Government plan to help out of work youths with big cash injection

The Government has pledged to pump £300m into tackling youth unemployment.

The new white paper, launched by Work and Pensions Secretary Yvette Cooper, sets out a number of schemes and ideas that will hopefully get thousands of unemployed youngsters into work or training.

Entitled, Building Britain's Recovery: Achieving Full Employment, the paper states that more than 100,000 opportunities will be made available to under 25s who have been out of work for six months or longer.

It also sets out plans to make it compulsory for unemployed young people to accept offers of employment, training or work experience before they have been out of work for ten months.

There are also plans to help parents get back into employment with suggestions of a Family Friendly Working Hours Taskforce to investigate the feasibility of increasing the availability of flexible and part-time work.

Alongside the white paper, 14-19 minister, Ian Wright, launched a cross-government Neets strategy, called Investing in Potential, which includes plans to increase the number of apprentices taken on and offer £12.5m in ‘golden hello' incentives for employers taking on 16 and 17-year-old apprentices.

Wright said: "Investing in young people during the economic downturn is a vital commitment to ensure that the tough economic climate does not ruin the prospects of a generation of young people."

Meanwhile a report by the Trades Union Congress (TUC) claimed young people are faring better in this recession than the last, despite the fact that those in their teens and twenties are bearing the brunt of the downturn.

Brendan Barber, general secretary of the TUC said: "The outlook for young people is not as bleak as it was in the 1980s. But even though the figures are not as bad as they were a generation ago, for every young person struggling to get work, this recession is a personal tragedy."