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Middle East: Economic Response

My Lords, with AI causing reductions in apprenticeship training and with minimum-wage resistance from employers, why do the Government not look, in addition to the laudable initiatives that they are introducing, at the 1980s community programme? It emphasised environmental improvement, the arts and charities. It took young people off benefits and put them into work in local communities, at a time when dangers from anti-social activities were developing from long-term inactivity and unemployment. Ministers might read the speech of former MP Graham Allen of 29 July 1988 on the Nottingham operation of the programme in his constituency. It is a lesson to be learned from the past.