Government NEET figures

[perseus]

The latest NEET (Not in Education Employment or Training) figures are out today. The overall number is now 10.3% of all 16-18 year olds, who are kicking around not doing an awful lot with their lives. It's around 191,000 young people nationally.

In Hartlepool, I think the figure is as follows;
3.8% for 16 year olds
6.2% for 17 year olds and
12.4% for 18 year olds, although I think those figures are out of sinc with the latest ones slightly. (which is around 300 young people in total).

Also, those figures have a massive 'unknown' percentage that really should be taken into account, and the real figure for 18 year olds at least is actually nearer 20% (if you include the 7% or so of youngers that the department for education don't actually know about in Hartlepool).
If you look at other figures for NEET such as 16-24 year olds, we're reaching a stage where about 1 in 4 people of that age in the town are not working or in education or training.

Those are very worrying statistics and I genuinely fear we're heading towards even more of a ghettoisation situation in areas of our town. I say ghettoisation in the sociological sense of the term.

What is it that you think makes our town so bad in realtion to these figures? and what can be done about it? Thoughts please. 

[steveL]

You can take yourself off into all sorts of endless debates about lazy teenagers, failed teaching, poor parenting and perhaps, an over-generous benefits system but the underlying factor in all of this is the simple lack of jobs.

If things were different and there existed relatively easy access to some kind of paid work for all which paid sufficiently to maintain a family without the need for Government subsidy then who knows how the debate over NEATS and the workless would change.

The lack of decently paid work is at the root of many, if not most, of all the town's present ills and in comparison, many other issues are just froth.

[mk1]

There will never be 'full employment'
Governments need a pool of unemployed in order to keep those in work in fear of losing their  livelyhood.
If ever there were more workers than jobs then those paying skinflint wages would never fill a vacancy.
Both Tory and Labour live by that rule and we must rememeber ''New Labour' specificaly (and saying it in public) importing Poles in order to keep down wages.
Big business and Government will both conspire to prevent this mythical 'full employment' ever ruining their gravy train.

Plus of course we need a whipping boy and the unemployed are a handy target  for everyone else to dump on...............

[steveL]

The word I used was 'if'.......

Full employment does not mean that everyone who wants a job has one. Even in the best of circumstances, there will always be a significant number of people looking for work. When I was studying economics in the early 70s, that figure was put at around 250,000 and Ted Heath's Government was under attack because the unemployment figure had just passed the 1 million mark.

In those days, being unemployed meant those people who wanted a job but didn't have one. Today, the unemployment figure has been bastardised so much it's almost impossible to compare but I have read that if the unemployment figure was still calculated on the same basis as it was in the early 70s then we would be looking at something around the 4 million mark.

There's no point in suggesting that a falling national unemployment figure should necessarily have led to a falling NEAT figure in Hartlepool. Jobs are not spread evenly in this country - or even in this region. Hartlepool's employment prospects have been dire for the last 50 years ever since the traditional apprenticeship routes into the shipyards were closed off and they've become progressively worse as the country's manufacturing base has collapsed.

Discussions about 'full employment' are a little academic for the moment; we just need to settle on increasing the chances of some employment.

[not4me]

service sector jobs were never going to provide enough jobs to match the jobs lost when manufacturing was allowed to die

[hartlepool65]

Things will only get worse for the likes of Hartlepool in respect of lack of jobs. I am in the business of trying to find people work but am finding full time jobs are being turned into part time jobs, part time jobs are being turned into jobs for work experience or voluntary jobs for those signing on at the Jobcentre or on the Work Programme, firms like TMD totally take the p*ss by using the anti union employment laws to their greatest effect, staff are getting sacked for the slightest thing , more  firms are paying cash in hand ,  bars and fast food outlets the biggest culprits. If you are lucky to find work wages will be low, £6.08 isnt the minimum wage its becoming the only wage as employers know they have a pool of workers out there desperate for work.The deregulation / asset stripping /union bashing/ erosion of employment laws  that has gone on over the last 30 years is now having a devastating affect on our economy no more so than in towns like Hartlepool.

[Stig of the Seaton Dump]

I was sick of going through threat of redundancy and recently joined the union even though they have no real presence where I work.
(Obviously I don't work for HBC !)

Here is the amusing bit, just after I joined, I got a letter saying subs are going up ...by a percentage greater than the combined pay rises I have had over the last 5 years !

So UNITE failed to stop 10% of my colleagues getting sacked through no fault of their own (multi billion pound profit company), failed to get me a pay rise or at least failed
to organise a strike or protest against this.

EVERYBODY wants a bigger slice of our earnings, wants us to work harder for longer and gives nothing in return.

It is a situation heading for collapse as the average worker like myself finds there is nothing left to cut back on, standard left to drop.

[Vincent]

That was a very depressing post by hartlepool65 so I thought I might try and balance it by posting the following: -
Young people who have fallen through the net need tailored support to get back on track. Disengaged young people often have complex problems that act as a barrier to getting them learning again, which the Government alone can't deal with. But very often local charities and businesses know what's going to help them.

That's why funding is being unlocked for these organisations to be as creative and innovative as they can, to do whatever it takes, to get the young people who need it most back on their feet. In exchange for this freedom, all we ask is that they get results. It's a win-win for government, young people and the organisations involved.

The new scheme to get NEETs (Not in Education, Employment or Training) back on their feet kicked off on Friday July 20 with charities and businesses given the go-ahead to prove they can turn young people's lives around in exchange for cash. Funding worth up to £126m is being made available to organisations across England, who will be paid by results to get 16 and 17 year olds back into education or training.

The programme, part of the Deputy Prime Minister's Youth Contract, is the first to use payment by results to help get NEETs re-engaged. Organisations involved have had to compete for contracts by showing they are able to get young people back on track. In return for proving they are experts in the field, they will be given freedom to tailor and provide support for disadvantaged young people in the way they know best.