Youth jobs scarce

By Casey Neill
VANESSA Brown is begging electricians to give her a go.
The Ferny Creek 18-year-old says unemployment is hitting young people in the hills hard and last week spoke out about her battle to find an apprenticeship, in a bid to improve the fight for others.
Ms Brown has sent out more than 200 resumes since last November, but has landed just one interview.
“I’ve had about 20 people get back to me,” she said.
“They’re all really good feedback, but no-one’s hiring.”
She completed a pre-apprenticeship in electro technology last year and is now keen to secure a first year electrical apprenticeship to learn her trade.
“I was told that if I did that course, got my licence, finished school, that I’d pretty much get an apprenticeship,” she said.
But Ms Brown said many of her friends were also still searching for work, or had been hired and fired just months into their apprenticeship.
“After the employer gets the bonuses for hiring them,” she said.
A lack of public transport was a major obstacle for Ms Brown.
“It’s atrocious. I can’t get public transport to work unless I want to get to work at 10am, which is not acceptable,” she said.
La Trobe MP Jason Wood recently sent out a youth survey to residents in his electorate aged between 17 and 26.
More than half (53 per cent) of the 265 respondents said they were concerned about finding employment.
“I’ve never before seen so many young people trying to get jobs,” he said.
Mr Wood said the Federal Government needed to focus on helping young people find employment.
“We have had some tough economic times, but the government has been spending billions and billions of dollars on school halls and insulation, so-called to create jobs,” he said.
“That money would have been much better spent going to a young persons’ fund to help young people get employment.”
A Federal Government spokesman said they monitored apprentice employers and had seen no evidence of them ending apprenticeships “without good reason”.
“The majority of incentive payments are targeted towards the retention and successful completion of an Australian Apprenticeship and therefore offer a larger payment at these points,” he said.
He said apprenticeship commencements fell during the economic downturn.
“The government has responded with increased investment to maintain trade apprenticeship commencements and completions and to support apprentices at risk of not completing their training,” he said.