Mayors to run local apprenticeship schemes to tackle Neets crisis, John Healey announces

John Healey said the mayor-run schemes would be “a bit like football scouts for apprenticeships”.

Mayors are set to get powers and funding to run local apprenticeship services to tackle the growing jobless crisis amongst youngsters, John Healey said.

Making his speech at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool this afternoon, the Chancellor said they would be “a bit like football scouts for apprenticeships”.

He emphasised his focus on driving down the welfare bill and tackling the crisis of youngsters not in education, employment or training, so-called Neets.

Almost one million 16 to 24-year-olds are currently Neet, and the Chancellor said Labour had a “moral duty” not just to splurge on benefit payments.

He referenced his upbringing in North Yorkshire: “We all remember our first job.

“Mine was in a pub called the Milburn Arms in North Yorkshire. I washed pots and glasses.

“I worked for John and Betty Young. They worked me hard, but fair.

“And that job taught me the basics - about turning up on time, about getting on with others, about respecting those with more experience.

“It also taught me the glory of a hand-pulled pint. But every person, every young person should know the pride of getting their first job, and taking home their first pay check.”

Mr Healey added: “It is simply not progressive to allow a bigger and bigger benefits bill and a system which offers an income but doesn't offer a future,” he said.

“So once again, as a Labour Government it falls to us to act. And this is more than an economic must. This is a moral duty.”

To tackle this, Mr Healey said mayors would get a share of £100m to launch local apprenticeship services in their areas.

He explained: “Local teams who will go to local firms that've never taken on a trainee, and say: ‘We'll help you do it.’

“That will go to the youngsters who've been out of work and say: ‘We’ve got a place for you.’

“Led by mayors, because it’s the mayor that knows their areas best.

“They know which firms are hiring, they know which colleges are delivering, and they know which estates have been left behind.

“That's what devolution means. And we had planned to start in a few areas. Now every mayor will have the chance to do it.”

The Chancellor explained: “The best thing we can offer a young person isn't a benefit payment. It's a first job. With training. And a wage.”

West Yorkshire Mayor Tracy Brabin said that she had already started work on this - with funding from Asda and Morrisons - but that it would mean she could “widen the scope”.

“To have that consistency, what it actually means, but also coming with more resource, which is good,” she said.

“It also encourages businesses who have unspent [apprenticeship] levy to come to us and say how can we keep it in the region?”

Mr Healey, who will deliver his first Budget next month, acknowledged that he did not have the money available to him that his predecessor Gordon Brown had in the New Labour era.

And facing increased government borrowing costs, the Chancellor sought to reassure the markets that he would be responsible with the money he did have.

“Through the core of the Budget I deliver a month today will be fiscal discipline, to give families and businesses a bit of breathing space, to drive good growth and jobs in more places and to write a new chapter of hope for Britain’s future,” he said.