Scottish Election 2021: Labour plan for new national jobs agency to tackle youth unemployment

Anas Sarwar has laid out plans for a £1.2bn jobs recovery plan, including a new national agency which would see the long term unemployed and young people struggling to find work directed into short-term jobs in areas which have been hardest hit by cuts to public spending.

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar has launched an ambitious £1.2bn jobs recovery plan.

The Scottish Labour leader said his plan was the “biggest job creation scheme” in the history of devolution, and was needed to “confront the national jobs emergency” as a result of the Covid pandemic.

He pledged that every person, particularly the young, who has struggled to find work would be “guaranteed a job” for six months, which would include training, and the scheme would be administered through a national platform.

The Scotsman understands the plan would be to help local authorities and other public sector bodies hire staff to take on jobs which have gone undone as a result of staff losses from cutbacks made as a result of austerity over the last decade.

People would take on roles from administration to grounds and park maintenance and helping the frontline in care or construction sectors – but the jobs would be additional to current supply and would not risk redundancies in the established workforce.

The scheme would see the creation of a new agency to which people would apply, with sector preference, and then be matched to local opportunities.

The announcement comes a day after Mr Sarwar also pledged to create 5,000 apprenticeship places at a higher wage than the £4.30 an hour that many currently receive, regardless of age.

The new scheme, he said, would be open to every person under 25 who does not have a job, everyone over 25 who has been long term unemployed, and every unemployed disabled person, providing “people at risk of falling out of the job market the essential training needed to restart their careers.”

He added: “This is a guarantee for every young person or unemployed person to have a job or and for everyone who needs it to get access to paid training.

“It is the biggest job creation scheme in the history of devolution – but it is the scale of ambition that is necessary to battle the crisis.

“The cost of doing nothing is even greater. Mass unemployment would fall hardest on young Scots, potentially leaving up to 100,000 people out of work.

“Neither Nicola Sturgeon nor Boris Johnson has the ambition to deliver what is needed – and Scotland deserves better that they can offer.”

The proposals come after new figures from the Office of National Statistics show unemployment in Scotland rose to 4.3 per cent between March and May – the highest rate in the UK. The figures also showed that 53,000 fewer people were in employment in Scotland since the previous year, while at the end of January 360,000 Scots were furloughed.

The party has also announced a new Scottish skills benefit to enable those on furlough or unemployed to up-skill or retrain, targeted training funds to recruit and train nurses, carers, teachers, health workers and engineers, ending zero hour contracts within public sector procurement, and focusing on decommissioning in the north east of Scotland and accelerating the growth of the Scottish Investment Bank.

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