Kickstart Scheme extended 'til March 2022

Kickstart is a large-scale intervention, designed to prevent a significant rise in youth unemployment and was launched in September 2020 in response to an expected surge in youth unemployment as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

It aimed to create “high-quality six-month work placements aimed at those aged 16-24 who are on Universal Credit and are deemed to be at risk of long-term unemployment” through funding provided to employers to create new jobs. The scheme was funded by a budget of £1.9 billion and a cost of around £7,000 per participant.

With labour market conditions developing in ways that were not expected since the schemes launch the department acknowledged it was unrealistic to achieve its initial aim of 250,000 young people starting a Kickstart job by 31 December 2021, and is now planning on the basis of up to 168,000 starts by the end of March 2022.

Around 100,000 people have started jobs created by the scheme so far and the department decided to continue the scheme on the basis that it could have a positive impact for the large number of young unemployed people who have been on Universal Credit for over a year, which has trebled since the start of the pandemic.

The overall impact of the scheme will not be fully clear until DWP completes its planned evaluation of participants’ future employment prospects, several years from now. The National Audit Office has made recommendations to DWP to help ensure the scheme remains on track. These include monitoring whether work coaches refer the right people to the scheme and assessing why there are many people who, in principle, are eligible for the scheme but are not taking up the outstanding vacancies.

“At the start of the pandemic, DWP acted quickly to set up Kickstart to help young people into work when youth unemployment was predicted to rise significantly,” said Gareth Davies, head of the NAO.

“However, DWP has limited assurance that Kickstart is having the positive impact intended. It does not know whether the jobs created are of high quality or whether they would have existed without the scheme. It could also do more to ensure the scheme is targeted at those who need it the most.”