Youth Contract

Local authorities have called on the government to give them control of the Youth Contract after figures showed it was struggling to help the most vulnerable. They state local efforts to get young people into work, education or training are outperforming the national Youth Contract scheme.

Government figures, released on 13 June, showed that the youth employment scheme got 27.5 percent of the 16 and 17-year-olds it worked with during 2012/13 into work or education.

However the Local Government Association state that similar initiatives at local level have performed better and that the Youth Contract should be devolved to local authorities.

An example it provided of this were a scheme run in Leeds, Bradford and Wakefield, which had got 57 percent of the young people it worked with into work, training or education, and a similar scheme in Newcastle and Gateshead, which had seen 47 percent enter training or employment.

The Department for Education has stated that Youth Contract had only started in September 2012 and that the government expected to see thousands more young people moving into work, education or training as a result of the scheme.