Nearly 1m young people out of work

It offers work across many sectors.

There are loads of large national agencies eg Reed, Pertemps, Hays, Manpower etc. As well as smaller local ones offering a variety of roles in a wide range of industries - everything from customer service and admin, to care work, manufacturing, warehouse work and professional industries.

What they are looking for mainly is commitment, reliability, work ethic and a reference.

My partner works in manufacturing and they take people on from agencies - a lot of their workers are agency and many have just been willing to work and turn up and have been trained on the job. A lot of them are men with no qualifications and some have little to no work history.

My brother joined an agency after university which led to a permanent graduate role.

If they're at university, they will have already demonstrated the soft, interpersonal and admin skills for a low level job. Eg group assignments shows teamwork, if you've taken notes during these meetings, you have experience of minute taking. If they're school leavers who haven't worked, any extra curricular activities etc will have given them soft skills. Agencies will find a way of spinning your skills in a positive way.

The best thing they can do is to come up with a CV and make contact with a few agencies. The consultant my daughter spoke to was really helpful.

Basically, agencies will take on anyone who applies and come across well! After that, it's down to the individual how successful they are. And agencies will pretty much tell you that.

This topic was discussed on radio 5 yesterday. A guest on the show said there were 10,000 grad jobs available....and 900, 000 people graduating!

Of course not everyone is entitled to a graduate job but its a bit shitty to constantly hear young people are entitled/snowflakes/need to get a grip....when multiple posters are sharing how difficult it is for their YP to get a job. My DD wants to work and earn money, she's got a job but its a zero hours one....which means zero hours more often than not! (Yes, she is looking and applying elsewhere)

And its not helpful to relate what any of us did in the 1990s because the whole world including jobs has changed massively since then. Fwiw I got my first saturday job in 1995 because my friends mum worked in a department store and asked if I wanted a job there. Said department store has gone bust and Saturday jobs aren't generally a thing any more. Point is I wasnt applying for 100s of jobs, only to get a job that doesnt even guarantee a 4 hour shift per week!

I agree. I'm an accountant with lots of small business clients, many "one man" tradesmen like electricians, plumbers, joiners, and garage mechanics. Not a single one takes on a "trainee/apprentice" these days. Go back a few decades, when I first started in accountancy in the 80s, and nearly all "tradesmen" clients had a trainee/apprentice. THAT's the difference today. Same with other small businesses like "one man" shops, small cafes, etc where it's usually the owner and spouse and/or children rather than unrelated staff.

Everyone says the same that they would love to have a youngster helping out, helping to grow the business, take on more work, etc., but it's the cost and bureaucracy that they can't absorb, and worries/risk/stresses of all the employment protection legislation, i.e. risk of being sued for unfair dismissal or discrimination etc.

The increase in rate of employers NIC and reduction in NIC threshold is just another nail in the coffin, as is the increase in minimum wage for youngsters. I've seen a constant fall in the number of small business clients taking on young staff over the last 20 years. Today, literally none at all have young/trainee staff and when talking to them, none have any plans to do so.

Lots of them have, over the past couple of decades, been in contact with the local college of FE to discuss apprenticeships, but all have said they got no help at all from the college who just wanted lots of "paperwork" before they'd even have a chat, such as employment policies, risk assessments, copies of insurance policies etc - i.e. putting barriers in place before they'd even talk about it.

I've got a steady stream of elderly tradesmen clients who are retiring, a handful each year, and they despair at having to give up and give away their customer base - usually long standing regular/repeat customers. Having an apprentice to take over would be a brilliant start for the next generation giving them a ready made business, but it all just gets thrown away.

One guy who isn't a client is our alarm maintenance guy/electrician who looks after our home and my office. He's in his 70s, a local guy I've known for decades as we live in the same village. He's the exception. Around five years ago, he took on an apprentice. A lovely lad who was his neighbour. When he first came, he was really shy, quiet and nervous and clearly hadn't a clue. They come a couple of times per year. Each visit, he's been more confident and for the last couple of years has done all the actual work himself with the old guy just watching. Last time they came, he announced he's retiring and the lad was taking over. That's how it should be and how it always used to be. But so sad it's now the exception rather than the norm.

Whilst I do agree, I have sympathy for the young people caught in this mess. Friend’s DD graduated from an RG uni and couldn’t get work. Any work. She became depressed and was comfort eating
and sleeping in, she felt shit that she had to go back and live with her parents and couldn’t move on. And yes, a diagnosis followed. But the diagnosis that I think she should have got is “fucked by a broken country”.

This sadly.
seen it first hand. Things need to change, including MH support for those young people who need it.

Graduates are being rejected from minimum wage jobs as well. There aren’t enough jobs.

Governments have made it harder and harder on businesses. I know a bloke who has his own business. He knows he’d benefit massively from an extra pair of hands and he’d be perfect to take on a younger lad and train him up. Thing is, the costs and risk of him employing someone or them not showing up or doing shit work, the burden of admin and taxes - well it’s meant that my friend is keeping his business small and only taking on work that he’s going to do himself. and my brother is in a similar position - he started out on his own after getting made redundant in Covid and he could do with an extra pair of hands but the costs and risks aren’t worth it. Governments have stifled the shit out of these small businesses. There ought to be some kind of scheme to help one person businesses take on another pair of hands to make it less onerous and risky.

my h works for a larger company and they have decided to take zero graduates this year.

it’s nothing to do with getting a grip and taking any job.

A terrible insight and I totally agree with you.

It's not just the minimum wage. We also we need to remember that Starmer recently did a deal with India so UK companies don't have to pay NI if they employ young Indian workers, while the media have been portraying young Brits as lazy snowflakes for over a decade.

It's almost a surprise when any company spends time and money employing a young Brit.

Nail on the head.

Statistics show a record low number of available jobs. Lots of youngsters want a job, any job, but simply can't get one.

My son made a few dozen graduate job applications in his final year of Uni - he spent hours and hours on them over several months. His flatmates were doing the same. All going through stage after stage of the various online application procedures, getting excited when they "passed" a stage and moved onto the next stage. It was soul destroying how much time they wasted when they got rejected time and time again in the later stages.

My son finally got a very good graduate scheme job offer and is now in his third year working for one of the UK's biggest insurance firms. But each year since he started, they're taking on fewer and fewer graduates every six monthly intake. In his dept, he was one of four, in the last intake, they only took on one.

Amazing that you know the thoughts and wishes of a million people.

Did you not notice the recent report showing a record low number of graduate jobs available at the moment?

It's not about youngsters not wanting a job (some don't!), but there not being any jobs for the vast majority who do want a job.

They need to get a grip and find a job. Any job. Most are precious about what they do. All of us have been in the same situation. After uni I had no option but to get work. I wasn’t living at home being bankrolled by parents. I took anything. Yes minimum wage. All of us did. We made it work. It paid off.

Yes id be interested too.

DDs first job last summer was working for a festival, they weren't advertising she just emailed the organiser and asked if they were recruiting.
But she was paid a daily rate which worked out at less than minimum wage some days, and it was a 2hr commute each way. But she said it was the quickest way she was going to earn a few hundred quid. And certainly a lot quicker than her current zero hours job.

Would you mind sharing the type of work this recruitment agency have on offer? Is it hospitality/retail/office

From someone in the same age bracket and a similar situation, thank you!

As a disabled person in my 50s, too young (and poor) to retire, too ill to work, and not ill enough for benefits, I can tell you a lot of people are just highlighting that people like me are a "problem" and a "burden on society" and a "drain on the economy" every fucking day and it sure feels like blame.

It’s terrible for everyone that so many young people are out of work. But currently there are 2.6 unemployed people for every vacancy so there are not enough jobs available. Shortage occupations are not always ‘jobs someone doesn’t want to do’, many are ‘jobs we don’t have sufficiently skilled people to do’.

Not everyone can get a job as a carer - nor should they. The answer is going to take time, and in the meantime we have to make sure young people are fed and clothed and have the chance to do at least some things that will keep them happy and motivated.

The place my h works at has just said they can’t/wont take any graduates this year. And it’s a big company. There is a serious shortage of graduate jobs and this isn’t the fault of young people.

As far as I can see, there aren’t really a lot of nighttime shelf stacking jobs as they are done by the main supermarket staff.

This is also a problem. When I was young I worked all the antisocial shifts other people didn't want to do (Friday and Saturday nights, weekend mornings) because they paid more, and because I could attend college during the day. Now many of these type of jobs will only take on people who are willing or able to work whatever time if day/night they are told to, rather than employing different people for early and late shifts.

Demands by employers for 24/7 flexibility excludes people who are studying, or have any caring responsibilities (children or other family), or who can't drive and need to stick to bus time tables, etc.

When I worked full time I was on a continuous cycle of burn out, sick leave, staggered return, full time, workload ramped up, burn out etc.

I reduced my working hours in the end for the sake of my health, but it has severely restricted my career as few jobs are offered part time anymore. I usually have to take full time jobs and then negotiate reduced hours, then people get snotty that I knew I couldn't work full time when I took the job, but if I didn't do this I would have been unemployable and on benefits for the last 20 years 🤷

IMO the decline in availability of part time jobs since 2010 has had a massive impact on the young (working while studying), the disabled (can't manage full time) and people with caring responsibilities (can't be out the house for long hours). I suspect this contributes to the number of people "economically inactive" (how I fucking despise that term).

The younger generation is hugely entitled. Many (not all) expect rather than want. There should be no given right to a certain lifestyle, it should be through attainment.

Thie situation is partly due to parenting. I think many need to look inward as to why there is a problem.

As a disabled person, my experience is that employers don't want the "problem" of disabled staff, no matter how much they say all the right stuff about diversity etc.

I only get jobs when I don't mention my disability on applications or interviews. For people with visible or otherwise undisguisable disabilies, this isn't an option.

Even then, once my health conditions flare up and become noticeable, which they do every few years however well I manage them, I'm gently (or no so gently) encouraged to leave 🙄

Historically, societies have been best flourishing when they are growing economically and job creation is strong.

I don't see that truth changing.

I don't think we can expect to have a thriving society by outsourcing everything to tech/cheap labour in other countries while leaving most of the population idle. That sounds like a recipe for disaster to me.

It's easy to talk about banning the term "benefits bashing" if you're not sick or disabled and not being made to feel like a scrounger and a burden and drain on society, because that is how it comes across when you're on that side of the fence. Yes, no system is perfect and there will be some fraudulent claimants, but a lot of genuine people are being or going to be hurt by all of this.

Would you really want somone providing intimate care for your elderly parents or disabled child ,who was only there because they had to be ?
I worked in a nursing home at 17 to get experience before I did my nurse training
And its hard work but not everyone is suited to it
When I was a nurse I worked. With some staff that should never have got a job in the care/ health sector as they lacked any empathy or understanding
Vulnerable people who cant advocate for themselves are much more likely to be abused .