Headline figures miss important groups, such as the part-time workers who want to go full-time but can’t, or the freelancers and self-employed who are barely attracting enough work or customers to get by. Neither of these groups are out of work; but nor are they fully employed. And while they are included in some totting … Continue reading
Teenagers in England are to be offered the chance to take new courses in engineering and construction as part of an overhaul of vocational education. Ministers said they would develop seven qualifications in the two subjects to equip youngsters with relevant skills. The Department for Education also said thousands of vocational qualifications which were “of … Continue reading
For current undergraduates, prospects after university might seem dire. Certainly the statistics suggest uncomfortable truths: 24.8% of 21-year-old graduates are unemployed, approximately 83 graduates apply for every job, and nearly a million young people are out of work. Meanwhile, a recent report by the Prince’s Trust has warned that youth unemployment will lead a generation … Continue reading
The number of people heading to Britain, less the number leaving, dropped significantly by 84,000 to 163,000 in the year to June, fuelled by a 17% drop in the number of foreign students arriving. Immigration to the UK fell from 589,000 to 515,000, its lowest since 2003, official figures from the Office for National Statistics … Continue reading
An explosion in poverty-related hunger in Britain is putting the government in danger of failing to meet its international human rights obligations to its most vulnerable citizens, charities have warned. The UK is a signatory to a UN economic and social rights convention that sets out minimum standards of access to food, clothing and housing. … Continue reading
The number of self-employed people in Britain has shot up by 367,000 since the financial crisis, according to official figures, becoming the fastest growing sector in the labour market and masking a fall in the number of employees, as many were forced to make their own way because of the global downturn. In recent months, … Continue reading
Rising wages and low house prices helped the baby boom generation to prosper. Today’s young face high unemployment, expensive education, and a lifetime of renting. Have they never had it so bad? Let’s take a typical 24-year-old everyperson. This person lives in Nottingham. There’s a one-bedroom flat they want but it costs £120,000. You need … Continue reading
The harsh reality is government programmes are failing. In fact, fewer than 6,000 young people have been helped into sustained jobs: that’s just 3.4% of young people on the Work Programme. The Youth Contract, launched with much fanfare by the deputy prime minister last year, is working so well that the government has decided to … Continue reading
Honda is cutting 800 jobs in Swindon as the shrinking European car market forces the company into its first ever UK job cuts. Honda blamed the slump in European sales as it announced it will cut its Swindon workforce by almost a quarter, months after hiring hundreds of new employees. “It’s entirely the car market,” … Continue reading
More than a third of the poorest children do not have the internet at home and a similar number do not have a computer, official figures suggest. A new breakdown of Office of National Statistics (ONS) data also showed that children from the wealthiest homes all had internet and computer access. Campaigners say this ‘digital … Continue reading
The media and education group, which also owns publisher Penguin Books, said that changes to the way apprenticeship schemes are funded had had a “radical” impact on demand for the courses offered by Pearson in Practice, which are tailored to specific industries and each last between three months and a year. Around 5,000 apprentices signed … Continue reading
Key findings The wealthiest tenth of households owned more than 40% of overall wealth and were over 850 times wealthier than the least wealthy tenth of households A household required total wealth greater than £967,000 to belong to the wealthiest 10% of the distribution The south-east of England had the highest percentage of ‘wealthy’ households … Continue reading
“Youth unemployment was rising since well before the current economic downturn, but the fallout from the financial crisis has brought it to the top of the government’s agenda and generated a plethora of publications and initiatives to tackle the problem.” write Tess Lanning and Katerina Rudiger in Youth unemployment in Europe: lessons for the UK (Adapted chosen excerpts by … Continue reading
In the darkest days of the financial crisis economists were predicting the unemployment toll would reach 3m. Thankfully, those fears never materialised, with joblessness peaking at around 2.7m. However, the side effect of containing the jobs figures well below 3m has resulted in swathes of people working part-time or reduced hours because they cannot find … Continue reading
Over 1.5m public sector job vacancies will need to be filled by 2017, but ‘poor perception’ is presenting a key barrier to attracting new recruits, according to new research. Bridging the Gap: Developing a framework to attract new talent into the Public Sector – published by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) and … Continue reading