Canal & River Trust secures funding to create waterway roles for young people

[Ray T]

PRESS RELEASE

 

11 December 2020

 

CANAL & RIVER TRUST SECURES FUNDING TO CREATE WATERWAY ROLES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

 

Waterways and wellbeing charity Canal & River Trust has secured government support to create dozens of opportunities in heritage repair and construction, and waterways management, for young people, funded by the Department for Work and Pensions.

 

The six-month positions are being offered as part of the Kickstart initiative, a programme for young people aged 16-24 who are claiming Universal Credit and are at risk of long-term unemployment. The programme will support young people to build up their experience and help them move into sustained employment after they have completed their Kickstart-funded role.

 

The Trust will offer a total of 69 placements, at an estimated value of c.£500,000. In Burnley, Leicester and Walsall, up to 36 young people will gain experience in waterway management and customer service, including canal and towpath care and a range of ‘green’ environmental projects.  Another 31 positions are based with the Trust’s construction teams, where participants will learn heritage skills ranging from masonry, bricklaying and carpentry, to canal bank protection and towpath resurfacing.  Two further roles are being created in the charity’s digital marketing team.

 

Steve Higham, head of partner & outcomes development at Canal & River Trust, said: “We are delighted to have secured Kickstart funding to offer 69 roles across the waterways to help young people to develop the skills, and gain the experience, that will help them secure long term employment. Our waterways run through some of the most deprived areas in the country and it’s particularly important that we can offer local opportunities to young people in these communities. Working with our experienced teams, participants will learn a range of skills to equip them for work in conservation, heritage and the environment as well as on the waterways themselves.”

 

The Kickstarter opportunities will be advertised before Christmas with a view to placements beginning from February 2021. They will be advertised on www.gov.uk/find-a-job and the Trust’s website, and will be shared with the Trust’s community and skills partners.

 

ENDS

 

For further information, please contact:

Fran Read, national press officer

e fran.read@canalrivertrust.org.uk  m 07796 610 427

[Alan de Enfield]

Sounds like a re-run of the 70s / 80s YOP scheme, gets some 'free labour for the company, and gets them 'off the unemployed numbers'.

 

From memory the YOP attendees rarely got into full time employment after attending but it was found to help in the mental health of the participants.

 

 

[Tim Lewis]

6 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Sounds like a re-run of the 70s / 80s YOP scheme, gets some 'free labour for the company, and gets them 'off the unemployed numbers'.

 

From memory the YOP attendees rarely got into full time employment after attending but it was found to help in the mental health of the participants.

 

 

A friend of mine trained as a bricklayer on a Basingstoke Canal YOP/YTS scheme which set him up for life!

[Alan de Enfield]

3 minutes ago, Tim Lewis said:

A friend of mine trained as a bricklayer on a Basingstoke Canal YOP/YTS scheme which set him up for life!

 

One of the lucky ones, according to Hansard fewer than 30% actually achieved full time employment and the numbers were reducing as it was being discussed.

 

HANSARD 1803–2005 → 1980s → 1981 → October 1981 → 21 October 1981 → Commons Sitting → Schedule 8

Youth Opportunities Programme

HC Deb 21 October 1981 vol 10 cc376-402376

§Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn—[Mr. Newton.

 

EXTRACTS

 

I am disturbed to learn that only about 30 per cent. of young people completing YOP schemes are now entering employment. There has been a considerable drop since the scheme was introduced..................................................

 

What is the number of 16 and 17-year-olds who have held a full-time permanent job? The YOP figures mask the true position because it takes them out of the monthly unemployment barometer. Will the Minister—the civil servant in the Box can occupy himself with this—tell me the number of 16 and 17-year-olds who have never held down a permanent job? They may have been in and out of a YOP scheme but they have never held down a permanent job.............................

[Arthur Marshall]

It'll let them make a few more permanent employees redundant, and after the six month placement they won't be replaced. That's largely what happened with the YOP and similar schemes - someone left, or got retired, their jobs got done for free for a bit and then the additional work got shared out among the remaining full timers. Strangely, no-one got paid more for doing more work, but as expenses went down, dividends went up and so did the board's bonuses!

[noone]

They will become the skilled people that our waterways need desperately.??...Then they will be sent on their merry way!!??..?

[Alan de Enfield]

1 hour ago, Leggers do it lying down said:

They will become the skilled people that our waterways need desperately.??...Then they will be sent on their merry way!!??..?

 

I doubt they will become 'the skilled people we need' in 6 months before they have to go back on the dole.

[Jenno]

Boooo...

All you hear about these days is what a hard time the "yoof" are having.

Get in the queue boys and girls and once you've paid into the pot you can look at getting something out of it......

 

What about us wrinklies.

Whilst I still have a few teeth and hair follicles I'd like some of that government cash to help me follow my life's dream.

The ballet dancing's out on account of my varicose veins but I could train to be a brickie (as long as it's not too parky outside) or something like that.

 

Bloody Snowflakes ....... ?

 

[David Mack]

3 hours ago, Tim Lewis said:

A friend of mine trained as a bricklayer on a Basingstoke Canal YOP/YTS scheme which set him up for life!

A friend of mine who had spent a lot of time as a volunteer on a restoration project got funded as a full time employee for a year or two through whatever scheme was running in the early 80s.

[ditchcrawler]

33 minutes ago, soforene said:

Boooo...

All you hear about these days is what a hard time the "yoof" are having.

Get in the queue boys and girls and once you've paid into the pot you can look at getting something out of it......

 

What about us wrinklies.

Whilst I still have a few teeth and hair follicles I'd like some of that government cash to help me follow my life's dream.

The ballet dancing's out on account of my varicose veins but I could train to be a brickie (as long as it's not too parky outside) or something like that.

 

Bloody Snowflakes ....... ?

 

So where are these young snowflaks, I was lucky enough to get an apprenticeship when I left school, in those days employers trained people for the future, now they just expect to find them ready trained. I remember the company who did our building maintenance complaining he couldn't get skilled workers, when asked how many apprentices he was training he went very quiet and left. 

[matty40s]

1 hour ago, soforene said:

Boooo...

All you hear about these days is what a hard time the "yoof" are having.

Get in the queue boys and girls and once you've paid into the pot you can look at getting something out of it......

 

What about us wrinklies.

Whilst I still have a few teeth and hair follicles I'd like some of that government cash to help me follow my life's dream.

The ballet dancing's out on account of my varicose veins but I could train to be a brickie (as long as it's not too parky outside) or something like that.

 

Bloody Snowflakes ....... ?

 

if just a couple of these kids can make a difference and get interested in the Burnley, Walsall and Leicester sections, the money is well spent, very well. There's not many kids getting interested in canals other than a temporary cheap accommodation basis,so having kids on the bank able to relate to them will be good. 

In this kind of economy and potential recession, this is damn good news for kids and canals......all of us were kids once. 

[noone]

3 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

I doubt they will become 'the skilled people we need' in 6 months before they have to go back on the dole.

If it is anything like the Y.T.S. scheme I experienced back in the 80's.they will be able to make a lovely cuppa!.

[ditchcrawler]

I hope its better than that. My friend a small builder tried taking on a lad. Couldn't go on a scaffold, out in the rain, lift things. It was the lad objecting, he was up for it, getting involved.

[Guest]

God this forum is filled with so much negativity sometimes.

 

Life can be what you make it, this could help people who have been so affected by the pandemic, employment wise.

 

Yet some people mock it.

[Tracy D'arth]

Heavens, C&RT are going to have to buy back 31 wheelbarrows and spades, what a turn around!

 

I hope someone gets some long term value for half a million quid. Give me the money and I could train more than 100.  But then I would not employ half a dozen "managers" with company cars, bonuses and pensions to look after their wellbeing by water.

[Jen-in-Wellies]

9 hours ago, Leggers do it lying down said:

If it is anything like the Y.T.S. scheme I experienced back in the 80's.they will be able to make a lovely cuppa!.

A life skill that was well worth learning as I'm sure you'll agree! ?

[TheBiscuits]

46 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Heavens, C&RT are going to have to buy back 31 wheelbarrows and spades, what a turn around!

 

Don't be daft - they won't get a complete set each ...

 

 

[pete.i]

11 hours ago, matty40s said:

if just a couple of these kids can make a difference and get interested in the Burnley, Walsall and Leicester sections, the money is well spent, very well. There's not many kids getting interested in canals other than a temporary cheap accommodation basis,so having kids on the bank able to relate to them will be good. 

In this kind of economy and potential recession, this is damn good news for kids and canals......all of us were kids once. 

Just this^^^^^^^    I am an educational volunteer for the CRT and have been for eight or so years. We talk about water safety, canal history and how and why the canals are there. As matty40s says if it just gets a couple of children interested, although with the amount of work that I and other volunteers put into it I hope it's a lot more, then it's work well worth the effort. What curmugeonly boaters who only seem to want to blast CRT, ESPECIALLY on this forum, is that we will not be around for much longer and it's the kids that WILL be taking over the running of the canals. In my time as a volunteer I haven't seen many boaters who volunteer to help out most (not all I will admit) it seems to me, just want to pootle up and down the canal system and leave the work to others. If we want our canals to survive and more importantly the lifestyle that boaters want, then EVERYBODY, boaters, fishers, walkers, cyclists and people and children who use our canals, MUST get together and help out. Yes I know as boaters we pay a lot of money to use the canals and I am still a boater paying my bit but it isn't enough, everybody must dive in, um not literally, to help. Once the canal system disappears you all will have to live in bricks and mortar. Think it wont happen? Think again, it can. it has and quite possibly will happen if we as a canal community don't do all we can to keep the inland waterways system in existance. We have already seen what happens when builders get their hands on canal land. Even where canals and canalia are retained the hoy poloy who buy the properties overlooking the water don't want boaters in their field of view and, occasionally when I see some boats, I don't blame them for that. Some canals have disappeared totally and have been replaced by cardboard housing complexes. That WILL be the fate of the inland waterways system unless we ALL do our bit and teaching children about safety, maintenance, heritage etc etc is the only way to go because, as I keep saying, we will all be dead and gone all too soon.

 

[Arthur Marshall]

The problem with all these "work for dole" schemes, which is what they are really, for the participants is that the dole you get isn't very much. You have no savings. So now you have to pay for travel to where you're working, pay for food, get suitable clothing - all without the funds to do it.  You end up hugely worse off. Plus they'll probably find, when the scheme finishes, that their benefits get stopped because they haven't kept up with applying for real jobs. Sanctioned, they call it, and the offices have targets for how many benefit claimants they can shut down.

Back in my dole days, the worst thing you could do was get a temporary job for a few weeks, because it then took you months to sort out your claim when the job ended and you nearly starved in the process. The benefit system is now infinitely worse and it was a nightmare then. I solved it by moving from Yorkshire to Sussex to try to find work (and living rough for a while), but that kind of mobility is not an option for most people.

It's nice to think it will encourage the youth to get involved but it's more likely to breed huge resentment. I hope I'm wrong, and at least it might get a bit of towpath work done on the cheap for CRT, but I very much doubt it'll make much difference.

[noone]

11 hours ago, The Happy Nomad said:

this could help people who have been so affected by the pandemic, employment wise.

A full time job is what they need,not some P.R. stunt.

[noone]

1 hour ago, pete.i said:

What curmugeonly boaters who only seem to want to blast CRT, ESPECIALLY on this forum

If crt were to actually ENGAGE with boaters instead of ignoring us and making our lives increasingly more difficult,maybe some of us would be more supportive.

[Guest]

48 minutes ago, Leggers do it lying down said:

A full time job is what they need,not some P.R. stunt.

No body can create full time jobs out of thin air.

 

Unless of course one has a magic money tree or as a licence payer you are prepared to pay a LOT more to pay them.

 

 

Edited December 12, 2020 by The Happy Nomad

[noone]

1 minute ago, The Happy Nomad said:

No body can create full time jobs out of thin air.

 

Unless of course one has a magic money tree.

 

But they can waste money on this!?

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, Leggers do it lying down said:

But they can waste money on this!?

You clearly are missing the point of such a scheme, which for a kick off is govt. funded and will be time limited.

 

PS the clue is in the name 'Kick start'.....

 

 

Edited December 12, 2020 by The Happy Nomad

[noone]

5 minutes ago, The Happy Nomad said:

You clearly are missing the point of such a scheme, which for a kick off is govt. funded and will be time limited.

 

PS the clue is in the name 'Kick start'.....

 

 

Cheap labor, then a kick up the ar~e!...I was on such a "scheme" in the 80's!...Y.T.S.