Jayne Dowle: Poor prospects for young people left trailing by a self-perpetuating elite

I KNOW a young woman who will graduate this summer. Her ambition is to work in events management and public relations. But – and this is a very big but – she is from an ordinary working class family in the north-east, and right now, she can see no way of getting a job in her chosen profession.

It is virtually impossible to enter this competitive industry without undertaking a period of work experience. And work experience, inevitably, involves living in another city, probably Manchester or London, and working for free for months. Unless she finds a fairy godmother – or moonlights as a pole dancer – she can't imagine how she will do it. Knowing this girl, she will.

Like a lad I know who grafted on a building site all winter so he could go to London, put himself up in cheap digs and work on Loaded magazine for three weeks. He lived on any free sandwiches that came into the office, but he got paid work in the end, and now runs his own business back in Barnsley. But I'm telling you about this girl in case you feel tempted to moan about over-qualified graduates who can't find a job, and how much it costs taxpayers to support them etc etc. For thousands, this is the reality.

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A good degree, a winning personality, and the total frustration of being unable to get a foot in the door.

A recent survey found that 60 per cent of employers won't even consider employing a young person unless they have done work experience. In essence, I agree with them. There is nothing more irritating than a graduate who enthuses about "wanting to be a journalist" but has never bothered to attempt to get a word in print. And I am glad that the Government is planning to extend the period of work experience for young people on benefits, hooking up with employers such as Punch Taverns, Homebase and McDonalds to provide up to eight weeks in the workplace to prepare them for securing a "proper" job.

I've been there and done it. The week after I graduated, I went to London and slept on my university friend's floor for six weeks so I could work as a general gofer on women's magazines. That was more than two decades ago, and even though my parents sent money for my "keep", and in those days employers paid a nominal fee of "expenses", I was so skint I had to hide from the bus conductor.

Without it, I would never have got started. For years, I have drilled it into young people that the only way to get a job in the media is to get as much experience as possible. Over my time as an editor, I witnessed a procession of hopefuls. They would write in with their glowing CVs, turn up in the office terrified, and sink or swim. Some of them went on to become very successful. Some of them have even employed me.

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But it is clear that the only young people who can afford to work for free these days are those whose families can afford to fully support them.

Well-off middle-class families, in other words. Grandly-named "internships" are often little more than slave labour. These kids don't even get travel expenses. Talking to friends on national newspapers, it is apparent that most interns are the sons and daughters, nieces, nephews and friends of established journalists, with somewhere free to stay in the capital. It's the same in the law, the theatre and television. All this does is create a self-perpetuating elite, where the only kids who can get on the ladder are those with plenty of money. What hope for those like my young friend from the north-east?

It would be OK if she wanted to work for McDonalds. But like me at her age, she is more ambitious. And this is what angers me about her situation, and of those coming up behind her. No-one expects a job on a plate, but her life chances are being blighted because of her background.

At least she got to university, because she went to college to study for her A-levels supported by the Education Maintenance Allowance. Now I know there are students who abuse the EMA.

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But I know too, that when it is scrapped, thousands of young people from modest backgrounds simply won't be able to afford to continue their studies. Ministers go on about offering higher education to all.

But there is a huge hole in their logic. If they don't support less well-off kids doing their A-levels, how will these kids even get to university? I know they waffle on about special grants and so on, but these are no substitute for transparent, easily-accessible funding.

Call me a cynic, but could it be that this is all part of a grand plan to cut down on the further public funding such students would require if they actually made it on to a degree course? Talk about a self-perpetuating elite. It's bad enough now. What's it going to be like in 10 years' time?