In what has been heralded as ‘a Budget for jobs', the chancellor, Alistair Darling, announced this afternoon in his Budget speech the Government would invest the money to guarantee people, who have been unemployed for more than one year and who are younger than 25, either a job, work experience or training.
HR professionals and industry experts have welcomed the move, which will also see the recruitment of more benefits staff in the Department of Work and Pensions.
The TUC predicts the initiative could create at least 100,000 paid work-experience jobs.
Debbie Hayes, HR director at Vinci Park UK, told HR magazine: "It is always a good thing when money is invested in recruitment. I do not know how this will pan out because the market is changing rapidly but the Government needs to give hope that it will offer some help to the unemployment situation."
And Gemma McIntosh, head of stakeholder management at market research specialists TNS, added: "This is good news. It is important to focus on work experience and training - but I am not convinced it will bring a massive change. Employers like to do their own training and although training and work experience will push applicants' CVs further up the pile, it still might not ease unemployment hugely."
Tom Hadley, director of external affairs at the Recruitment and Employment Confederation, agrees: "Employers will either recruit or not - they could get someone in more cheaply to do a job and train them up themselves. It is recruitment taxes that are preventing employers from taking on staff. The Government needs to do something to help employers take on temporary staff - like removing the 15% tax on recruiting agency workers - and work on creating a climate to make employers want to take jobseekers on."
Budget 2009: Huge government investment in getting unemployed back to work
The Government is to invest 1.7 billion in helping unemployed people into work.
