You’ll wish you’d supported us when you retire, Mr Osborne

One of our prized Youth Advisory Board, Amy Benn, is wondering what we expect to happen in the long term if the Government budget doesn’t start offering more support to young people.

Unlike many people my age, I'm a bit of a politics geek. I've watched the annual Budget announcements keenly from the age of about 13. In those 12 years I've seen lots of patterns and many broken promises by the Labour and Coalition Governments, but never really reflected on how it affects me or my peers.

This year I’m challenging myself to think about the budget’s impact on young people in the UK.

What positives are out there already?

I am a minimum wage, part-time worker struggling to find full-time work in the recession. I have a degree in a sector with few job opportunities due to funding cuts, and my fiancé and I seem unlikely to ever be able to afford to buy our own home. I also volunteer to support young people, including running my own website supporting youth workers. Between the increase in the tax-free earnings allowance, and things like a new (though slightly re-hashed) lending scheme for first-time home buyers, the budget could well be a positive thing for me and others in similar situations. Time will tell.

But this blog isn't just about me. It’s about all young people in the UK, and how this budget will affect them. Is this really a budget for an, “aspiration nation,” or is it simply a few little glimmers of hope that won't really have a great impact on young people at all?

Young people as entrepreneurs

When it was announced that the number of unemployed young people aged 16-24 rose to 993,000 (or 21.2%), it seems as though finding positives for young people in this year's budget would be impossible. But during his speech, the Chancellor tried to ensure his budget was seen as a plan to increase jobs in the private sector by announcing cuts to both corporation tax and National Insurance bills for small firms. The word 'enterprise' came up again and again throughout Mr Osborne's speech. Is this his way of telling us he wants those out of work to look to setting up their own businesses instead of seeking jobs? If so, will there be more support for those young people who are perhaps most vulnerable to unemployment, or who lack the skills to start in business? If Mr Osborne really wants to see enterprise taking off and changing the future of our economy, he needs to ensure some of those funds going to local enterprise projects are going to be targeted at young people out of work to give them the support, skills and finance to start their own businesses.

Who does the current Budget focus on?

The budget has had little effect in real-terms on young people as a whole group. Other than the increase of the tax-free earning allowance, and the offer of loans (and therefore extra financial strain) to get on the property ladder, there is very little in this budget to really help young people. Young parents might benefit from the promise of tax-free childcare, but if it actually happens it won’t be soon enough to relieve the finances of young parents currently struggling to pay for childcare while they work, if indeed they have a job to begin with.

The budget focuses more on pensioners. I am not against supporting pensioners, but it would be nice to see a balance in support for younger and older people. The Intergenerational Foundation criticised this budget for this very reason, saying that, "This budget has again considered the interests of those currently retired or close to retirement over those of younger people or those not yet born." More funding for apprenticeships or young enterprise projects would be a great way to boost the economy while simultaneously providing a future for young people who currently don't feel like they have one. Perhaps listening to young people's concerns about their futures would mean the Government begins to see that, while a small drop in beer duty and a freeze on fuel duty are helpful to a lot of people in society, it's really time to start using the budget announcement to really support young people in real terms.

After all, if young people don't have jobs, they'll never gain the skills needed to run this country when Mr Osborne and his colleagues retire. And then we're really in trouble.