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Under 18-year-olds have been served poorly by the benefits system for far too long. But change is in the air writes Neil Bateman.

Complex, contradictory and callous. Three words to describe the system of financial support for young people under 18.

Anyone who has ever spent time taking a young person around the agencies which administer the numerous strands of financial support for young people will recognise this description.

Whichever avenue one goes down - education maintenance allowance, income support, jobseekers’ allowance, housing benefit or paid employment, the way is littered with exceptions, multiple form-filling and obscurity. To make matters worse, this shantytown of benefits and allowances can undermine young people’s participation in learning. Is it then any wonder that the proportion of young people not in education, employment or training (Neet), has remained at around 10 per cent since the 1980s - despite improved exam results, economic recovery and government initiatives? Indeed, Neet numbers have increased by 8 per cent since 1997.¹

Growing concern by groups working with young people, as well as concern in local and central government, might however lead to improvements.

Following an initiative by the Local Government Association, a cross-government examination of the issues of financial support for young people culminated in the announcement by chancellor Gordon Brown in the Budget of a full review of the whole system of financial support for 16 to 19 year olds. Currently still in the planning stage, the review will report next spring.

Speaking on behalf of Barnardo’s, long critical of current arrangements, principal policy and practice officer Neera Sharma says: "We welcome this review as the benefits system discriminates against 16 and 17 year olds and impacts adversely on the most vulnerable young people."

The Low Pay Commission has also recommended that "...in principle, there is a case for introducing a minimum wage for 16-17 year olds, set at a lower rate than that for 18-20 year olds. But we do not wish to encourage 16-17 year olds to leave [full-time education] or training positions, nor to harm their employment or training opportunities."² The government has asked the commission to examine this further and it will be consulting interested bodies later this year.

Homelessness charity Centrepoint, which has suggested that a learning allowance should replace the current maze, welcomes the government’s commitment to support young people. Chief executive Anthony Lawton says that the review "must also consider those young people without family support and a home. They need a flexible benefits system to secure work, education or training".

According to Surrey Council’s Alaster Calder, who advises the Local Government Association, the review "puts the financial needs of young people upfront for the first time in years".

¹ Working Brief No 140, p20, December 2002

² Fourth Report of the Low Pay Commission, 2003, The Stationery Office

Neil Bateman is a welfare rights specialist.

Problems with financial support for young people include…

• Confusing rules which require expert help to navigate.
• Limited availability of independent advice and advocacy services to sort out welfare rights problems. Money paid through numerous different routes of entitlement from different agencies with different, sometimes contradictory, eligibility rules encourages buck-passing and poor take-up.
• Delays in payment a frequent feature.
• Rules designed to minimise young people’s entitlement to jobseekers’ allowance.
• Complex rules for exceptions to the general denial of entitlement to jobseekers’ allowance.
• Insufficient support for participation in education for those on very low incomes.
• Inadequate benefit levels for those living independently.
• Housing benefit paid at lower rates to most young people in the private sector - pushes them into poor quality accommodation, deters landlords and causes rent arrears.
• Very low training allowance which does not motivate young people to learn skills.
• Exclusion from national minimum wage until age 18.
• Research shows the current situation causes destitution and encourages related problems of antisocial behaviour, exposure to exploitation, abuse and offending.