Youth voices 'critical' to £5m employment plan

A new youth forum is being set up in a county where data shows economic inactivity among young people is at a record high.

The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority (CPCA) approved a business case on Monday to find ways to improve young people's access to employment, training or education.

If successful, it would unlock more than £4.9m in government funding to be spent on a pilot scheme that would be used to see how other projects could work across the county.

Paul Bristow, the mayor for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, said the approval was "another step forward" in helping young people.

He said: "I'm determined this programme makes a real difference to the lives of young people across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough."

The aim is for Cambridgeshire to become one of eight regions in England designated as "youth guarantee trailblazer areas", where they test different ways of tackling unemployment.

The other areas are the East Midlands, Liverpool, London, Tees Valley, the West Midlands and West of England, with each region thinking up their own approach.

In the West of England, for example, the scheme is being targeted at young people in south Bristol, rural areas of north east Somerset and those with special needs or mental health conditions in South Gloucestershire.

A report presented to the CPCA funding committee said the youth forum would be "critical" to making the scheme a success and should include "young people's voices and lived experiences".

It said there were record high shares of 16- to 24-year-olds in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough who were economically inactive, at nearly 49% in the year to June 2024, although most of these were students.

Numbers of young people economically inactive due to other reasons had increased on an annual basis, such as being temporarily sick, discouraged, or unable to seek work.

Peterborough had the highest rates of teenagers not economically active, in education or training (NEET), at 4% for 16-year-olds and 6% for 17-year-olds.

The CPCA said: "Having assessed current levels of NEET, economic inactivity and the index of multiple deprivation, we are concerned about Peterborough, Fenland, East Cambridgeshire, and some neighbourhoods in Cambridge and Huntingdonshire."

The youth guarantee would apply to 18- to 21 year-olds, as well as 16- and 17-year-olds who have disengaged from education or are at risk of doing so.

The new forum would be recruited with the help of local organisations such as youth groups, councils, job centres and volunteer groups.

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