Youth Unemployment and the Future Jobs Fund

Written evidence submitted by New Deal of the Mind

Submission

1. The Future Jobs Fund allows young people to access a paid entry level opportunity within the creative sector which is notoriously difficult to break into unless one is willing and able to work as an unpaid intern. There are many young people who simply cannot afford to work for free doing an entry level job in the creative sector which means only those with the right connections and sufficient financial support are able to do so. Consequently, a job in the arts world is simply out of reach to thousand of talented, creative people from ethnic minorities and lower socio-economic groups.

2. The FJF allows young people to break out of the Catch 22 cycle of "needing experience to gain experience". The vast majority ( 85%) of companies in the creative sector employ less than 5 people so young people can gain valuable experience working in a small business environment where their employer effectively becomes their mentor. The Bernie Grant Centre in North London is a good example of how this works and there are many models of "creative hubs" around the country which support and nurture creative entrepreneurs and artists.

3. Openings created through the FJF help young people get their foot on the ladder and provide something concrete for them to take to future employers, not least of all the discipline and responsibility that comes from being employed. Many of the young people we have worked with speak enthusiastically of being part of a team, learning new skills, and having a renewed sense of self confidence after a long period of unemployment and rejection.

4. FJF opportunities in the arts are often perceived as more interesting than 9-5 office based work and are therefore good at attracting candidates that might lack motivation simply because they have no idea what’s available beyond offices and shops. Working alongside creative, entrepreneurial individuals encourages such young people to see different ways of working and opens up a vast range of opportunities for skilled craftspeople that they otherwise may never be exposed to. For instance, experience of working in a theatre may inspire someone to become a skilled carpenter and work on set design while heritage and archives will draw on a range of IT skills.

5. The FJF allows young people to access professional networks to help them find work. This is vitally important in the arts and creative sector and is borne out in the report NDotM produced for the Arts Council , "Creative Survival in Hard Times" in which it is abundantly clear that aspiring artists and creative individuals yearn for the "hand-ups" of business advice, work space and mentoring networks more than the "hand-outs" of unemployment benefit. The FJF allows organisations to recruit staff that they otherwise may not have been able to afford.

6. The FJF, being a restricted fund, has helped increase access and diversity within the creative industries. Our experience has shown that by engaging with the FJF, arts organisations recruit from a different social group than usual and often a different ethnic group. The FJF addresses the culture of unpaid internships which is endemic in the arts, head on. An FJF employee is paid at least the minimum wage and entitled to the same benefits as a full time employee.

7. The Future Jobs Fund is geared to the idea that one is either an employee or an employer and is no help to freelancers and self employed people who dominate the arts and creative sector. So, many young people trying to gain experience in the creative sector are willing and eager to take on freelance work but freelancers do not qualify for the FJF. Similarly, many aspiring artists work part-time in other jobs in order to survive and are therefore not qualifying for the FJF which would arguably be more use to them - the next generation of creative entrepreneurs – in terms of networking and gaining experience than working in a bar.

8. The length of time that someone has to be registered as unemployed in order to qualify for the FJF is simply too long. Many of the young people we work with had spent up to 18 months trying to find work before they were desperate enough to sign on for JSA by which point their self confidence had taken a sever battering. Months of rejection or worse, no response at all from prospective employers, the endless cycle of trying to gain experience without experience is soul destroying and sadly, there is still the stigma of unemployment which makes people who’ve been out of work for a long time unattractive to employers.

9. Six months, which is the length of FJF placements, is often too short a time scale for someone to learn new skills to the level that they are truly transferable. While a six month commitment is attractive to an employer and is a good way for them to "sample" new recruits, many young people who’ve experienced long term unemployment will feel a shadow over them at the fear of returning to that once the FJF placement ends purely because of their own experience. We would like to see the reintroduction of something like the Enterprise Allowance Scheme which would support people who want to start their own businesses as well as encourage young people to take ownership and responsibility over their lives.

10. The Future Jobs Fund is a very temporary measure that while welcome in many respects, can only be a sticking plaster on the deep wound of unemployment. While the FJF takes young people out of long term unemployment temporarily, it fails to address what happens to them at the end of their placement and there is perhaps an element of trusting to luck that many FJF employees will be kept on. At London’s Southbank Centre, 14 of the 30 FJF recruits have been kept on in permanent roles but that simply is not an option for smaller, poorer organisations. These may be able to offer part time or freelance work but as has been pointed out elsewhere, JSA and FJF doesn’t appear to recognise freelancing or self employment as a valid work choice.

11. In order to qualify for FJF funding, jobs have to be of benefit to the community. One could argue that preventing unemployment alone is self evidently of benefit to the community but that is apparently not enough to tick the boxes for FJF. There is a degree of inflexibility about the FJF which puts it out of reach of small organisations and businesses unless they work within an aggregate such as NDotM. We would argue that two jobs in a small creative business are more valuable in the long term than two jobs at a supermarket because they will encourage and promote creative entrepreneurship which is essential to the country’s economic recovery.

12. Access to information and advice about FJF is extremely patchy and varies from Jobcentre to Jobcentre according to the staff and their level of training and knowledge. There are many people who could have benefitted from FJF had they been claiming JSA for the requisite length of time but in some rural and coastal areas where seasonal freelance and part time work is available, people will manage but ultimately miss out on opportunities that could increase their employment and earning potential.

Conclusion

NDotM recognises that the FJF has helped many people into paid work and lifted them out of long term unemployment. Our area of expertise is in the arts and creative industries which have characteristics peculiar to them;

· Hard to enter and high levels of unpaid internships,

· High levels of freelancers and self employed workers

· 85% of creative businesses employ less than 5 people

· Creative entrepreneurs and artists tend to work in clusters

· Arts and culture drive regeneration in many parts of the UK

The FJF has been valuable but is by no means the only way of helping people into jobs in the arts and creative industries because it is too temporary, too inflexible and too short term.

We need to be as imaginative and innovative and those we want to help – the next generation of creative entrepreneurs. These will build businesses, create wealth and jobs and contribute vastly to the UK’s social, economic and cultural well being. Self employment and freelancing needs to be recognised in any Welfare to Work schemes and we need to create apprenticeships and work pairings where young people could "shadow" a self employed person. We must look at the contribution older artists and creative people could make as mentors and facilitators at creative incubators (with so much emphasis on youth unemployment, older artists and creative people are all but forgotten yet an innovative job creation scheme could see them eligible for short term paid placements working with aspiring young artists or refreshing their own skills). We need, urgently, to think about the long term and how to build support networks so that people on FJF placements don’t simply fall off at the end of six months. We need to examine indirect support such as space to work, access to business and financial skills and mentoring. We need to stop unpaid internships which create a two tier jobs market, especially in the arts where such practices reinforce the totally unrepresentative and inaccessible nature of the sector.

Welfare to Work should be about encouragement and inspiration. The premise of the FJF that you had first to suffer unemployment for so long before you might escape is fundamentally flawed. A more flexible, imaginative and long term scheme could pay huge dividends and support for people setting up on their own is vital if we are to nurture the innovation, creativity, talent and entrepreneurship that is going to be key to economic recovery in the UK.

9 September 2010