a better future. Can I ask my noble friend the Minister, if volunteering could be placed at the heart of its strategy for supporting young people into employment and opportunities? I look forward to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Minister's reply. Yes. My Lords. It's a pleasure to have the opportunity to. Take part in.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Take part in. This debate and I congratulate my noble friend Lord Evans of Rainow. I concede that the Rainow. I concede that the government is not responsible for every societal phenomenon, so I accept that artificial intelligence accept that artificial intelligence and the overhang of Covid is something out with their competence. something out with their competence. But nevertheless, that is about as consensual as I'm going to get this
13:23
Lord Jackson of Peterborough Portrait Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Conservative)
-
-
afternoon. I congratulate the noble Lord Lord Walker of Broxton. I Lord Lord Walker of Broxton. I think you could probably call that friendly fire from him. It was an excellent speech. And particularly, excellent speech. And particularly, I think there is a consensus around the triple lock, and we have to come back to that debate. But my come back to that debate. But my Lords, we have a crisis of youth unemployment in this country and we have a welfare budget which has have a welfare budget which has been said is out of control.

In 2020 five, 26, total UK welfare spending is forecast to be £334 billion, 10.9% of UK GDP and by 2031 it is predicted to have risen to £409 billion. This is completely unsustainable and not. Not only is an inefficient use of resources, but frankly is a social catastrophe. I campaigned against the free movement of Direct Free Movement Directive from 2005 onwards as a constituency MP, because, as has as the noble Lord Austin of Dudley has said, quite rightly, what we did was to import cheap foreign labour and displace our own indigenous British youth workforce by driving down their wages and conditions.

And that was under a Labour government, unfortunately, and I thought that was a completely ill thought out policy. We have 13.5% of all 16 to 24 year olds who are NEETs, as we've heard earlier. And yet, in the 2024 election manifesto, Labour committed to reviewing Universal Credit and reforming the employment support and this government committed to make work pay. But do businesses and business leaders think that the government has succeeded? The answer is no. The British Chambers of Commerce have predicted that the rate of unemployment amongst young people in the UK will rise to 17.8% by 2027.

They've argued that the government's decision to raise national insurance contributions and the minimum wage, have helped to lock young people out of opportunities. We only need to look, for instance, at the experience of Shepherd Neame, Britain's oldest brewer, at the managed decline of 15% of their business. The number of applications has risen by 15% and a 41% increase in applications for bar jobs. Young people are attempting to get into employment, but the government's economic policies are making it harder for them to get employed.

And David McDowell, the head of Britain's biggest pub company, said to the government directly I quote, I implore the Chancellor to reverse the increase in NICs to give our sector and the wider UK high street the support it needs to reinvigorate youth employment and the increase in national insurance costs is making it impossible to hire people in entry level roles. An increase of £1,200 makes it impossible to effectively run a business, and the same message comes from UK hospitality, who are suffering in a similar way.

The government have a choice to follow their own. MPs, who were famously quoted recently by the Secretary of State for welfare, as saying who can we tax in order to pay benefits to others? Unquote? They can follow those MPs and increase the welfare bill or commit to welfare reform that both incentivises people into work and cuts the cost to the taxpayer so that these employment costs can be cut or mitigated. The balance spent on welfare payments versus employment support needs to change.

And Milburn's review, as we know, shows that nearly two thirds of all 16 to 20 year olds claiming Pip payments do so on the basis of anxiety, depression, autism and ADHD. My Lords, 8 in 10 GPS admit that they prescribe antidepressants that they do not think are necessary. Rather than diagnose and overtreat, we should recognise that often worthwhile employment would have a more transformative effect. We mustn't tolerate abuse of the benefit system. One of the policy proposals in the centre for Social Justice is the benefit budget report was that welfare support for those with milder anxiety, depression, ADHD should be reduced or removed.

In conclusion, my Lords, this this government has to prioritise job creation over benefits if they want Britain to succeed. Labour have done it before and they can do it again if they do not. The crisis of youth unemployment, which they themselves have recognised social mobility, societal strife and inequality will only get worse.
13:28
Baroness Meyer Portrait Baroness Meyer (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, it's an honour to follow my noble Lords, my noble follow my noble Lords, my noble friend's excellent speech. As many pointed out, Alan Milburn review pointed out, Alan Milburn review was a wake up call. I'm not going to go through all the facts or figures again, because they were so figures again, because they were so clearly presented by Lord Evans in his opening speech, and followed on by many other who spoke before me. But the reality is that, as Lord Milburn warned, that we risk creating a lost generation trapped in economic inactivity, a long term dependency, and that should concern us all.

Work is about far more than earning a living. It provides purpose, dignity, self-respect and independence, a society that leaves growing number of young people without work is failing them. I therefore welcome the government's recognition that the current welfare system is unsustainable and that economic inactivity must be reduced. But recognising a problem and solving it are two different things. The welfare Bill is projected to exceed 400 billion a year. Our national debt is approaching 3 trillion, while debt interest repayments alone exceed 100 billion a year.

I imagine that the Minister will remind us that Britain's borrowing remains below the average of the G7 economies. But is that really a fair comparison or a comforting one? It would be a little bit like claiming that freedom of speech in the United Kingdom is excellent because it is better than in Russia or in it is better than in Russia or in China. I lost my page. Sorry. The reality is that a country cannot indefinitely spend more money than it creates.

And yet I fear that this government is not confronting these challenges with pragmatism. The Chancellor's doctrine of secure nomics rests on an assumption that government can play a central role in directing growth and wealth. Well, history suggests otherwise. Government can create the conditions for growth, but they do not create wealth itself. Wealth is created by businesses, entrepreneurs, innovators, investors and workers. The role of the state is to enable growth, not to substitute itself for growth.

This matters because it exposes a fundamental contradiction at the heart of the government's welfare reforms. Minister Ministers say they want more people in work, yet they continue to increase the cost of employing them. They say that they want to reduce welfare dependency. Yet the burden, the very business that creates jobs and provide, provides entry level opportunities. They say they want growth, yet they pursue policies that discourage investment, enterprise and wealth creation. The sectors that traditionally provide young people with their jobs.

As pointed out many times before, hospitality, retail and small businesses are already under immense pressure and young people are being locked out of the labour market. Before they even reached the first rung of the ladder. This is not a coherent economic strategy. The current incapacity benefit system illustrates the problem perfectly. Too much of the the of the debate focuses on what people cannot do, rather than what on what they can do. The system asks, why can't you work? A better system would ask, what support do you need in order to work? This is a fundamentally different philosophy.

Of course, we must support those who generally cannot work, but the challenge is not simply to reduce welfare spending, it is to increase employment. A welfare system should provide a safety net, not become a destination. The government cannot claim to be tackling Worklessness without simultaneously making work more expensive, more regulated and harder to find. This is not pragmatism, it is ideology. Does the Minister not agree that Labour's economic policies are undermining its own welfare system? Even Sir Tony Blair has warned that the government lacks a credible plan for growth, and has questioned whether its current approach is sustainable.

So if the government accepts that work is the best route out of dependency, can the Minister explain why it believes that increasing the cost of employing people will help achieve their objective?
13:34
Lord Sentamu Portrait Lord Sentamu (Crossbench)
-
-
Yes. >> My Lords, the interim independent review by Alan Milburn into young people and work. Young into young people and work. Young people were not in education, employment or training is employment or training is absolutely for me. I would say I am guilty as charged, but the acronym NET is it appropriate? My Lords, personally, I am not a lover of acronyms. Given the many accents of our union, any e t could easily be pronounced in a way that may mean what is not intended.

I could try that on you, but time doesn't allow me. Besides, it's not an inviting acronym for young people of the United Kingdom who are not in work or employment. Now, reading Alan Milburn's interim report reminds me the question. Queen Elizabeth, who famously asked economists at the London School of Economics after receiving a briefing on the unprecedented magnitude of the financial crisis and the resultant global credit crunch, she asked why did nobody see the awful financial crash coming if it was that big? Well, a group of leading economists sent the Queen a three letter page explaining that the crisis was caused by a failure of the collective imagination of many bright people.

My Lords, as regards young people who are not in education, employment or training and claiming health and disability benefits, I think the crisis we face now has been caused by a similar failure of the collective imagination of many bright people. So what can we do? How do we lift up our young people out of this deep quagmire? They find themselves in? The interim report is a wake up call for all of us. Let me take us all in heart and mind to the northern province of York to hear what we try to do with changing the habits of young people in their hearts so that they can develop these wonderful habits of the heart, not commands that are given in our schools, colleges, that they may not end up as the million young people not in education, employment or training.

My Lords, most of us, the habits we now practice, we learnt them from what we lived, not by somebody telling us from the wrong distance. Well, Archbishop Desmond Tutu helped officially inaugurated the Archbishop of York. His trust in 209, and it has gone on to help quite a lot of young people. It trains them to learn to be leaders, empowering them from six up to post 16, that they can actually be leaders in their communities. And I strongly believe, of course, that young people are not our leaders of tomorrow, but our leaders of today.

Young people and children can make a positive difference to their local communities. And this is very transformative. For example, a group of 50 young people living in a very deprived area went around and asked 500 homes of older people and they said to them, what do you want to get at Christmas, which will keep you warm? And the answer was very simple. Woollen jumpers and fleeces. Then they contacted the business in their community and these were supplied all the goods that they needed.

Then they went to those homes and gave these older people fleeces and jumpers. Now, in an area that so troubled by truanting and bad behaviour, suddenly these older people saw these young people as friends and no longer people who are just causing a menace. I could give you endless examples. Time doesn't allow me. When Alan Milburn final review is is published, it will be crucial to see young people as key players to become the change they want to see.

Turning their eyes to the horizon of hope. May all our work with children and young people be similar to Isaac Newton, who saw his groundbreaking discoveries in physics and mathematics. He built upon the earlier work of his predecessors, and he wrote, I have seen father because I've been standing on the shoulders of giants. May we become those giants that these young people can stand on our shoulders and then learn to be leaders and helping other young people.
13:39
Lord Hannan of Kingsclere Portrait Lord Hannan of Kingsclere (Non-affiliated)
-
-
My Lords, I declare my interest >> My Lords, I declare my interest as the director of the Institute of Economic Affairs, the longest established free market think tank established free market think tank in the country. My Lords, I recently discovered something called Munchhausen Munchausen Syndrome by proxy. The. The medical or legal name for it is FDI. A factitious disorder imposed on another. And it means giving people poison in the guise of medicine. Sometimes it's a mental health condition, occasionally it's a crime.

I don't know if any of your Lordships happened to catch the dramatisation. The Serpent, which told the story of Charles Sobhraj, who would poison backpackers in Asia and then under the guise of making them better, would give them more and more of the poison until he was able to murder and rob them. I want to talk a little bit about the theme of giving the patient more of the medicine that sickened him in the first place. The illness here is actually very easy to identify.

We've we've heard it from all sides. There is a rise in unemployment, and particularly a rise in youth unemployment between 2021 and the present, the number of 16 to 24 year olds out of work rose from 9.7% to 12.8%. So this is since the pandemic, when we should have been in an upswing, 957,000 young people on the latest figures are not in education, employment or training. Now, why is that? Well, I think actually it's quite obvious to look at if you look at cause and effect, what has caused these things.

First, the national insurance rise that has deterred firms from taking people on imposition of some 25 billion on the private sector. The Employment Rates bill is always an unpopular thing to say, but if we want to make it easier to hire people, we need to make it easier to fire people. The thing that will encourage employers to take people on is the knowledge that if something goes wrong, they're not going to be lumbered with an open ended commitment. And therefore, all of these rights are a way of building up the number of unemployed.

And then the one that people really don't like to talk about, which is the extraordinary rise in the minimum wage up by the cost of employing someone up by over £4,000 since the beginning of the pandemic, up 26% in three years. All of these things happening in an economy that more widely is failing to grow because of excessive taxation, regulation and debt. I put it to you that the things that we individually complain of price rises, tax rises, debt levels, worklessness.

Dependency on welfare, that these are really all the symptoms of the underlying disease, which is excessive government, governments intruding in fields where they have no proper business and making things worse. Which is what I mean by more of the medicine that sickens the patient. Because what are the government's solutions to youth unemployment? Not to remove the things that are causing it in the first place, but to have even more expensive and intrusive measures to deal with the problems of their own creation.

I'm reminded of the aphorism popularised by the great African American economist Walter Williams, who said almost all our problems are caused by politicians trying to solve problems that they themselves had created. So what are the cures that are being offered to this disease of big government? They're all more government. The jobs guarantee, the Youth jobs grant, the new apprenticeship initiative, some 80 youth hubs, a fair work agency, which is currently in Tashkent. Its members are off on a jolly in Uzbekistan.

Looking at the impact of migration. All of these things are adding yet more intrusion and money, which is what caused the problem in the first place. So let me finish with a heartfelt plea to all frontbenchers, because some of these problems predate the current government. Will you please spare us your however well-intentioned interventions? Will you please just leave us alone? We don't want the grants or the guarantees or the initiatives or the agencies or any of the regulation. All we ask is to

**** Possible New Speaker ****

be allowed to get on with our jobs. Yeah.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Yeah. My Lords, it's a huge. Pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Hannan. And I'd like to add my Hannan. And I'd like to add my thanks to Lord Evans for securing this debate. This isn't the first this debate. This isn't the first time I've spoken about the million plus young people who are not in education, employment and training.
13:44
Lord Elliott of Mickle Fell Portrait Lord Elliott of Mickle Fell (Conservative)
-
-
education, employment and training. It's a subject I follow closely as president of the Jobs Foundation, as declared in the Register. In his interim report, Sir Alan Milburn rightly said that we're at risk of a lost generation of young people. And he rightly stated that if public policy aims to increase youth participation, it has to minimise risks and maximise incentives. In this vein, I want to reiterate a cost free idea I first proposed over a year ago, which has now garnered support from other noble Lords, as well as backbenchers in the other place and regional mayors.

Noble Lords will be aware that there's currently a scheme to incentivise employers to hire veterans, which was first introduced in 2020 and has been extended by the current government to last until at least 2028. The scheme is very simple employers who hire veterans don't have to pay employers national insurance contributions for that new employee during their first year of employment. This is facilitated through a zero rate of employer's NI on salaries below roughly £50,000 a year. In a similar way, employers hiring those under 21 also don't have to pay employers NI, a change first introduced in 2015.

My hope is that the government might be willing to consider extending this scheme for those older than 21 who are moving from welfare into work, they might wish to extend it to anyone moving from welfare to work, or they might wish to restrict it to those aged 24 or under. But it's certainly a proposal which would help maximise incentives for employers. As to Alan Milburn put it when I first mentioned this proposal last year, when we debated the Universal Credit Bill, it was only supported by the Jobs Foundation and the Good Growth Foundation, whose advisory board boasts the noble Lord Lord Liddle, who I'm placing in his place, and I endorse his proposal, his call for a cross-party approach on this issue.

Crucially, the Good Growth Foundation estimates that the policy would save the exchequer up to £1.1 billion every year were to be adopted for all employees helped from welfare into work, so would surely also save the Exchequer money were it to be restricted to NEETs. I am pleased to say that support for this proposal has grown over the past year. In your Lordships House. The final report of the Autism Act 2009 Committee, published last November, recommended and I quote, the use of tax incentives and or National insurance relief to help businesses employ more autistic people.

The concept has also received backing of Labour backbenchers in the other place. Speaking to the Sunni Times a fortnight ago, Labour backbencher Wes Streeting said I think we should be thinking about actively, actively thinking about a targeted reduction in employers National insurance. And I was also pleased to hear one of our great regional mayors, the Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, telling BBC Newsnight that he was sympathetic to reversing the recent rise in national insurance for employers. So, given my modest proposal, now has the growing support of across on a cross-party basis, I have two questions.

Just two questions for Noel Baroness Neate. Minister. First of all, can the Minister confirm that the Milburn Review will be allowed to make policy proposals with budgetary implications, including those involving tax incentives? And secondly, can the noble Baroness Minister clarify whether the Treasury will hold back from finalising the autumn budget until it's both seen and considered? The final recommendations of the Milburn Review.
13:48
Lord Blackwater Portrait Lord Blackwater (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, it's a great privilege to follow my noble friend Lord Elliot, and I also want to Elliot, and I also want to congratulate my noble friend Lord Evans on the excellent way he presented this debate and the figures he set out. He touched a real nerve with me because, like him, my first job was working in a pub, and I feel I learned much more pub, and I feel I learned much more there, probably than I did at the university I went to afterwards.

I want to agree with the present Prime Minister, who spoke a year ago of a moral imperative to fix the welfare state. He spoke ironically, hours after being forced to U-turn on benefit reforms. He promised that there would be reforms. But he said in a Labour way a year later, we're still waiting keenly to see what that way is. As my noble friend Lord Hannan has said, we must treat causes and not symptoms. Nothing will help young people find work and contribute to society, as, according to the Milburn report, 84% of them long to do was.

The right reverend Prelate said, better than a taxation and regulatory system allowing businesses to create such jobs. Currently, young people are priced out of work and as we have heard, particularly in the hospitality and retail sectors. Worse, as the noble Lord Lord Austin said, some developed psychological frailties because they cannot work. The moral imperative must be to help them by finding them jobs. Among the barrage of statistics, one is deeply alarming that the proportion of those not in employment, education or training or.

And diagnosed with a work limited health condition has risen from 26 to 44% since 2015. Psychological conditions account for much of that rise, but there is a fundamental economic problem. Only this week, Tom Kerridge, the restaurateur, said of his sector and I quote younger people, part time staff, they just don't exist very much in my businesses any more. Those businesses just can't afford it. He cited National Insurance contributions for those over 21, the steep rise in the minimum wage for those aged 18 to 20 and pleaded for a VAT cut for the hospitality industry last Monday.

The owner of a car repair business, quoted in The times, said the minimum wage for an apprentice now is ridiculous. It steers you away from wanting to have young people in your company. Now we must have some doubtless uncomfortable philosophical discussions about the minimum wage and about other employment rights, and about the health assessment process for benefit claimants, most of whom, as noble Lords heard on Monday, never have face to face consultations. We should discuss how to make as many work limited health conditions as possible.

Unlimited. I realise this may require a review of GP's working practices and I entirely agree with the noble Lady Baroness Fox, who said we must perhaps be less uncritical about some of these diagnoses. It's unfashionable to cite the Victorian distinction between the deserving and the undeserving poor, but that too merits discussion. However Dickensian that distinction might sound, and Dickens himself, as close students of him will know, was not so opposed to it as many think. It did ensure that scarce resources were channelled towards those in the most need, and not used to encourage a life of unnecessary dependency.

My Lords, it's 84 years since the Beveridge Report, but since politicians of all colours like to cite it as the foundation stone of Welfarism, we might note some of his doctrines. Beveridge said that getting work or getting well may involve a change of habits, doing something that is unfamiliar, or leaving one's friends, or making a painful effort, or some of some other kind. But he said the danger of providing benefits which are both adequate in amount and indefinite in duration, is that men, as creatures who adapt themselves to circumstances, may settle down to them.

As relevant to this debate. He also said, and I quote, six months for adults would perhaps be a reasonable average period of benefit without conditions. But for young persons who have not yet had the habit of continuous work, the period should be shorter. For boys and girls, it should ideally be no unconditional benefit at all. Their enforced abstention from work should be made an occasion of further training. He stressed that welfare should not stifle incentive opportunity responsibility. He emphasised that benefit in return for contributions rather than free allowances from the state is what the people of Britain desire.

My Lords, I suspect that our people desire that still, and they would endorse another of the Beveridge's fundamentals that idleness which destroys wealth and corrupts men, whether they are well-fed or not, is bad when they are idle. This reminds us that the Prime Minister's moral question remains shamefully unanswered.
13:53
Baroness Stowell of Beeston Portrait Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Conservative)
-
-
Yeah, yeah. in the gap. I've been here from the beginning of this debate because as a social mobility commissioner, this is a topic which is very close this is a topic which is very close to both my heart, but obviously my responsibilities in that role. And responsibilities in that role. And as it happens, our annual symposium in a fortnight's time will be very much devoted to the topic of Neet. I did, in fact, originally sign up to speak in this debate. But when I saw the August array of speakers, I wasn't sure that there was anything that I could add to what I expected to be said.

And I've very much enjoyed the contributions that I've heard from all the Lords. But there's one thing that I haven't heard mentioned, which I do feel is really important. So I wanted to just add it before we get to the winders and and that is the importance of the family to anybody's progress and the importance of a stable and secure home to a child's development. Now, much has been said in this debate about employability skills or soft skills.

I tend to call them the credentials of character. Things like punctuality and reliability, the kind of things which are shared in common standards that we expect of one another when we start work or at work, or indeed when we're in work. And we are faced with people of lots of different backgrounds or different levels of educational attainment or different abilities. And these kind of shared standards are very much what we learn at home and in the family. Yes, they do form part of what we learn at school, but they are critical to anybody's progress.

And, and I think it's worth noting that in a children's commissioner report in 2022. So not that long ago, 44% of those born at the start of this century in this country didn't live with both biological parents for their whole childhood childhood. And that's up from 21% for children born in 1970. So I do think we have to really include the family and home when we are looking at at this topic. And so I would like to I would like to know from the Minister when she comes to wind up what the government is doing to support families, generally speaking, but very much in the context of how they are considering responding to the kind of challenges that have been highlighted in the Melbourne report.
13:56
Lord Mohammed of Tinsley Portrait Lord Mohammed of Tinsley (Liberal Democrat)
-
-
Yeah. Join other. >> Yeah. Join other. >> Noble Lords in thanking Lord Evans for. >> Securing this important debate, and to all noble Lords for their contributions that have been very thoughtful. As I listened to thoughtful. As I listened to today's contributions, I was struck by the fact that for me, this debate is not merely about stats, it's not about forecasts, it's not about the government's programme. It's about people, particularly young people, and the opportunities that can shape the course of their lives.

And I say this as because I know from my own personal experiences that in the late 1980s, I was fortunate enough to gain a place at a youth training scheme. Yes, we all know what they were £27.50 for 40 hours. Mine was at the Sheffield Co-op at Hillsborough. And like many young people growing up at the time, I entered that labour market during a period of economic uncertainty and high unemployment, similar to what young people are facing today.

And that opportunity that I received through that program wasn't simply about a wage, my Lords. It was for me. It gave me confidence, experience, skills and perhaps most importantly, a sense of purpose and a possibility. And I often reflect on how different my life might have been had I not had that opportunity. And that opportunity existed for me. And that experience has stayed with me, my Lords, throughout my career. And before I entered your Lordships House, I spent many years working with young people that are in Sheffield that are often referred to during the debate.

It is neat. I often want to change it and get rid of the N and replace it with L, looking for employment, looking for training, etc. because often when you speak to young people, you don't like being called a neat. And I met those young people and I. What I saw in them, there was a talent that was obvious to everyone, except often those people and the system that was there to support them. And I met young people that were struggling with poor mental health, unstable homes, as we've heard earlier, family difficulties or a lack of confidence.

What I learned from that is that very few young people actually lack ambition. What many lack is the opportunity and support, and sometimes some want to believe in them. This is why the figures contained in the House of Lords Library should concern us all. Almost a million young people are now, in my view, looking for employment, education or training. That's often while welfare spending continues to rise significantly. We've heard from a number of noble Lords. Lord Shipley Lord Austin about this 25 to 1 ratio.

You know, we're spending 25 times more welfare than we are helping and supporting these young people that are looking for opportunities. And it reminds me of my time in local government. We often used to have a kind of term investor I invest in now and make savings, and I really hope when the Minister does stand up to respond, that we look seriously at how we can look at investing now to save in future. How can we invest in young people's future now? Because for us, the test of welfare reform is not about how we can move people off.

Benefit roll. The test is how many people we can help into fulfilling a sustainable employment and support in an independent life. The most successful welfare system, not those that simply reduce expenditure. Those are those that invest in people. And we've heard from many noble Lords about the example of the Dutch model, where they do have a lot more investment in training in in those early years, you know, secondary schools and the fact that their needs level is almost, well, less more than half hours should mean that we should now take that opportunity that's been afforded to us by the review by Milburn to say he's diagnosed a problem.

The next challenge, the next six months will be what are the possible solutions. And I hope that we can use the energy and expertise right across your Lordships House to kind of come together and say, how can we shape those recommendations of the Milburn Review? So rather than waiting for Alan Milburn to come back to both houses with his recommendation, I think we should use that time now, possibly a cross-party working group, whatever you want to term, and I hope the Minister looks at it where we can use our experiences to say, look, what what should be Milburn? And because what we all want to see is less young people on welfare and more support for them to fulfil their lives, because that will be good for society.

And I think the government is right to recognise that economic inactivity has become a significant challenge to growth. And we also, from these benches, welcome efforts to improve access to employment, training and apprenticeships. As my noble friend Lord Shipley said earlier, however, we do remain concerned that some aspects of the welfare reforms focus too heavily on short term savings while failing to address the underlying causes of inactivity. And as I said, my experience in Sheffield has taught me that many young people who are disconnected from work are facing multiple barriers simultaneously.

A young person experiencing anxiety, depression or poor physical health simply cannot be instructed into employment. A young person without qualifications, work experience or stable supporting network requires investment and guidance. And if you ignore these realities, we risk treating symptoms as we heard earlier, while leaving the cause untouched. And like I say, as Milburn said, he warns of a lost generation and it's a warning to us all and we should use those words should resonate in your Lordships House.

When a young person spends years disconnected from education, employment, the consequences often, as Milburn said, lifelong lower earnings, poorer health outcomes and reduced economic participation are all follow the cost of personal, social and economic. But I remain optimistic because I have seen what works. I have seen young people flourish when given access to mentoring, skills, training and meaningful work experience. And I just want to flag with. Your Lordships that as the university term and the sixth form term is coming to an end, many young people are seeking the opportunities for work experience.

I will be taking a number of young people on in July, and I really hope that many other members of your Lordships House do take that opportunity to be able to give that experience, because what I always say to young people is that you're all going to get GCSEs, some of you will get A-levels, some of you will get degrees. What else can you get? Because that will be the difference an employer seeks. And if we, in our very small part in your Lordships' House can do that, I really urge you all to take up those opportunities that your young people will come.

I know I've badgered my Liberal Democrat colleagues to take on for young people that have approached us, because with that great investment in young people, I also want to plead with the Minister that investment in youth services and community organisations is really important, because they often engage with young people before the statutory sector gets involved, and we need skills and apprenticeship systems that work for every young person, not just those that follow that traditional academic route. We also need employment support that is personalised and supportive.

Many disabled young people and those in long term health conditions want to work but need flexibility and understanding. And the principle behind the government's right to try approach that people should be able to test their ability to work without fear of losing support is a sensible one, and I welcome it, and I. I hope they can strengthen it further. My Lords, the economic argument, as we've heard today by many Lords, is compelling. Britain cannot afford to leave the talent of over a million young people untapped at a time when growth remains weak and productivity challenges persist, helping young people into education, training and employment is not simply a social policy, it's an economic policy.

And yet, beyond the economics lies something even more important. Every young person deserves a chance. That. I was fortunate, as I said earlier, to receive as a young trainee all those years ago. And one thing I do hope that we can build on, and I know that the government has. Trying to reset its relationship with the European Union around Erasmus. I know when I was in the European Parliament with Lord Hannan, we would you know, I was on that committee and we were looking at expanding Erasmus to include more young people on apprenticeships.

So not just academic route, because I, at that time was arguing that the sons and daughters of hospital cleaners and car mechanics from Hull and etcetera elsewhere, if they were working in Siemens, they should also have the opportunity to go abroad. And I really hope that that opportunity continues, because young people do deserve that opportunity to discover their talents, contribute to their communities, and build a better future for themselves. And if we are serious about welfare reforms, we must be equally serious about creating the opportunities, as I said earlier, and if we are serious about economic growth, we must invest in potential for our young people.

And if we are serious about building a fairer society, we must also ensure that no young person is written off because they have to start life on the wrong side of the opportunity to finish. My Lords, there is a challenge for us all. It is one that I hope the government will continue to address with ambition, compassion and determination.
14:06
Baroness Stedman-Scott Portrait Baroness Stedman-Scott (Conservative)
-
-
Thank you. >> My Lords. I too would like to pay tribute to the Viscount Younger, our colleague on these benches, who our colleague on these benches, who has left the House not of his own volition, but left the House a volition, but left the House a great loss to the House, as are all the Hereditaries who have left us. I also wish to thank the noble my noble friend Lord Evans, for making this debate happen. Look what

**** Possible New Speaker ****

you've done A. Fantastic array of speeches and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Fantastic array of speeches and of knowledge. And thank you very much to the noble Lord Evans of Rainow DWP PIP DWP whip. And I'd like to also welcome my noble friend Baroness welcome my noble friend Baroness Spielman to our front benches. She'd be a great asset to our team. Now, I hope the Minister and Now, I hope the Minister and everybody in the House has enjoyed the masterclass they've had today on welfare reform and opportunities to help young people into the labour market.

I know we've had lots of debates and questions and conversations about the problem, and many judgements have been passed across the House about who's caused this problem. And I hope today we've got past that and that we've been able to speak honestly about some of the things that we believe might help in the situation. I'm not going to repeat all the statistics in my speech. I've rubbed them out because they've been made very powerfully. But I would like to start by talking about the concern that young people who were reported as Neet 61%, a record where economically inactive means that they are not working and not looking for work and in many cases, not required to look for work.

No, my noble friend Lord young made the point. Can can the noble Baroness, the Minister, tell us what proportion of those who are economically inactive are so because they are not required to look for work, and I'm sure that the noble Baroness. The Minister, will have noted Alan Milburn's warning that the welfare state is exacerbating inactivity. A point that's been made right through this debate. And his argument is that the government's new work programmes alone. Welcome, though they are, will not be enough to address the problems that are far deeper rooted.

So let me ask everybody. Let's be brave. Let's think the impossible to to take seriously some of the recommendations that have been made today, even by an Etonian. My noble friend Lord younger, about changing the way in which Jobcentre plus money and activity is used. My Lords, I spent 32 years trying to help people get and keep a job. That's why I got up in the morning and to some degree it's why I get up now. But I want to tell you about a meeting I had with a doctor at a conference, and he said to me, Debbie, I've got heart sink patients.

And I said, well, what's wrong with them? He said, my heart sinks every time they walk into the surgery because I've got nothing for them. Can you put your people into my surgery? And can you see what you can do for them? To cut a long story short, we had 200 people on our books. We had a consulting room in the surgery, and I'm pleased to say we reduced the antidepressant prescription by 34%, reduced the referrals to counsellors by 80%. And of those, we got into work, which was around 56% in a year, 76% of them were still in work a year later.

Now, that's the kind of magic, and that's the kind of energy that we need to inject into our thinking and our challenges. So the challenge before us all now is profound. Now is the moment for us all to work together. It's been said by many people to improve the lives of the people that we exist to serve. Now I have to congratulate the noble Lord Walker for his outstanding contribution. It can't have been easy to make it, but well done for your bravery, sir.

I wish we all had it by the bucket load. And if the noble Lord Walker wants another job, then I think a speechwriter beckons you. I'm sure you'll be very welcome. But as far as the economy is concerned, I recognise that this year is, at least in part, on the government's radar. Policies such as the Youth Guarantee. While we may have disagreement, represents the beginning of a response. But the scale of this challenge demands something far more serious, more coherent and more ambitious.

And I want to thank the my noble friend Lord Elliott for his idea, which seems to have caught everybody's imagination, and one which we should be embracing. My Lords, the labour market has changed fundamentally over the past 20 years. The noble Lord Liddle has said that that my noble friend Baroness Shephard of Northwold, our economy now has around 1.6 million fewer lower and medium skilled jobs that it once did. Entry level work is harder to find, if not impossible.

Competition for those jobs is more intense, and the pathways into stable employment are far less straightforward than they were for previous generations. Technology's changed and absolute support on an individual basis is really important. I want to just say from an employer perspective, that the British Retail Consortium talked about the impact of the government's changes to the cost of hiring people. And they say, and it's not me saying this, that taking on young people is more expensive, more complicated, and schemes are not working.

And so can we be brave enough to go back to the drawing board and just work out what might work? And I'm sure today's debate has helped us come up with even more ideas than is possible. The government cannot do this job alone. They cannot do it alone. And it's incumbent on all of us to work together to do it. I spent a whole couple of days in Suffolk recently talking to businesses, talking to colleges, talking to Jobcentre Plus, and I'm.

They were very excited about the prospect of the job centres merging with the career service. So I wonder. It hasn't been mentioned today, but I wonder if at some point either in the noble Baroness is the Minister's response or in writing. If. If we could be told how long the merger will take and how long it will take for it to become fully operational, and what outcomes we're expecting for people in this. I want to go on to talk about regional disparities now.

I am absolutely in agreement with everybody who said that national programmes have been good in the past, but I don't think they're right for now. And we've got to allow local people and local organisations to come up with interventions that work for them. So we need a no national programme, no national programme can sort it. But whatever happens, whatever happens, it must be known nationally, delivered locally and the impact must be known and felt personally.

And finally, my Lords, I want to talk about early intervention. For me we've got a knee problem. But if we want to prevent NEETs in the future, we've got to start earlier and we've got to make sure that no young person leaves education in whatever form as a need. I want to talk to you about another thing that I was involved in called Think Forward. And we put our advisers into schools to work with those young people at the age of 14 who everybody said they're going to end up in trouble, they're going to end up Neet, they're not going to get anywhere.

And we work with them. And it was the most wonderful thing I think I was ever involved in. But 85% of the 14 to 16 year olds have had shown statistically significant improvements in their attendance because when they didn't turn up for school, we went around their house and got them. 60% of our school leavers achieved at least five GCSEs, grade two C and 96% of our 17 to 18 year olds were currently. When I left that in further education, employment and training and the Neet problem had been all but eradicated.

This is. This is the kind of thinking we need today. So can the noble Baroness set out what the government is doing on early intervention and how her Department is working with the Department of Education to make sure that happens. Mental health has been mentioned. I know that young people are suffering anxiety, and for those of us who have people in our families who see it, it's real. And we've we've got to help them. But the other thing that I want to finish on, if you'll allow me, is that we need a strong economy.

Others more eloquent than me have articulated how that that that should work and what needs to happen. It is obvious only employers create jobs. Only employers create jobs. And so again, I'm going to plead with the noble Baroness, the Minister, please, will you rethink. Will your government rethink the additional costs that you've added to business? Because I'm telling you, if we if we did something about that now, this problem would start to to go away. So we need earlier intervention.

We need a vibrant economy. And we need people to think what they dare not think and implement it. So can I thank the noble Lords for their honest contribution. I hope all contributions have been taken by the government in the right spirit, and that it propels us into action to do the right thing.
14:17
Baroness Smith of Malvern Portrait Baroness Smith of Malvern, Minister of State (Education) (Labour)
-
-
My Lords, can I also thank Lord >> My Lords, can I also thank Lord Evans for bringing forward this debate? And it has been a very constructive, I think, a wide constructive, I think, a wide ranging debate, and there is a clear consensus in it that far too many young people in this country are leaving education and not getting the chance to work. And we must be clear about the scale and the implications of this challenge that we face. It is, of course, not a problem that arrived in the last year or in fact, in the last two years.

It is deep rooted and long term. The number of young people not in education, employment or training has been rising for years, increasing by a quarter of a million in the three years leading up to the election. As many others have said, it is now close to a million, which is far too high. But it is not inevitable. It is a crisis of opportunity and one that we should not accept. But I agree with those who have said what it isn't is a failure of ambition among young people.

There are many young people keen to learn and to work who are not being provided with that opportunity. It is too often a failure of the system to provide the opportunity and support that they need. And as others have said, it is not only a social challenge, it is an economic one as well, and it is one that needs early intervention and work across the whole of government. And that is why I am so pleased that I sit now in two departments, both in the Department of Work and Pensions and the Department for education and one of my bosses, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, commissioned Alan Milburn to examine the underlying drivers of rising youth inactivity because we were clear that this is not a single issue with a single cause.

And also, as the right reverend Prelate, the Bishop of Leicester identified, these are a series of individuals, quite often with differing needs and reasons why they are not working or learning or earning, and in many cases very much want to work. And as a another area of consensus in the debate, I think we all agree that Alan Milburn's report provides a very important, serious assessment of the challenge. And I agree with the noble Lord, Lord young, that this is having read quite a lot of government produced or prompted reports in my time.

It is very, very much better than a lot of them, and certainly well worth a read in reading it. Of course, I'm sure noble Lords will recognise, as I pointed out to the House the other day, that Alan Milburn does make clear that. And this relates to the point made by several noble Lords about the position of the economy. The costs in the labour market in both paragraphs 266 and paragraph 264, that it is not actually the National Insurance contribution increases or the national minimum wage.

If we look at the way in which both those impact on the labour market, but also the reliefs that are available to employers, particularly with respect to national insurance contributions when they take on young people. This is not at the heart of the cause of youth unemployment. And in fact, we have the fastest growing economy in the G7 country. We have 416 000 more people in work in this country now than a year ago. Our unemployment is lower than most OECD countries and the EU average.

So there are specific issues that young people face in being able to access the labour market. And we need to respond yes to the economic conditions, but also to all the other issues. The other important thing about the Milburn report is it brings into sharper focus the nature of what we face, not just its scale, but its persistence. What has been described as stickiness. Too often, once a young person falls out of work or education, they can become stuck outside the system.

And the longer that continues, the harder it becomes to return. With lasting consequences for their prospects, their health and their earnings. And the report highlights the growing number of young people who are not only out of work, but who are assessed as having health related barriers to work. And that underlines, as I say, that this is not simply a labour market issue, but one that cuts across employment, health, education and welfare. And that is why this cannot be a challenge for one department alone.

It must be a whole of government effort. And in fact, as the noble Lady Baroness Stedman-Scott also says, a broader campaign across the country to tackle it. And as the chamber has also recognised today, when so many young people are outside work or education, we constrain labour supply, limit productivity and store up long term costs for individuals, for the exchequer and for the economy. And that is why this government has acted and is investing in response to the noble Lord, Lord Tinsley.

This government is investing now to save for the future an additional £2.5 billion into the Youth Guarantee and the Growth in skills Levy in support of young people and employers over the next few years, including a 300 £0 youth jobs grant for employers. Hiring a young person who has been out of work for six months alongside a 200 £0 incentive for small and medium sized businesses taking on young apprentices. Returning the focus of apprenticeships back onto young people, including the full funding of training costs for SMEs employing apprentices under 25.

And I strongly agree with my noble friend. My noble friend Lord Austin, and the noble Lord Lord Willetts, about the need to achieve this pivot of the apprenticeship system back to young people, and to reverse the sharp decline in apprenticeship starts amongst young people, which have fallen by 40% over the last decade. That's why we're expanding opportunities for young people through new foundation apprenticeships. It's why, as I say, we've introduced a £2,000 hiring payment for non-levy paying employers.

We are removing the requirement for small businesses to fund training, any element of training, and there will be additional investment for taking on apprentices if they are out of work. This is backed by an additional billion pounds investment and will support 5000 more young people into apprenticeships over the next three years, providing a clear a clear route into skilled work and helping businesses grow with the talent that they need. And I think my noble friend Lord Austin is right to emphasise the role of government here, and I am proud that in the Department for education are a state strategy as we repair and rebuild, schools will provide places for 13000 more apprentices and T level placements.

And I can say to the noble Lord Lord Willetts, we have. We are considering the report of the Social Security Advisory Committee on the impact of Apprenticeships on benefits, and we will have more to say about that. Second, another element of the youth guarantee is the expansion of youth hubs across the country, bringing employment skills and wider support the sort of wider support that the right reverend Prelate, the Bishop of Leicester, rightly identified together in local communities. And perhaps here I could say in response to the noble Baroness, lady Shepherd and the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, who particularly raised the issue of rural unemployment.

We do recognise that transport can be a real barrier for young people in rural areas. That is why we design youth hubs to be flexible, to work with local partners, to tailor delivery to what works best in each area, including flexible opening hours or choosing locations that can align with local transport patterns. And youth hubs, of course, bring together employability support from job centre work coaches with mental health, housing, essential skills and employer engagement support in community settings so that young people have got access to local opportunities and support tailored to community needs.

And we are also in doing that. And I think the noble Lord, Lord young, is right about the need to have more place based, both funding and ability to be able to address this problem. We are actively testing and evaluating place based delivery models, including how we reach a diverse customer base, including those with specific needs and in hard to reach areas such as through job centre vans. Mobile units being tested in nine areas including Bolton, the Highlands of Scotland and North Wales, and in particular, of course, the youth Guarantee Trailblazers, where we are working with mayoral strategic authorities in eight areas, are testing the ability of those strategic authorities with government investment to test innovative approaches to identify and deliver support to young people who are Neet or at risk of becoming Neet.

And I'm sure the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, will be pleased to hear that in the West of England, one of the ideas that they have in rural north east Somerset is to facilitate the ability for young jobseekers to use to have e-bike loans, to be able to to travel young people on another element of the youth guarantee young people on universal Credit looking for work will get support through the Youth Guarantee, with a dedicated gateway meeting and intensive support if they're still not earning or learning after 13 weeks, that's nearly 900 000 16 to 24 year olds who will be able to benefit from that dedicated session and four weeks of additional intensive work coach support, including work experience, the ability to enter into and benefit from sector work based academies as well.

And could I say, and finally, sorry, in the youth guarantee, a jobs guarantee providing six months of paid government subsidised work for young people who remain unemployed in the long term? After all of that other support. And I welcome the comments of the noble Lady Baroness Neville-Rolfe about her experience at Tesco's. She is absolutely right that these are not easy cohorts of young people by. By definition, if they've been out of work for 18 months, the delivery partners that we are working with are not consultants.

They are organisations. Exactly. With the experience of getting young people to work, getting them there on time. I agree with her about all of the those requirements. Perhaps we should send the noble Lady Baroness Stedman-Scott round to get them to get them up in the morning, and also in relation to to the question that has been asked. It is the government's intention, and we've actually expanded the investment in this to enable this job guarantee to provide the six months of paid work to 9000 young people by virtue of our investment.

I will just touch on the issue of retail and hospitality raised by several noble Lords, not least because, as we know, retail and hospitality have traditionally provided those first experiences in work for young people. And we know that employers want to play their part in supporting young people. For instance, I welcome the announcement just this week from Marks and Spencer that they're launching a training programme for 1000 young people. I had a very good visit to B&M, where I met facilitated by the BRC, other retailing employers.

I was able to join the bricks HR leaders webinar just the other day. And what I have found. Yes, of course, concerns about the costs of employing young people and the risks of doing that, but also a very big enthusiasm to be involved with the government's youth Guarantee and to be part of that and to play their role in it. And in exchange, we want to support and work with employers to develop opportunities for young people. And we continue to expand in DWP, our current network, to more employers in key sectors such as retail, such as hospitality, where there is a critical demand for workers.

We've expanded opportunities through new foundation apprenticeships in hospitality and retail, and this is in addition to our new VE level in marketing and retail, which we aim to introduce in 2028. There was also an important theme that noble Lords raised about how we prioritise prevention, how we make it easier to identify young people who are at risk of becoming Neet, and how we stop that from happening. And as the noble Lord Lord Storey identified, we know that these barriers emerge early in life, and that's why we have also focussed in government on ensuring that young people get the best start in life, which for many of them, they are not currently getting.

That's why we're bolstering our prevention measures through steps in our child poverty strategy. We're taking steps to lift 550,000 children out of poverty. We've committed to ensuring that 75% of children reach a good level of development by the end of reception, so that they can engage in learning. We know that persistent absence from school is not just a short term problem, it is closely linked to young people becoming Neet later on. That is why we welcome the action that has led to the fastest improvement in attendance in a decade.

We know that too often the transitions between school, further education and employment are simply not strong enough to keep young people engaged and moving forward. We know that the curriculum needs change, which is why we set up the curriculum and assessment review, and it will enable young people to have more of those skills that are necessary to be able to operate in the modern job market. It's why we're reforming post 16 qualifications to increase the numbers of young people who can do T levels, and also to introduce, as I say, the new qualification in V levels closely linked to occupational standards, working with employers, providing a high quality vocational route for young people, I.

I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Baker's further push to me about UTC sleeves. I will come back to him about that. I also hear what noble Lords are saying about work experience. And of course, one of the things that Alan Milburn identified is the way in which it is much harder now for young people to get work experience. And that's why, through our youth Guarantee, we will find 300 000 placements for work experience and sector based work academy programmes backed by major employers like Manchester Airport Group, JD Sports Gatwick Airport.

We're strengthening. Work experience in schools with a guarantee of two weeks high quality work experience for every young person and I think as my noble friend, Baroness Nargund said, volunteering also plays a very important role in this. But there are other deeper challenges at play as well. More than 1 in 6 young people who are not earning or learning had a mental health condition as their primary condition in 2024, more than double the rate in 2012. That's why it is so important this week that we were able to show that how the expansion of mental health support teams in schools is progressing.

6 million children now have access to mental health support in their schools. We know that young people with Send and those who struggle to achieve at school face a significantly higher risk of becoming a Neet. And I think the noble Lord Lord Shipley is right. Supported internships, which I was fortunate enough to go and see in in practice at Whipps Cross Hospital just last week through Project Search, who I know are also now working with Amazon on a very big expansion of.

Supported. Internships are important, important both for those with education, health and care plans. But the government is also investing in research as to how we can develop them. For those who don't have a c p. So this is about much more than education or employment alone. It's about early support, about wellbeing, and about ensuring that our systems work together around the young person. It's about more responsibility on schools to identify early who will become a neat with with the with the improved risk of Neet indicator tools that we are developing.

And it's about ensuring, as we are doing that there is a that we build on the existing guarantee of a place in education or training for every 16 and 17 year old. My Lords, much of this, particularly the youth guarantee, is welfare reform, but we are reforming the welfare system more widely as well to ensure that it supports people to engage with work wherever possible. That includes legislating for a right to try so that disabled people can take steps into work without fear of automatic reassessment.

It means changes to universal credit to reduce disincentives to work, and investment in personalised employment support, including for people with health conditions. These reforms reflect a broader shift under this government from a system which can too often write people off to one that acts as a platform for opportunity now also essential to ensuring the long term sustainability of the system, supporting those who need it while enabling more people to move into and to progress in work. We are clear, however, despite this significant progress, that more must be done because for many young people, the barriers to work do not begin at 16.

As I've said, they often have their roots in poorer health disadvantage and unequal access to opportunity. And as our population ages and migration falls, we will depend more than ever on the talent and potential of our young people. We cannot afford, economically or socially to leave so many outside work and education. We will take determined action. We will learn from others. Which is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State at DWP is visiting Netherlands, possibly even at this.

The Netherlands at this very moment. To learn from them, we look ahead to Alan Milburn's full recommendations in the autumn. But our objective is clear to build a system that places opportunity and

**** Possible New Speaker ****

work at its heart. My noble friend Lord Evans, at the beginning of this debate, asked the beginning of this debate, asked when the government would respond to the select committee report on social mobility, the report was published in November. The government convention is reply within eight weeks. It's now almost six months. When will we get a

**** Possible New Speaker ****

reply? I I'm sorry that there hasn't been a reply yet. I think there been a reply yet. I think there should have been, and I have already made that point to both the DfE and DWP, and I will undertake to ensure that we get that back as quickly as possible. So just to to reiterate, as I was saying, our objective is clear. We need to build a system that places opportunity and work at its heart, one that is not only concerned with what people receive, but asks a broader question how do we help people to change their lives? That is the challenge before us, and it is one that this government is determined to meet.
14:39
Lord Evans of Rainow Portrait Lord Evans of Rainow (Conservative)
-
-
My Lords, I am truly grateful to >> My Lords, I am truly grateful to each and every one of you that have contributed with excellent speeches contributed with excellent speeches at this debate today. And as Lord Liddle said, it's been a Liddle said, it's been a non-partisan debate and which means that it. Look, I look forward to debating again when we get the Milbourne report. As the noble Baroness Limb Minister says in the autumn, because it is so, so important.

And I and I referred to the coalition government and the progress made there 15 years ago. I do think the Lordships House has a important role in helping out with this neat issue, and Lord Walker's excellent contribution. He made the point that it's the Labour Party, not the Benefits Party, and that private sector business indeed, private sector family businesses create the jobs, create the wealth to move the the nation forward. And I'm also grateful to the noble Baroness, the Minister, for her responses and.

And in terms of the Lords report on social mobility, which I'm biased because I sat on it, but it is an excellent report and is complementary to the Milburn report. As my noble friend Lord young referred to the. The key recommendation is to. To do a pilot scheme and look at a combined authority such as Andy Burnham in Greater Manchester, or indeed Bristol and elsewhere, so that we can. We can give them the money to see if we can learn from a focussed and concentrated effort to reduce NEETs in those communities.

And as. As we say in the report, there needs to be a welfare system reset to reflect the local areas and local labour markets, because those mayors know best about the specific needs. And one hat does not fit all, and it's not even on a regional basis. It's on a town by town, city by city basis. And we cannot carry on spending more on disability and incapacity benefits than we are defence. And at the beginning of my speech, I did refer to the growth predicted growth in welfare spending of £333 billion by 2030 and and drawing this debate, I'm very sorry to learn that the Defence Secretary, John Healey, has resigned his position specifically because of the lack of money being provided for our defence at this time, and I and I wish to pay tribute to John Healey because he was an outstanding defence Secretary and indeed a public servant.

But but finally I my my noble friend, Lord young light heartedly pointed out to the Select Committee, where there were four conservatives, and he pointed out there were three Etonians, Old Etonians, but. But there was also one Neet, and I was. The Neet sat on that committee, and when I left school at 16, with no qualifications, I was lucky enough, as I indicated in my opening remarks, to have had a Saturday job in a shop and also working in my local pub, which gave me the work ethic which enabled me to get into manufacturing, into a business career, in manufacturing, in the local aviation sector near where I lived, which set me up for for life.

And that is the challenge, my Lords, for young people to get into those early start up jobs Saturday jobs are a rare thing these days. That's ably been pointed out now. So we we do we are in a position. This House is in a position. The Lordships House is in a position to help

**** Possible New Speaker ****

NEETs at the moment. I beg to move. The question is that this motion be agreed to. As many as are of be agreed to. As many as are of that opinion will say content. The contrary, not content. The contents have it.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

have it. From the Commons that they have passed the Railways Bill to which they desire the agreement of your

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Lordships. My Lords, I beg to move that the

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Railways Bill be now read. A first time. Question is that this Bill be now read a first time. As many as are of that opinion will say content. The contrary, not content. The contents have it, my Lords, I'll pause for a short while before
14:43
None Portrait Railways Bill 1st Reading
-

we start the question. I will pause for a short while whilst we. Before we start, the question for short debate for noble Lords to leave the chamber, who may wish to do so, and I'm sure the House will be most I'm sure the House will be most grateful if they could do it very

**** Possible New Speaker ****

I I just.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Question Question for Question for short Question for short debate.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Question for short debate. Political and security situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Baroness Helic.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Helic. I thank all the noble Lords. Participating today and acknowledge the considerable.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

acknowledge the considerable. Expertise and experience. They bring to this debate. The treaty. international.

**** Possible New Speaker ****

international. between. What governments say. And what governments do become impossible to ignore. I believe that we have reached such a moment with respect to our policy on Bosnia and Herzegovina. The government's own assessment last week identified instability in

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Western Balkans, and, I quote, as a. Strategic risk to the United

**** Possible New Speaker ****

Strategic risk to the United Kingdom and our NATO allies. To quote further, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, we have seen attempts to undermine the Dayton settlement that has maintained peace since mid 90s. These are serious conclusions. 90s. These are serious conclusions. They deserve serious response. For over 30 years, the Dayton peace over 30 years, the Dayton peace agreement sustained peace in Bosnia. It did so because it rested on strong local institutions and a broadly united international commitment to defend them and to defend the sovereignty of the country itself.

By 2010, the assumption was that the constitutional settlement has become sufficiently entrenched that European integration would drive reform, and that the international consensus underpinning the post Dayton order would endure. Today, those assumptions can no longer be taken for granted. Bosnia and Herzegovina faces its most serious political crisis since 1995. What
14:46
14:47
Baroness Helic Portrait Baroness Helic (Conservative)
-
-
1992. That would not merely destroy a country, it would destabilise an a country, it would destabilise an entire neighbourhood, pulling a thread that could unravel wider European security and the consequences for the people of Bosnia, of every ethnicity and every community, would be devastating. The memories of 1999 devastating. The memories of 1999 1990s are sadly still alive. Let us be clear this is not a project pursued in the interest of ordinary Bosnian Serb citizens. They are among the poorest in Europe.

They deserve better than to be instrumentalized and used by political elite who would sacrifice their futures and futures of their children on the altar of nationalist ideology and personal ambition and gain. The question today is whether international framework that preserve peace for the 30 years remains capable of responding effectively. Last week, the Peace Implementation Council, of which the United Kingdom is a founding member, met in Sarajevo to agree a successor to the outgoing High Representative. It was unable to do so.

The matter that matters profoundly because the Office of High Representative remains the principal international mechanism for safeguarding the peace agreement. At the moment of Bosnia's most serious challenge in a generation, the states responsible for upholding the peace publicly demonstrated that they could not agree on the future leadership of its most important international institution, the United States, our closest ally, sought to install a preferred candidate, as though the high representatives were a political appointment rather than an independent office. That is precisely the wrong approach.

The High Representative must be chosen on the basis of independence, credibility and unconditional readiness to uphold the Dayton Peace Accords impartially, not because they are acceptable to one capital or another, including this one. The office derives its authority from Dayton Agreement itself, not from the preference of any individual state. This failure reflects a broader and more troubling changes. Last year, the United States lifted sanctions on 48 Republika Srpska individuals and entities. The very people that the president Trump himself or his administration described as a corrupt, destabilising political agenda with destabilising political agenda for enriching themselves and their associates at public expense, including denial of genocide.

I do not speculate on the motives behind that decision. There are many views in Washington, but significance extends well beyond the sanctions themselves. The United States appears to be taking a wrecking ball to the architecture of its own successful policy. My Lords, Britain cannot determine American policy, but neither can we treat these as inconsequential differences. They go to the very heart of European security. Nor can we ignore the broader regional geopolitical picture. Regrettably, Serbia continues to provide a political and material support to the leadership.

China is actively converting its economic relationship with Belgrade into military cooperation, gaining strategic leverage in the heart of Europe. Even Croatia, a member of both NATO and European Union, often meddles in Bosnia's constitutional arrangements. But above all, it is Russia. It is working systematically to fracture Bosnia and the wider Western Balkans as a part of its sustained campaign to weaken Euro-Atlantic institutions, recruiting fighters to fight against Ukraine. Using this information, and not because it cares one iota about the citizens living there, but because division is its instrument of power and control.

I would not be shocked, my Lords, if in the years ahead a new wall were to divide Europe and it would run through Bosnia, a country almost entirely bordering EU and NATO member states, that is the strategic absurdity we are sleepwalking in. My Lords, the government has spoken at length about its commitment to deepen defence cooperation with the European Union and the European greater European responsibility. These are serious and welcome ambitions. We must be self-reliant. This would be make us stronger.

But. And it would also respond to the Washington push. But ambitions require practical foundations. EUFOR Operation Althea, working with NATO, remains the principal international military mission responsible for maintaining stability in Bosnia. Yet Britain left after Brexit. We currently lack the framework that would permit participation in that mission should circumstances require it. Instability in the Western Balkans is genuinely. Strategic interests of the United Kingdom. As the government rightly says, then it's stronger. UK, EU defence cooperation. January priority then the absence of such framework is difficult to reconcile with either that risk assessment or those stated priorities.

I have several questions for the Minister. First, what specific actions? Not statements, but actions, will follow from the government starting identification of Western Balkans as a strategic risk to the United Kingdom and our NATO allies. Second, does the government regard the failure to agree the High Representative as a serious sign of weakening international cohesion? And what is it actually doing to break the deadlock? Will the next peak be held at the ministerial level? Third, does the United Kingdom have plans to negotiate a third party participation agreement? EUFOR Operation Althea and if not, why not? Fourth, does the government believe the international framework protecting Bosnia and Herzegovina and its territorial integrity is as credible today as it was 1020 years ago? And if not, will it raise with NATO allies the case for more explicit security guarantee? Finally, my Lords, Britain helped to end the war in Bosnia.

British soldiers served there. Some never came back. British diplomats helped shape the settlement. Bosnia is not a peripheral concern. It sits at the intersection of European security, transatlantic relations and the credibility of the international agreements upon which peace itself depends. The government has correctly identified the risks. The question before us, the question I hope the Minister will answer is whether Britain. Britain's response matches its own assessment. I look forward to
This debate has concluded
Return to start of debate - Return to top of page