MORE than 4,000 18 to 24–year-olds have benefited from the Youth Employment Scheme (Yes) and Employment Minister Stephen Farry is urging more to join them.
“I welcome the sustained decrease in the unemployment rate and would encourage young unemployed people to explore the opportunities associated with my Department’s Youth Employment Scheme,” he said. “Yes provides a platform to assist young people who are job-ready but lack the employability skills required to convince an employer of their ability to enter the world of work. Since the launch more than 4,000 young people have participated in the scheme.
“The focus of the initiative is to ensure that young people are provided, at the earliest possible stage, with the skills to gain jobs, compete for jobs created in the future and retain and progress in those jobs.”
Young people can avail of a variety of Yes work placements across a range of sectors including web design, engineering and hospitality. Employer vacancies are advertised at Jobs and Benefits offices or JobCentre and staff can offer advice on the availability of work experience placements and how to sign up to them.” The Youth Employment Scheme offers young people the following:
Development of basic job search skills such as CV building, application writing, interviewing skills;
‘Taster’ work experience opportunities from three to eight weeks across all sectors to allow job-ready young people to experience the world of work and develop skills;
Skills Development Programme offers a six-month period of work experience, blended with skills training to develop qualifications;
Enhanced Employer Subsidy — employers offering permanent fulltime jobs to young people may be able to avail of an enhanced employer subsidy of up to £5,750 for the first 52 weeks.
For more information on Yes visit http://www.nidirect.gov.uk/skills. Meanwhile Invest NI released its first figures of jobs created as a direct result of its support, revealing nearly 18,000 jobs created in three years.
Chief executive Alastair Hamilton said: “Historically Invest NI has reported on jobs promoted — the number of jobs a company expects to create as a result of a new project. This has been in line with the targets set for us by the NI Executive.
“Back in 2011 I briefed the Enterprise, Trade and Investment Committee about our plans to introduce new systems to enable us to measure outputs delivered as a result of our work. The most important of these measures was jobs created.
“We have now put in place processes to enable accurate reporting of the actual number of jobs created as a direct result of those projects which we have assisted. In doing so, Invest NI is the first development agency amongst those in the rest of the UK or the Republic of Ireland to report in this way.