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Youth Unemployment

I am not sure whether the hon. Gentleman was in the Chamber at the beginning of the debate when we explained the simple point that during the latter months of our term in office, when the recession was difficult, youth unemployment was not rising but falling. All that progress—the fall between the peak of youth unemployment and when we left office—has been undone in the months since May. The hon. Gentleman shakes his head, but it is a fact. That is why earlier this week the former chief economist at the Cabinet Office, Mr Portes, told the Government bluntly that the challenge of youth unemployment is serious. He told The Times that the Government were failing to address the scale of the problem. Without urgent action, he warned, hundreds of thousands of youngsters face a bleak employment prospect throughout the rest of their lives. That is why our motion calls on the Government to reflect again on the lessons of the future jobs fund, to commission an independent evaluation, draw the right lessons, learn from them, establish a more substantial programme for the future, and do it with urgency. The future jobs fund is at the heart of the motion. Because we felt so strongly about the scourge of youth unemployment, a concern that is shared by many Members, we were determined to make sure that as it began to rise again after falling so far, something was in place that would help. We set up the future jobs fund because we knew that one of the greatest lessons from the 1980s is that when young people are allowed to drift too far from the jobs market they lose the habit of work, which is a curse that can stay with them for the rest of their lives. That is why we made substantial investment, which at the time was supported by the Conservatives, to get 150,000—rising to 200,000—new jobs that would last six months, 100,000 of them for young people and 50,000 of them in areas of high unemployment.