Not sure whether or not to read this month's labour market briefing? The stats are a bit boring this month but LOOK AT THIS COOL CHART. More cool charts via the link.

"Following the Milburn Review this further confirms the need for urgent action to support young people who are not in education, employment or training." ✍️ L&W chief exec @stephenevans.bsky.social responds to today's labour market statistics from ONS.

Ha! I thought the online version was punchy enough…

1. The Milburn Review interim report is imminent & tomorrow we have new NEET stats. This matters because almost 1m young people are not in education, employment or training, up 1/3 since the pandemic, risking LT damage to their career prospects. learningandwork.org.uk/theres-one-m...

The Milburn review is expected to put out an interim report this week, diagnosing the challenges faced by young people who are NEET. However, we’ll have to wait until autumn for the solutions. But, do we? And should young people have to wait? We already know quite a lot about what works. 🧵

Sounds like the Milburn review is going to vociferously reiterate the view held by everyone in employment world that 'systems failures' are the heart of the NEET issue. (eg. see this from @stephenevans.bsky.social from March) So - what specific failures need to be shouted about the loudest?🧵

"The labour market remained flat heading into the current international crisis, with employment, vacancies and other measures all flat or worsening. If the crisis persists, this risks being the calm before the storm." ✍️ L&W chief exec @stephenevans.bsky.social responds to May's labour market data.

Sadly I don’t have a bunch of agents ploughing through my inbox while I am here, but am still v glad I have made the time for today’s @ifow.org conference. Looking forward to a day of clever, thoughtful, tech-aware discussion.

Roll up, roll up, get your labour market key stats here. Slow wage growth is leading the headlines today, but there's nothing new really in the latest labour markets release, so we've done a bit of a deeper dive into youth (un)employment.

A boring set of labour market stats means we’re going to need to try and liven up our briefing through force of personality. Will we succeed? Sign-up here to receive our attempt direct to your inbox later today: learningandwork.org.uk/supporter-ne...

1. Fairly flat set of labour market stats today. Some further easing, including in earnings growth, but any falls seem much smaller than pre-Christmas data. This leaves underlying challenges, like needing another 2m people in work to hit Govt 80% employment rate target. And economic risks ahead.

The Chancellor struck a positive note overall on employment prospects in her statement, but worth noting that the latest OBR forecast puts the 2026 unemployment rate peak at 0.33 ppts higher than their November forecast.

No policy announcements today - but Reeves said there is more to be announced on Youth unemployment, which is clearly truly worrying this Gvt (more so than overall ⬆️ of unemployment rate, which OBR thinks will peak this year). We have had a lot already announced - so what else might be coming?

📉🤯📉 Should we be panicking about the labour market? I have commandeered the L&W monthly briefing + our expert team to help me think this question through. 🤯📉🤯 You can read the whole thing here - but here are some headline thoughts... learningandwork.org.uk/labour-marke...

📉🤯📉 Should we be panicking about the labour market? I have commandeered the L&W monthly briefing + our expert team to help me think this question through. 🤯📉🤯 You can read the whole thing here - but here are some headline thoughts... learningandwork.org.uk/labour-marke...

"Overall, employment is falling, unemployment rising and vacancies flat." 💬 L&W chief exec @stephenevans.bsky.social responds to the labour market statistics released by ONS today.

Introduce yourself with the name your parents almost gave you Daisy, after a beloved great-aunt. They worried I would be mocked for having a girly/old fashioned name. So they lumbered me with the name of half the millennial women I meet. 'Emily Andrews' is so common, my hairdresser sees two of us

"Looking ahead, slow growth and global instability increase the risks of rising worklessness, increasing the importance of the Government focusing on growth." ✍️ L&W chief exec @stephenevans.bsky.social responds to today's labour market statistics released by ONS.

"Occupational standards can be the foundation of a smarter, more responsive skills system. But only if we’re willing to rethink how they work—and who they’re really for." Read L&W's @stephenevans.bsky.social and Pearson's Donna Ford-Clarke's article on occupational standards in England. ⬇️📝

"We need a twin approach of providing more help to find work and creating the conditions for employers to create jobs." ✍️ L&W Chief Executive @stephenevans.bsky.social responds to the labour market statistics released by ONS today.

Some worry signs in the labour market. Payroll jobs & employment heading down, with relatively large falls for retail & hospitality. Unemployment at its highest since the pandemic, partly reflecting more people looking for work (inactivity down) but suggesting they're struggling to find jobs.

"With four out of five of the workers of 2035 already in the workplace today, we cannot rely on schools, colleges and universities to provide the Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons of the Brave New World we are entering in this latest technological shift." www.ft.com/content/460b...

I missed the leak when I went to get a sandwich. Does this mean I still have to watch the speech?

This sums up the fundamental tension in the "impact" agenda for me. The route to policy impact is to accept the premise of what policy-makers want to achieve, and help them achieve it. My whole academic training taught me to question/disrupt/reject policy-makers' premises.

Elizabeth understands what it takes to make these kinds of changes. She’s pushed me into a slightly more positive position about today’s review - but we’re all concerned that none of the change it promises will come to fruit quickly.

"Employers need to do more to help people stay in work and return to work, and we know that when employers get it right, it benefits everybody." L&W Deputy Director @elizabethgerard.bsky.social responds to the Keep Britain Working Review. ✍️

Feat. me hard at work improving my line management skills using a genuinely (and I must admit surprisingly, to me) useful AI tool…

In celebration of Get The Nation Learning Week, we’ve put together a blog about five famous lifelong learners whose passion for learning has inspired millions to continuously explore and seek new knowledge: bit.ly/4974xLt #GetTheNationLearning @learnworkuk.bsky.social

As someone who has worked outside Gvt trying to create employer change, I don’t see anything here that harnesses the unique power of Gvt to actually do things. So it all reads as sensible - it’s sort of what I would do - but I am not The Government!

Today’s Keep Britain Working Review essentially recommends Government takes a “What Works” approach to work and health. My headline: really sorry to say this is a missed opportunity for the goodwill and legitimacy Sir Charlie has generated over the course of this review to deliver actual change.

It's Get the Nation Learning week! We need learning to help us thrive and grow - as individuals and as an economy. It should be an engine of progress, but right now it's deepening inequalities. People with the most money do the most learning; people with less do the least. That holds us all back.

New target for 2/3 young people to do HE or an apprenticeship is probably broadly sensible (abolishing 50% HE target that doesn’t exist is about headlines). But is it ambitious? 25% of YP already do apprenticeships. 50% do HE. Some overlap & likely app drop since this data. But just describing now?

Is it churlish of me to immediately start wondering what level apprenticeships will count?

Running the leaflet gauntlet at political conferences is always a challenge, but I don’t remember ever being confronted with leafletting CHILDREN before. How are you supposed to stone-facedly walk past a 10-year old trying to hand you a leaflet about child poverty…

Pleased to see the Government funding work placements for long-term NEETs, like Future Jobs Fund. As I say in Times, q’s on detail re eligibility (should be open on voluntary basis to young UC health claimants) & placements (how long, which employers, what support). www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/...

This is of course great news. But worth noting limited eligibility: UC claimants out of work for 18 months. As our recent research showed, only 1 in 3 unemployed NEETs actually claim UC. To really tackle youth unemployment, we need to reach the rest. learningandwork.org.uk/resources/re...

A great thread - and one that is more relevant to labour market policy than you might think. The concern about economic inactivity has renewed interest in engaging people in employment support outside JCP. But in order to do that, you have to rebuild some of the missing community infrastructure…

In @thetimes.com, L&W chief exec @stephenevans.bsky.social welcomes the Government's plans to increase job support for people on sickness benefits. Stephen said this would refocus support to people who get little help today, but called for a broader plan to engage people and offer a range of help.

It’s journalism’s obesogenic environment problem. Everyone knows you’re meant to eat your greens (speak to domain experts, double-check), but social media has created a sea of cheap and convenient (open an app), hyper-palatable (sensationalised, alarmist), nutrient-poor (dubious veracity) options.

NEET rates are soaring. This is well known by Gvt, who rightly fear a generation of young people unable to get out of the starting blocks. BUT new @learnworkuk.bsky.social research today reveals only 1 in 4 are getting supported to find work via the benefits system. www.ft.com/content/f04d...

And, perhaps more consequentially, Jacqui Smith isn’t leaving DfE - she’s becoming a joint DWP/DfE skills minister. Which presumably means that she will have more influence in DWP, but I imagine not much of the policy work/people will move? Not necessarily a bad thing - certainly less disruptive.

Just clocked that Alison McGovern has been moved out of the Employment brief. I’m sad about this. She seemed a proper employment nerd. DWP reform agenda has felt a little disjointed over the last year - but the energy & ideas were all there, with lots of scope to learn and move forward positively.

1. Looks like skills is moving to DWP. What might this mean? I assume it's 19+ funding, which these days is the Adult Skills Fund (£1.5bn, 2/3 devolved to mayors) & apprenticeships (£3bn, inc small numbers of 16-19s). All Govt structures create silos. You need to pick least bad & work around them.

4. There's an opportunity too: half of people with low literacy or numeracy are out of work. How about an essential skills guarantee for everyone on benefits, giving them a chance to gain these fundamental skills? Or making the Youth Guarantee truly joined up? Or more ambitious devo in England?

Adult skills has been unloved at DfE, which has always felt like the department for children, schools and families at heart. Alison McGovern has called DWP as 'the HR department for the growth mission'. This change could/should bring that closer to reality.

Welcome back (by the sounds of it) the DfES! We looked at shifting 19+ skills funding to DWP when I worked in govt. Ultimately decided the location of the policy area wasn't the key thing that had held it back. But will be interesting to see if this leads to a genuine change of approach.

🧵@learnworkuk.bsky.social is leading a pilot of community-led employment support programme, JobsPlus, which is making a real impact. 📈 Over 700 people engaged 💼 150 already in work ❤️ Many heartwarming stories of lives changed You can find more info in our PR here: www.fenews.co.uk/education/mo...

I have found my people: people who look at the labour market data, then also look at the chatter on the UK employment subreddits, and go "huh?" I'm so interested in research that is working out how to use this kind of posting data as a potential leading indicator of labour market change.

Reminder that functional skills already allowed, it’s not GCSE over & over. Condition of funding means so many more have gained skills they need. Will stripped down functional skills be credible with employers? www.thetimes.com/uk/education...

Hear unique insights from the early stages of the JobsPlus pilot programme in England... 💡 ...at our webinar on Tuesday 16 September! L&W is leading the JobsPlus pilot programme with support from Communities that Work, @employmentstudies.bsky.social and Youth Futures Foundation. Register now. ⬇️