Jobs and Education: Building the Bridge to Opportunity

You can read the full report here.

Over one million young people in Britain today, 1,012,000 between the ages of 16 and 24, are not in education, employment or training. Behind that statistic sits a generation whose path from the classroom to the workplace has been blocked, delayed or never properly built, and understanding why is one of the defining economic challenges of our time.

Jobs and Education: Building the Bridge to Opportunity is the latest in our series examining the core factors that shape job creation and economic growth, following our earlier work on energy costs, investment and taxation. Over six months, authors Tim Clark and Catherine Frost travelled the length of the country, visiting businesses and schools to understand what employers actually want from young people leaving education, and where schools can fill the gaps. The result is an ethnographic study that is rigorous, human and, at times, uncomfortable reading.

The report's central finding is that the NEETs crisis has two causes, and both need addressing at once. On one side of the bridge stands the world of work, where rising employment costs, from higher employer National Insurance contributions to a narrowing gap between youth and adult minimum wage rates, are making businesses increasingly reluctant to take a chance on inexperienced young people. We call this the demand problem. On the other side stands the school system, where teacher shortages, funding pressures and uneven access to employers mean many schools cannot deliver the careers education that would prepare young people for work. We call this the supply problem.

The businesses chapter draws on conversations with employers across manufacturing, hospitality, construction and business services, from national names like Greene King, EY and Mace to SMEs and specialist manufacturers such as Britten-Norman and AESSEAL. A single message emerged, without exception: employers recruit for attitude and character, and train for skills. Yet even the businesses doing the most to prepare young people for work, and even those actively hungry for talent, told us they are being priced out of hiring the very people they have spent years preparing.

The schools chapter profiles some of the most impressive careers provision in the country, from Meadowhead School in Sheffield and La Retraite in Clapham to the JCB Academy, Harris Academy Greenwich and DFN Project Search. These schools prove that outstanding careers education transforms outcomes, reducing the likelihood of young people becoming NEET by up to 20 per cent in the most disadvantaged communities. But they also reveal a system that too often relies on individual heroism rather than structural support, and where the foundations of the problem are laid long before secondary school.

The report sets out six recommendations spanning both sides of the bridge, from financial incentives that make hiring young people viable to a national work experience framework, a broader curriculum from 14 to 16, and an Employability Passport that recognises the character and work ethic employers value most. The crisis is resolvable, but only if both sides of the bridge are repaired at the same time, and only with active involvement from central government. The evidence is there and the solutions are within reach. What is needed now is the political will to act.

You can read the full report here.