Youth Unemployment and the Future Jobs Fund

Written evidence submitted by St Mungo’s

1. Executive Summary:

The Future Jobs Fund has provided funding which has enabled St Mungo’s and its three charitable partners (Peter Bedford Trust, Broadway and Umbrella) to provide a relevant and supportive service to a highly excluded group of clients, far from the labour market, namely homeless people and mental health clients. The benefits of this support have been:

- The provision of real work opportunities paid at least at minimum wage or above, and therefore regarded by clients as real work.

- A programme supported by training and managerial supervision to a high standard

- A flexible model able to meet the needs of this client group.

- A route into employment for people who have been long term unemployed and face multiple barriers to employment

This programme was designed for young people but we also believe there to be wider application particularly for groups who experience high levels of social exclusion.

We believe that good outcomes have already been achieved and would have continued, however as the funding has now been terminated by the Government, we are unable to continue this valuable service.

2. Introduction:

St Mungo’s

3.1 St Mungo’s opens doors for homeless people. Mainly based in London and the South, we provide over 100 accommodation and support projects day in, day out.

3.2 We run emergency services – including street outreach and emergency shelters. We support homeless people in their recovery – opening the door to health care, and getting more homeless people into lasting new homes and training and work than any other charity. And we prevent homelessness through our high support housing and support teams for people at real risk.

3.3 By opening our doors, and our support services, we enable thousands of homeless and vulnerable people change their lives for good every year.

3.4 St Mungos currently houses over 1400 homeless people a night and we offer housing advice to several thousand offenders from London prisons and local probation offices. Our Skills & Employment teams work with almost 2000 people a year (not just hostel residents), 280 participate in our training projects, 215 take part in job search, 85 take up volunteering options and 75 progress into work.

Homelessness & Unemployment

3.5 A recent survey of St Mungos client showed only 4% are in paid employment, while a similar survey of clients in 1983 showed 86% were in paid employment. In addition many of our clients have been out of work for a long time. Our most recent survey of residential clients shows that about 93% have not worked in the last year, suggesting that unemployment is not only common it is entrenched. We believe these figures are indicative of the homeless population and the current employment support does not reach homeless clients.

3.6 We have also looked closer at the current needs of all of our clients and found that they face many barriers to employment which could keep them out of work. For example:

· 43% have a significant medical condition

· 36% have a diagnosed mental health condition

· 21% have a suspected mental health condition

· 47% drink alcohol problematically

· 48% use illegal drugs problematically

· 46% had an offending history.

· 72% had more than one complex need

· Education level:

o 39%        None

o 37%        CSE/GSE/GCSE

o 8%          A Level

· We estimate between 35% and 40% of clients need literacy support in order to find work

· In the region of 27% have numeracy levels below those considered requisite for most jobs.

3.7 This goes someway to explain why so many of our clients are so far from the employment market. Our own research in 2010 showed that: 15% of our clients had never worked, 26% had been out of work for between 5 and 10 years, 27% had been unemployed for over 10 years.

3.8 Further research showed that 40% of homeless clients believed "people were not going to employ anyone that was homeless" but still 80% said their goal was finding work. 50% felt that lack of confidence stops them getting into work or training.

3.9 Research commissioned by St Mungo’s in 2007 by ORC International found that by helping 125 homeless clients into proper and stable employment each year could save the economy as much as £5.6 million, or £45,000 per client, per year.

4. Future Jobs Fund Provision

4.1 St Mungos as part of a wider consortium managed a Future Jobs Fund project, starting in December 2009. We initially recruited 20 homeless people, all St Mungo’s clients, into new temporary part time positions within the organisation, while our three charity partners (Peter Bedford, Umbrella, Broadway) offered15 positions through their own organisations and recruited unemployed people against these, not all from their own client group. Each charity deployed additional resources to ensure the programme would meet the needs of the client group, which we were all prepared to do because the programme filled a very real gap in the provision of employment services for vulnerable people.

4.2 We were given dispensation by the DWP to recruit 1/3 of the clients from the age group of under 24 and a maximum of 2/3 over the age of 24, from high unemployment "Hot Spots", recognising that our clients fitted the "Hot Spot" criteria.

4.3 The opportunities offered were all real jobs, including project assistants in hostels, training assistants in vocational training teams (eg gardening) and administration assistants in maintenance departments. All were offered contracts of employment with the partner agency. Clients embraced these opportunities wholeheartedly, worked hard on their duties and attended any necessary organisational training courses, such as Health and Safety. The St Mungos trainees have also been following a Level One Open College Network accredited care course, which included First Aid and IT, using additional ESF funding.

4.4 As well as this training, FJF trainees were offered one-to-one managerial supervision in their place of work, as well as further one-to-one support and career progression advice.

4.5 With 3 weeks remaining of the programme 19 of the original 20 St Mungos cohort are still in employment, as are 9 of the 15 partners’ trainees. Several have been offered further work by their hosts or other companies, while others have been offered internships or training in other fields with their hosts or other agencies. We are also confident that all 19 St Mungo’s trainees will have gained the OCN accredited care qualification in this time, which will assist their long term employment prospects. We believe this compares favourably with other programmes offered to this client group. For example a 2010 NAO report on the Government’s drug strategy found that only 8% of drug users receiving support to get into work were able to keep a job for 13 weeks.

National Audit Office, Tackling problem drug use (NAO 2010)

4.6 There is a great deal of suspicion among homeless people about statutory services, which was demonstrated by "Work Matters

St Mungo’s, Work Matters (St Mungo’s 2010) http://www.mungos.org/views/665_work-matters-homeless-people-and-employment

7 September 2010

4.7 The organisation saw the success of the scheme early on with 19 of the 20 new workers at St Mungo’s showing both improved soft and hard employability skills and as such we were very keen to roll out a second stream of Future Job Fund opportunities in late September, early October 2010. However the funding for this second stream was abruptly terminated by the new Coalition Government and we cannot progress this.

4.8 The programme was flexible enough to meet the needs of this client group and to provide a relevant and supportive service to a very excluded group of clients, far from the labour market, namely homeless people and mental health clients.

5. Recommendations:

5.1 We believe that the success of programmes such as Future Jobs Funds in not only providing under 24’s and older homeless people with real work opportunities to beat the barriers to employment they experience, but are also essential in developing clients’ softer employability skills and their prospects of sustainable employment. Each charity deployed additional resources to ensure the programme would meet the needs of the client group, which we were all prepared to do because the programme filled a very real gap in the provision.

5.2 We understand the need to ensure that 18-24 yr olds are helped to acquire the real work experience they need to gain a foothold in the employment market, so they are not consigned to future long term unemployment or reduced earning potential. But there is a need to make provision for the over 24s as well and this approach has shown real merit in our view.

5.3 We believe that apprenticeships for adults are not being given enough priority especially at a time when the skills system needs to support labour market fluidity. People need to have good quality, impartial information available to them on which they can make difficult decisions to re-train. Not having more opportunities for adults, who need to re-train while in work, is at present a real weakness in the skills system and a barrier for many homeless in rebuilding their lives.

5.4 For homeless people, we strongly believe there a need for specialist homeless programmes that recognises the needs of our client and addresses the inequalities of the current employment market and back to work programmes felt by our clients.

5.4 We believe that the Future Job Fund was a very successful programme in assisting both under 24 year old and over 24 year old homeless people back into work and any replacement programmes should recognise the success of "place and train" programmes in assisting marginalised people back onto sustained employment. We believe the government needs to take responsibility for homeless peoples’ poor employment record and we particularly ask that any future programme highlights Homelessness as a priority group and offers the additional necessary support and training.

5.5 In the development of the Work Programme we think there is room for a Future Jobs Fund type model particularly if, in the short to medium term, there is a rise in unemployment and a limited supply of jobs. Job creation in this way, short term and targeted at those furthest from the labour market may be a cost effective way of ensuring the Work Programme is successful in tackling long term unemployment.