Major retailers pledge to create 100,000 jobs for Neet young people
Britain’s biggest retailers will offer young people thousands of work experience placements as the Government aims to slash youth joblessness.
The placements, with businesses including Tesco, John Lewis, Curry’s and Costa Coffee, will be offered directly to young universal credit claimants in a programme dubbed “Opening Shift”.
Some 40 retailers have already signed up to offer more than 11,000 placements, providing young people with two-to-four weeks of work experience.
They will also offer those young people an interview at the end of their placement, aiming to take on as many as possible.
The placements will be voluntary, and young people will continue to receive their universal credit where eligible.
The programme, organised by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and the British Retail Consortium (BRC), is part of plans to create 100,000 jobs for young people not in education, employment or training – so-called “Neets” – by the next election.
Speaking to the Press Association on a visit to John Lewis in London’s Oxford Street, Work and Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden said the placements would offer young Neets “huge” benefits.
He said: “They are quite often caught in a bind of no experience, no job.
“About 60% of Neets have never had a job and this cuts through that.”
He added: “Once they get that (experience), the chances of getting hired in a long-term paid job go up hugely, every senior manager of a business tells you that.”
BRC chief executive Helen Dickinson said: “Retail is coming to the rescue for tens of thousands of young people struggling to take their first step on the career ladder.
“Too many are trapped in a no experience, no job doom loop. High-quality work experience is essential to fix this problem and Opening Shift is a major contribution to delivering it.”
An estimated 981,000 people aged between 16 and 24 were classified as Neet between April and June 2026.
While this was a slight fall from the more than 1 million Neets in the first quarter of the year, the figure remains 30,000 higher than in 2025.
Ministers have commissioned Blair-era cabinet minister Alan Milburn to come up with recommendations for cutting youth unemployment, and recruited former M&S chairman Marc Bolland to work with businesses to get young people into jobs.
Mr Bolland, who played a key role in organising the BRC work experience programme, said the announcement created “thousands more opportunities for young people to build a future in one of Britain’s biggest industries”.
Mr McFadden said he hoped to expand the scheme beyond the retail sector, encouraging other businesses to make similar commitments.
He told PA: “Together, we can say that this is a cause for the UK, that we are not simply going to sit back and accept the situation where 1 million young people are not engaged in productive economic activity.”
Published: by Radio NewsHub