§ Mr. Iain Millsasked the Secretary of State for Employment if he will make a statement about the enterprise allowance scheme and other special employment measures in 1984–85.
§ Mr. Alan ClarkThe enterprise allowance scheme, which helps unemployed people to set up their own businesses, was extended to the whole of Great Britain from August 1983 with 25,000 grants available in the period ending March 1984. The response to this extension has been encouraging, as have the results to date of the earlier pilot experiments. The Government are providing a further £37 million in 1984–85 to the Manpower Services Commission to extend the scheme until March 1985. This550W is intended to provide grants to a further 35,000 people on broadly the same basis as the current scheme. Any changes in the scheme's rules thought necessary in the light of operating experience will be announced later.
We are also extending the voluntary projects programme, which provides a variety of opportunities which unemployed people can take up on a voluntary unpaid basis. Currently some 200 projects are operated under this scheme, and in 1984–85 an additional £2 million will be provided to enable applications to be received up to March 1985.
We also propose to continue in 1984–85 the experimental job splitting scheme, under which grants are available to employers to offset additional costs incurred in splitting jobs to provide part-time opportunities for the unemployed.
In addition, as already announced, the young workers scheme and the job release scheme will continue in 1984–85, as will the part-time job release scheme which started last month.
The temporary short-time working compensation scheme will close for new applications at the end of March 1984.