Youth Opportunities (Hansard, 19 July 1979)

§ Mr. Alexander W. Lyon

asked the Secretary of State for Employment (1) if he will provide his estimate of the net cost per person per week of employing young people in community industry after taking into account the savings in unemployment and other benefits;

(2) what proportion of 19 to 24-year-olds who have been continuously unemployed for more than six months and over 25-year-olds who have been continuously unemployed for more than 12 months live outside the areas to which the special temporary employment programme is now confined;
(3) in what way the criteria for entry to special temporary employment programme schemes are to be tightened to ensure that a higher proportion of entrants are drawn from the long-term unemployed;
(4) if he will define precisely how the length of time for which young people remain in the youth opportunities programme is to be reduced;
(5) if he will define precisely how savings will be made in the youth opportunities programme by shifting provision marginally towards less expensive opportunities;
(6) if he will provide an analysis of the youth opportunities programme places, providing work experience on employers' premises, by standard industrial classification;
(7) how many young people who left school at Easter or summer 1978 have (a) not been offered a place on the youth opportunities programme and (b) been refused a place on the youth opportunities programme;
(8) if he will provide the best available estimate of the net cost per person per week of each of the component elements of the youth opportunities programme, after taking into account savings in social security and other benefits;
(9) if he will provide whatever information is available on how many people who have been employed under the special temporary employment programme have progressed into permanent employment;
(10) if he will provide the best available estimate of the net cost per person per week employed under the special temporary employment programme, after taking into account savings in unemployment and other benefits and the payment of taxes and national insurance;
(11) how many special temporary employment programme schemes, employing how many individuals, have been closed down or are due to be closed down as a result of the Budget cuts.