Plea for transport overhaul to avert rural plunge into poverty

RURAL communities could plunge below the poverty line unless a radical overhaul of countryside transport links is undertaken to improve access to more job opportunities, a councillor warned yesterday.

Concerns have been expressed that poor public transport links are often hindering many young people in taking their first steps in a new career.

The recession has already accentuated the difficulties which many under-25s have faced in securing employment, and fears are growing that many young people will desert rural communities for towns and cities to find jobs.

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Coun Nick Harvey, who represents the Hertford ward on Scarborough Borough Council, is now pushing for a task group to be established to look into the problems faced by rural communities in travelling to work.

He has spoken to concerned parents and calculates that up to a fifth of the weekly pay of a teenager on the national minimum wage who is living is some rural parts of the borough is being spent on bus fares.

Coun Harvey said: "It is a major problem that many people are not aware of, but it is one that needs to be highlighted.

"There is a real danger that many people will simply say it is not worth looking for a job if it is low paid and they are having to spend a day's wage on simply travelling to and from work.

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"It could well mean that many young people will leave the villages they grew up in and move to towns and cities where it is easier to access jobs. We need to enfranchise the countryside communities and make it easier for them to travel to places like Scarborough for work."

Coun Harvey will raise the issue at the council's southern area committee on Thursday next week and hopes the matter can be taken up by the projects and partnerships overview and scrutiny committee before a task group is established.

He has urged bus companies to look to extending permit zones to allow cheaper travel, as well as linking in with train operators to provide joint passes for further discounts.

He has also suggested drawing up proposals for introducing formal car-sharing clubs and extending Wheels 2 Work schemes, which have already helped hundreds of young people living in remote parts of North Yorkshire.

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The project was launched in the county nine years ago, lending mopeds to jobseekers so they could get to work or training.

However, the problems faced by young people in finding work have been heightened during the economic downturn, many enduring long periods of unemployment.

A report published on Monday warned that young people across Yorkshire could face a lifetime of poor health and permanent psychological scars if the number of jobless under-25s is not reduced.

Currently one in five young people are unemployed, or 952,000, the worst since records began in 1992 and higher than any age group. Overall 7.9 per cent of people are on the dole.

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The report also suggested that unemployed young people are twice as likely to feel depressed than those in work.

The Yorkshire Post revealed in November that efforts were under way to provide thousands of unemployed workers in some of the nation's most deprived communities with the chance to resurrect their careers.

A groundbreaking 1.5m scheme has been unveiled to cut unemployment rates in Scarborough after research revealed that it had some of the worst deprivation blackspots in the country.

Official figures have shown that as many as 10,000 people in Scarborough are on Jobseeker's Allowance or other key benefits, and nearly a third have not worked for more than three years.