Get Britain Working is totally missing the current employment crisis economy

[myotheraccountsa]

Just read the BBC article about rate of UK unemployment up to 5% - the gvmt saying people should question the accuracy of this data, but also that it ties into their campaign to "Get Britain working".

I am mind blown. Are they not seeing what I'm seeing? This isn't an issue with people on benefits etc -

There's a huge new tidal wave of very highly qualified people who have been merrily working for all their lives, now made redundant or upon leaving theor jobs literally cannot find anything. There's a Mid-Senior level crisis all over LinkedIn - 500+ people applying for every 1 job. People searching for over a year with hundreds of applications, interviews, and getting nothing. Basically being told that nowadays the only way to get a job is through networking - it's back to who you know, not what you know.

And then the government act all surprised and like they haven't taxed businesses on workers to the point that they're cutting heads wherever they can? Or that they are oblivious to this and everyone should "get back to work" like it's easy for an ex-SVP to persuade the local chippy they're the ideal employee (even if they're desperate and would willingly work there).

Madness.

Don't hold your breath.

The reorganisation of the NHS hasn't been implemented yet. Why? Because they didn't factor in redundancy payments. They basically cannot afford to make NHS England employees redundant. You couldn't make it up!

There may well be a geographical aspect to it. Especially for younger people who are increasingly living with their parents as young adults - when I was younger, people thought nothing of relocating for a good job, but I'm not sure if that happens as much now.

Yes, I heard that. How on earth did they fail to factor that in?!

Is it good as in paid well enough to warrant relocation? What’s the salary?

I'm not talking about one specific job - we've had vacancies ranging from entry level to senior leadership.

Obviously, I wouldn't expect someone to relocate for an entry level admin role with limited scope for progression, but when I was in my twenties, I was absolutely prepared to move to wherever the interesting jobs were, and so were most my friends. And of course, some young people still do, I just wonder if they do so less than previous generations because it's that much harder for them to get on the housing ladder.

It isn't about the salary - we are definitely paying enough for people to be able to afford the move. However, the competition for rental properties is very fierce, with loads of people turning up for every viewing, and I know that some of our younger staff have struggled with this.

The LGR reorganisation is happening as far as I know unless Labour leaves power. I'm not so knowledgeable about the NHS reorganisation but my Mum has just taken voluntary redundancy there, as have colleagues. So no forced redundancies yet I think but voluntary ones are happening.

affordability and availability of rental properties is also a factor preventing mobility for jobs.

My DS after graduation got a role 6 hours away from home, finding somewhere to live was by far the biggest issue - we were considering buying him a caravan at one point!

Yes private rental might be an issue. As put on other threads policy on this will lower supply and increase prices.

Yes, I agree. The competition for rental properties in our area is insane.

"when I was younger, people thought nothing of relocating for a good job, but I'm not sure if that happens as much now."

It's because housing costs, moving costs, rental deposits are all too expensive, if you're on minimum wage or on a zero hours contract - it stifles free movement of people.

And then you have people like me who's clinging on strongly in a mid/senior role i'd have probably moved on from long ago, if i thought the economy would improve or my employment rights would be respected or taking on more responsibility would pay in terms of what you get in your pocket as net wages - better the devil you know so you stick around in a "good enough" job and it's a role other people can't get.

And this is happening with a lot of my colleagues at the moment - despite record dips in staff morale, health issues, stress, there's very little turnover in terms of resignations (redundancies, shifting down to part time working yes, but not exits triggered by staff themselves). Again, stifling natural movement for labour.

It's a real mess where no one is winning in any of this unless you have stable housing and can afford to take more work risks (mid-career/end career adults) or have parents supporting you (teens/younger adults).

I don't disagree with you here. I think the renters' rights bill was well intentioned, but it will have unintended consequences.

As @MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack says, it’s sector dependent. I’ve heard similar from DHs former company. He’s now retired but recruitment is still difficult. Everyone knows the big players in a job sector but aren’t great at looking at the smaller players. His former company offers everything you mention too.

There are too many people who don’t have the skills for varied work in his profession so they aren’t suitable for many roles. It’s partly a university issue (too much maths) and partly large employers who compartmentalise grads into narrow focus jobs. Many applicants therefore simply cannot do the type of work DHs former company has. Even getting good grads isn’t easy. Often they are not very articulate and don’t possess suitable written or oral skills to converse with clients and some work they simply won’t engage with. Many seem short on ambition.

Getting the right people has never been easy. Often redundant people are sifted out from firms because they aren’t great. Firms retain the best employees and they don’t need to apply for other jobs. The ones who aren’t wanted are the ones in the market for jobs but they aren’t the right fit.

When jobs are taxed, money goes into paying taxes. It could have gone into training and support measures. The government and MPs simply don’t understand business and employment.

Not so in my DDs trust, whole teams have gone, the move to saving money to move staff/care out into the Community is happening, also being done in a neighbouring trust too.

Obv i cannot speak for every trust.

I dont have a solution. I think my indirect point is just that small businesses can't afford those salaries without higher prices and its a vicous loop of seeing who will blink first. Usually the result is that the business closes which means less work available so higher unemployment, the knock on need for welfare.

If i was in charge, I would be looking closely at education and moving away from the standard academic route and look to promote 4 key GCSES: MATHS, ENGLISH, SCIENCE and a new combined humanities which pulls together the very basics and essentials of key dates, places and cultures. Look to get everyone a good solid rounding in those and from age 13, encourage a choice between academics or work skills training and focus classes appropriately. Group A focus on building a capable workforce straight fromschool: trades, warehouse work, management skills, business skills like accountancy and registering a company, organising insurance. Group B focus on the trickier academics for further education to become a solicitor, doctor, etc.

Currently we train children for university and that's not getting the right or most achievable outcome for most children.

People will always need an electrician, boiler fix, carpet, carpentry and these often pay well.

So i suppose my solution is training for work over training for education because its no longer the way out of poverty that it used to be.

Agreed. It’s not worth the stress. I’m down to 90% and just worked out that I could do 85% in a way that minimises childcare costs. Mulling it over…

Ds is second year at a top university and tells us that he's struggling to make friends because the other students are so withdrawn and many can't even respond when they're spoken to. The majority aren't taking an interest in their degree, aren't studying or just doing the bare minimum to get by. I know it's traditional for students to drink a lot, but surely some must be interested in other things and be able to show a bit of personality. They don't even speak up in lectures. If these are the people showing up for job interviews then God help them.

That sounds miserable for your poor DS. I hope he will find his people eventually.

We have certainly seen candidates for graduate entry roles with very little get-up - and-go and really poor interpersonal skills etc. I wondered if covid might have been a factor for some of them having failed to develop the people skills - obviously there are lots of young people who have fabulous social skills, though, so I'm not really sure. I guess there are always multiple variables that feed into these things.

Where I live (an isolated village) there isn’t a single job opportunity - the pre school, which was the last surviving thing we had, has just shut down because Labour changed the way it was funded and it had to shut. There is nothing else for miles and miles, and even there it’s ever more sparse.

That’s a shame. Ds hasn’t found that, thankfully.

Im hearing this more and more . If people follow through and don’t work / save / pay tax the country is absolutely screwed .

Another issue is the abysmal lack of support for childcare (Wales), especially if you have multiples. I've recently had twins, and work was in a tricky situation with a closure and an offer of another role elsewhere or redundancy. When I worked out the cost of full-time nursery for twins in addition to the travel expenses, I would be out of pocket returning.
I loved teaching, and I will miss it so much. But I can not work out how to make returning feasible until the girls are entitled to some funded hours, which isn't until 3.
I am fearful I will struggle to find anything if I'm out of work for so long.

I think we inherently have a strong work ethic in the UK. I don't know many people who enjoy or are happy being unemployed. But if two parents are working full time and struggle to make ends meet, there's no wonder unemployment is rising.

DD (second year uni) applied for 60-80 min wage jobs before getting one....it was an 8 hour contract,( 2 shifts per week) which was ok but ideally over summer she could easily have worked more. And not the same days each week so difficult to combine with another pt job. She was lucky she could earn enough in 12 hrs (if she could get an extra shift) but thats because she's a student living at home. She saved it to pay for the first month of uni

Shes just got another job in her uni town, again 8 hours/week over 2 shifts, some jobs she applied for were 9 hours/wk over 3 shifts so taking way more time (commuting/getting there) for the same money as just doing a day! DH thinks theyre all on short shifts so that no one has breaks

Can I ask what the issue is with the quality?

Is it that you're getting applications from people outside the sector you want?
Or lack of experience?
Or have been out of work for some time?
Or failure to evidence the base criteria?
Or personality/motivation not shining through?

Or are the CVs not representative of the candidates when you interview?

We welcome applications with transferable skills from other sectors and from people who have been out of the workplace for a while - we have comprehensive training programmes in place for new staff so we are confident that we can equip them with the technical skills and knowledge that they need to do the work.

What we feel is lacking is more to do with communication, interpersonal skills and attitudes etc - things which are absolutely essential for our work but not so easy to train people in. A lack of attention to detail is another common problem that we see. We also see quite a few candidates who appear to have turned up to the interview without having read the job description properly or looked at our website etc. I don't expect them to know everything, but wanting people to do a bit of very basic research about what they have applied for isn't unreasonable in my view.

We do find that CVs and/or written applications - we've experimented with various approaches - aren't always reflective of the quality of candidates at interview so we try to interview as many as we can. We do find that people who are strong on paper aren't always strong in person, and vice versa.

It hasn't been dd's experience either, thankfully. But one of her friends did move from another uni for similar reasons.