Youth unemployment is at a similar level now to when the coalition took office, having risen by nearly 250,000 in the two years leading up to the 2010 general election.

There have been periods of both rising and falling youth unemployment since 2010 but recent figures have been encouraging, with the number of unemployed

16 to 24-year-olds (excluding those who are full-time students) down 37,000 in the year to April to June 2013, to 676,000. The number of young people claiming jobseeker's allowance also fell by 72,100 in the year to July 2013, to 381,300.

Although improving, youth unemployment remains too high. That is why we have modernised our services by giving Jobcentre Plus advisers access to a comprehensive menu of help tailored to support the individual at the most appropriate point in their claim.

We introduced the Youth Contract which will provide nearly half a million new opportunities for young people—including wage incentives, incentives to take on apprentices, and extra work experience placements. Extra funding is being made available to support the most vulnerable 16 and 17-year-olds not in education, employment or training into learning, an apprenticeship or job with training.

Young people also have access to the Work programme which provides tailored support for those claimants furthest from the labour market. Young claimants are referred to a provider after 9 months of seeking work and those with more challenging barriers to work can be referred at three months. Providers are paid on the results they achieve, and are paid more for supporting the harder to help into work.

The information requested is not available.

Although no specific assessment has been made in relation to the support provided by Jobcentre Plus to jobseekers aged 50 with prior senior managerial experience, an evaluation of the Jobcentre Plus offer was commissioned in late 2011. The Department has been using the research to help ensure that the offer successfully delivers to all claimants

Furthermore, work is being carried out with districts to enable them to make better use of the 50+ module within the support contract. This module is an employability and job search workshop aimed at unemployed professionals but tailored for 50+ customers.

Advisers have generic guidance and learning on how to provide individual jobseekers with the help they need to give themselves best prospects of employment.

This is supplemented by a ‘Supporting Older Worker’ intranet site, which pulls together relevant information such as the support available to help older workers move into work, labour market statistics, research into older workers, adviser training, case studies, good news stories, best practice and other initiatives.

It also provides links to the Older Workers Statistical Information Booklet and The Age and Employment Network's ‘Survey of Jobseeker's Aged 50+’.

Statistics on how many people between 16 and 25-years-old in (a) Sheffield and (b) each Sheffield parliamentary constituency have been claiming jobseeker's allowance or have been unemployed for two years or more in each month since May 2010, from the claimant count, can be found at:

https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/default.asp

Guidance for users can be found at:

https://www.nomisweb.co.uk/home/newuser.asp

The following table shows jobseekers allowance claimants in the Glasgow North West parliamentary constituency, Glasgow City local authority district, Scotland and the UK. The number of people claiming JSA has fallen in all these areas, both in the last year and since May 2010.

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) produces an independent forecast of the claimant count. The latest forecast is published at:

http://cdn.budgetresponsibility.independent.gov.uk/March-2013-EFO-44734674673453.pdf

OBR forecasts are only available at national level.

There is no officially recognised definition of “early” retirement. The default retirement age has been abolished. Receiving a state pension at state pension age is not synonymous with retirement from work.

The following table shows the number of people self-reporting as “retired” before state pension age. People leave the labour market for a variety of reasons. Some who report other reasons for inactivity may in effect be retired, so the figures are likely to be an underestimate. There are no projections for the number of people who will retire early.

Jobcentre Plus personal advisers offer a comprehensive menu of help including support with jobs search, work experience, skills provision, volunteering, and help to set up their own businesses.

The Youth Contract provides wage incentives for employers who want to recruit an unemployed young person, from Jobcentre Plus or the Work Programme, and financial incentives to take on young apprentices.

Where Jobcentre Plus advisers feel that a person would benefit from a short period of activity, they can refer them to a Mandatory Work Activity placement that lasts for four weeks focused on delivering benefit to the local community.

In-work support for 18 to 24-year-olds is offered in Birmingham. This is designed to support those starting work who may have difficulties holding down a position for the first 26 weeks. Support includes a dedicated Aftercare Adviser, access to an In-Work Mentoring Service and Money Management and Debt Counselling.

There have been no recent discussions with the Secretary of State for Education, my right hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Michael Gove), on the effect of schools careers service on levels of youth unemployment.

Departmental officials continue to work closely with the Department for Education in setting up a strategy to improving opportunities for young people, so they can succeed in education and training and gain the skills they need to secure employment or gain an apprenticeship. The strategy sets out how radical reforms to schools, vocational education, skills and welfare provision will all make a significant difference to young people's opportunities and support.

In addition to this, I continue to meet with the Minister of Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for West Suffolk (Matthew Hancock), to work on ways to reduce youth unemployment.

Advisers in local Jobcentres now have the flexibility to offer all claimants, including older people, a comprehensive menu of help which includes skills provision and job search support. All claimants who are long term unemployed can access the tailored, back to work support, on offer from the Work Programme.

The available information is shown in the following table. Comparisons of the number of unemployed people and the number of vacancies need to be interpreted carefully. Any snapshot of unfilled vacancies at a point in time misses the regular turnover of new vacancies that are notified as existing opportunities are filled. Both unfilled and notified vacancies miss jobs available in the wider labour market, including those outside the local constituency and those coming up through other recruitment channels or filled by direct approaches to employers or word of mouth.

Universal Jobmatch has now replaced the previous Jobcentre Plus system of taking vacancies. Information on vacancies reported through the new service is not currently available for parliamentary constituencies. Some information, including notified vacancies at local authority level, is available via a Universal Jobmatch management information (MI) tool:

https://jobsearch.direct.gov.uk/Reports/Reports.aspx

Data drawn from Universal Jobmatch should not be compared directly to the previous Jobcentre Plus data.

DWP is working with Monster Worldwide Limited, the Universal Jobmatch supplier, on a timetable for prioritising and implementing improvements to the available MI, including breakdowns by parliamentary constituency. Further details will be released as soon as they are available.

I have no plans to conduct such an assessment.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) makes a valuable contribution to sharing information and best practice from around the world and we welcome its report, “Global Employment Trends for Youth 2013”. We will consider the report and will continue to engage with the ILO on employment issues, including at the forthcoming G20 Labour and Employment Ministers meeting.

There are no specific references to the UK in the report; however, the labour market for young people in the UK is showing signs of improvement. The ILO measure of 16-24 unemployment is down 57,000 over the past year, and the number of young people claiming jobseeker’s allowance has fallen for the eleventh consecutive month.

In most cases the wage incentive element of the Youth Contract is paid after a young person has been in work continuously for 26 weeks. Following the collection and quality assurance of this data, the first set of Official Statistics on the wage incentive should be available in the next few months.

The Department is working to guidelines set by the UK Statistics Authority to ensure we publish statistics that meet high quality standards at the earliest opportunity.

Jobcentre Plus personal advisers offer a comprehensive menu of help that includes job search support and skills provision. Advisers have the flexibility to tailor support to the individual at the most appropriate point in their claim. Get Britain working measures offer additional support, including Work Clubs, work experience, New Enterprise Allowance, Enterprise Clubs and sector-based work academies.

The Work programme provides tailored support to those claimants furthest from the labour market. Young claimants are referred to a provider after nine months and those with more challenging barriers to work can be referred at three months. Providers are paid on the results they achieve, and are paid more for supporting the harder to help into work.

The Youth Contract will provide nearly half a million new opportunities for young people—including wage incentives, incentives to take on apprentices, and extra work experience placements. Extra funding is being made available to support the most vulnerable 16 and 17-year-olds not in education, employment or training into learning, an apprenticeship or job with training.

To date, in financial year 2012-13, the Department has spent £82,182.85 (excluding VAT) on a pilot regional marketing campaign to promote all Youth Contract measures. The campaign encourages small employers to give young people an opportunity and includes information about the wage incentive. The marketing campaign includes regional radio and press advertising, e-mail marketing and local events.

This expenditure supplements no-cost communications techniques which allowed us to extend the reach of our message, such as social media and working with partners such as the British Chambers of Commerce to disseminate our messages.

The Department has spent £4,542 (excluding VAT) on marketing products which specifically promote the wage incentive and are distributed through Jobcentre Plus advisers. This comprises:

a flyer for employers which highlights key messages and directs employers to a local contact.

a self-marketing card for eligible 18 to 24-year-olds to promote the wage incentive to prospective employers. They will, for example, be encouraged to attach the card to a CV or leave it with an employer after an interview.

I have been asked to reply on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions.

The Youth Contract has a number of elements; the Department for Work and Pensions delivers some, but not all, of these elements.

Statistics on work experience and sector based work academies are available at the following link. These programmes were in place before the introduction of the Youth Contract. Statistics on these elements of the Youth Contract are included within this published data, which includes breakdowns such as age group or region.

http://statistics.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd1/pwp/pwp_gbw_feb13.pdf

In most cases the wage incentive element of the Youth Contract is paid after a young person has been in work continuously for 26 weeks. Following the collection and quality assurance of this data, the first set of Official Statistics on the wage incentive should be available in the next few months.

The Youth Contract also includes additional advisor support for young people. There will be no official statistics on this element.

The support for 16 to 17-year-olds not in education, employment, or training (NEETs) element of the Youth Contract is owned by the Department for Education.

The Apprenticeship Grants for Employers (AGE 16-24) element of the Youth Contract is owned by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.