In fact, this month a new report suggested that young people could face even harsher benefit cuts. In an attempt not to pay EU migrants benefits for their first four years in the country, the Government is considering cutting tax credits for those under 22 in a warped view of equality. It’s not easy being a young person in 2015.
All of this makes Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn’s approach to young people remarkably refreshing. He placed young people firmly in his plan and vision for the country. His plans, unveiled as part of his Labour leadership campaign, includes:
- Reducing the voting age to 16 years.
- An end to all tuition fees in further and higher education.
- The restoration of student grants, Education Maintenance Allowance and Disabled Students Allowance.
- The introduction of a statutory £10 an hour living wage for all workers, including replacing the current £2.73 per hour apprenticeship rate with an equalisation of a higher £10 living wage across the board.
- Establishing a Living Rent Commission to implement rent controls and protect tenants in the private sector by capping rent increases.
- Equal rights at work regardless of age or time worked, with a ban on zero hour contracts, and place a weekly minimum for hours on contracts.
- An end to different payments in benefits for under- 25s and the same rate of Jobseekers Allowance for all seeking work, and restoring equal access to housing benefit for under-21s.
- A statutory youth service to provide advice, guidance and support to young people wanting to access further and higher education.
- Compulsory sexual, consensual and relationship education.
Launching these plans, Corbyn said: ‘Young people have faced more challenges under austerity than the generation before them. It is wrong and immoral that our young people are three times more likely to be unemployed, to be paying huge rents and struggling with enormous tuition fee debts. What sort of country are we that we punish our young people for getting themselves educated, or wanting to get a job?’
On one level, this is only exciting if Corbyn becomes leader of the Labour Party (which we’ll find out sometime between finishing the magazine and it arriving through your letterbox) and subsequently Prime Minister. These changes would completely transform the lives and treatment of young people in the UK, taking the onus of austerity away from the generation that had least to do with it.
But there’s another thing at play here. The rise of Corbyn and the popularity of his left-leaning politics which places young people at the centre will have an impact. The Labour party will have to bear the left of the party in mind as they look to the next election, whoever the leader is, and this will extend to young people. More than any other campaign in recent years, Corbyn’s bid to be Labour leader felt like a movement, it captivated young people, be they members of the Labour party or not. And perhaps that will be Corbyn’s legacy, even if he never becomes PM; he’s reminded the country that to inspire people, that to start a movement, you need to put young people front and centre, which after decades of young people being ignored, can only be a good thing.
‘Contrary to the perceptions of many, the vast majority of the country’s young people are looking to do the right thing. Of an estimated 3.2 million 18 to 21-year-olds, only about 19,000 claim both unemployment and housing benefits, the benefits the government plans to abolish for that age group. Not only this, but our research shows that the amount of young people claiming these benefits is falling, not increasing. The number of 18 to 21-year-olds on both Jobseeker’s Allowance and housing benefit has more than halved in the past two years, and is falling quicker than any other age group. Eventually you realise the majority of young people who are accessing social security are not doing so out of choice. To them, it is a necessity.’
DENISE HATTON, YMCA ENGLAND’S CHIEF EXECUTIVE, WRITING IN THE THE GUARDIAN
