Jobless blackspot hit by cash snub

The Humber Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) area has failed to qualify for automatic support from the Youth Employment Initiative despite having the second-highest proportion of jobless young people in the country.

It is a particular blow to Hull, which has the fifth highest youth unemployment rate of any local authority in England.

The LEP has criticised the formula used by the European Commission to calculate the funding allocations, after the region lost out to Merseyside, inner London, Tees Valley and Durham and the West Midlands.

Now it is lobbying the Government for a share of the £16.4m left over from the £164m fund that it is able to direct to areas outside those decided by the Commission.

Lord Haskins, chairman of the Humber LEP, said: “Being automatically counted out of funding for something we are in clear need of in the region is disappointing and doubly so because the proposals through our City Deal and Investment Fund Strategy would be able to deploy this additional funding effectively when combined with our current funds.

“However, the Government has 10 per cent of funds they can direct to areas outside the predefined area and we hope that they will consider our case on this issue.

“We have strong partnerships focused on tackling youth unemployment and wider education and skills issues and we know we could make a significant contribution to reducing the number of young unemployed with this extra funding.”

The automatic EU funding was reserved for regions in which the youth unemployment rate exceeds 25 per cent, with the support spread over seven years.

The Humber LEP area – which also includes the East Riding and North Lincolnshire – does not reach the threshold using the EU formula, which calculates a rate of 22 per cent using data from 2011 for 15 to 25-year-olds.

But using the latest UK statistics, based on 16 to 25-year-olds over the past 12 months, the proportion of young people out of work in the region rises to 28.2 per cent – placing it second only to Tees Valley at 31.9 per cent.

When split down to local authority level it rises further, with Hull’s youth unemployment rate the fifth highest in England at 36.6 per cent and North East Lincolnshire ranking at 14th at 31.9 per cent.

More than a quarter of homes in Hull have nobody in work, according to Government figures published yesterday.

The city ranked among the worst in the country, with a workless household rate of 27.6 per cent throughout last year.

It is the latest in a long list of gloomy statistics that have repeatedly seen it singled out as an unemployment blackspot.

Last summer, the constituency of Hull North was named as the country’s most difficult job-hunting ground, with 44 applicants chasing every vacancy, and Hull East did not fare much better, with 30.1 jobseekers chasing every available role – the eighth highest number in England.

Hull East Labour MP Karl Turner has previously described youth unemployment as a “ticking timebomb” for the city.

“Long-term unemployment figures offer no let up for young people in Hull who are increasingly shut out of the job market,” he said.

Criticising the scrapping of the Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) and future jobs fund and the raising of tuition fees, he added: “The Government has turned its back on our young people.”

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