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UK retailers to create up to 100,000 short placements for NEET youth
The “Opening Shift” program, created with the DWP, will offer 18- to 24-year-olds placements lasting two to four weeks while participants keep receiving universal credit.
The UK government and retailers including John Lewis and Marks and Spencer are planning a short-term work placement scheme for young people not in employment, education or training, known as NEET, with a target of up to 100,000 placements over the next three years, according to the Guardian Business.
The initiative, developed with the Department for Work and Pensions, will place 18- to 24-year-olds in two to four week retailer placements designed to build “the skills and confidence needed to take their first step into work.” More than 40 retailers are expected to take part, including Marks and Spencer, Pets at Home, Asda and the John Lewis Partnership, with others such as Tesco, New Look, Wickes, Currys and Greggs also signed up.
The move follows warnings from former health secretary Alan Milburn that the UK’s 1 million NEETs could rise to 1.25 million over the next five years if ministers do not intervene. Milburn, who is leading a review into Britain’s youth worklessness crisis, said many young people are stuck in a cycle of having no experience and no job, and that six in 10 NEET youth have never had a job.
The scheme is also linked to the earlier appointment of former Marks and Spencer chief executive Marc Bolland to lead a taskforce to tackle youth unemployment. Under the plan, participants will continue to receive universal credit during their placements, mainly to address logistical barriers for claimants who might otherwise have to quit and then rejoin the welfare programme, the outlet reported.