Early Warning Signs
Primary schools in England should be required to identify children at risk of leaving education at 16 without finding a job, a government review is to recommend. Alan Milburn, leading the review into Britain's youth worklessness crisis, said he would call for sweeping changes in education policy alongside a shake-up of the benefits system. Speaking to the Guardian, he said ministers needed to 'make somebody responsible' for identifying and supporting children who risked becoming NEET (not in employment, education or training) after their GCSE year up to the age of 24.[S1]
Milburn said the warning signs are there from a very early age, frankly from preschool. He added that primary schools should definitely be identifying children at risk of being NEET, with secondary schools and other services intercepting, intervening, supporting, and helping those young people to get on a different path. The recommendation will form part of his final report, expected this autumn.[S1]
Record NEET Numbers
Britain's young adults are bearing the brunt of a rise in unemployment, with the number of 16 to 24-year-olds who are NEET surpassing a million earlier this year for the first time in more than a decade. Representing as many as one in eight young people, the rate has swelled at a significantly faster rate than in other countries amid a sharp rise in mental ill-health and a tough jobs market. Official figures show there were 1,012,000 young people classed as NEET between January and March 2026, making up 13.5% of all young people in the UK, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).[S1][S2]
Milburn's interim report in May found that six in 10 NEETs have never had a job, up from four in 10 in 2005, but 84 per cent of NEETs surveyed want a job or training. The review also highlighted that children who were not school-ready at ages four to five were almost three times as likely to become NEET by ages 16 to 17. Persistent absenteeism was associated with a 3.9 times greater risk of being NEET by ages 16 to 18, and a 6.3 times greater risk of being locked out of earning or learning for a sustained period.[S1][S2]
Policy Response
Under the proposal, schools in England would be expected to flag a child's risk of becoming NEET from the end of primary school, including by drawing on attendance records. The Department for Education would also be asked to refresh its pupil premium guidance to emphasise that extra money for supporting the most disadvantaged children could be used for tutoring and mentoring schemes for those at risk. Milburn said welfare reform would form a critical plank of his final report, but cautioned that any steps to restrict benefit payments for young people would need to be accompanied by higher levels of education, health, and job support.[S1]
Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said he is determined to reform the welfare system as part of efforts to fix Britain's dismal track record on youth employment, but would also provide more support for young people. Milburn said that by the time a young person reached the benefit system it represented an 'upstream failure' in education, skills, and health policy. He added: 'We've got to turbocharge that education; that support. We've got to turbocharge opportunities for young people; we've got to make it easier for young people to get a job. And alongside opportunities, of course, there has got to be some obligations.'[S1][S2]
