A Million NEETs Costs £125Bn A Year; How Do We Respond? Soundbite Edition 849
Welcome to FE Soundbite Edition 849: 30th May 2026. A Million NEETs Costs £125Bn a year; How do we Respond?
This is the weekly e-newsletter and e-journal by FE News: ISSN 2732-4095. We know life is busy, so here’s a snapshot of the latest announcements and epic thought leadership articles from sector influencers and thought leaders across FE and Skills this week on FE News.
Upcoming national day to celebrate vocational learning
Save the date for Vocational Celebration Day on 6 August 2026, led by Enginuity and EAL — a national campaign celebrating the value and impact of vocational and technical learning. Organisations, educators and individuals can now get involved and show their support by downloading the FREE campaign pack and joining the celebration.
Gavin’s Reflective Perspective
This week we finally crossed a threshold nobody wanted to cross. One million NEETs. And on the same day, Milburn’s Young People and Work Interim Report landed… 217 pages, looking at the NEET challenge from every angle. It is a beast of a report… and a brilliant one. We have been all over it this week at FE News… sector reaction with over 35 leaders’ views, a Deep Dive from Dan, articles from Olly Newton, Mark Morrin and Deirdre Hughes… and my own look at the numbers and drivers behind it all… and some home truths to take on from Milburn as well.
1 Million NEETs
The reason, same day, we finally hit the 1 million NEET mark. It was coming for ages, but this is a massive political hot potato.
This is not only a moral issue. As I highlighted in my unpacking article, there is a massive cost driver to the government in fixing the NEET challenge. NEETs cost £125 Billion per year. Add this together with the £212 Billion cost that Keep Britain working (Mayfield Review) on Economic Inactivity due to ill health. That is like £340 Billion’ish… per year.
You can understand why the Government is driven to fix not just the NEET issue. Milburn also highlights that if every currently NEET 18-24-year-old had been in full-time work, this would have contributed an additional £38 billion to UK GDP.
Only 705,000 vacancies, but 1 million NEETs
The problem is, we have 705,000 vacancies highlighted on the ONS Labour market data last week, but now over 1 million NEETs… there just aren’t enough vacancies… for NEETs, but those vacancy numbers are for the entire labour market.
So this is a serious problem to solve.. against our EU peers… by 2025, only Romania recorded a higher youth NEET rate among EU countries. So this is a massive problem, good thing… the government has realised this now (Milburn highlights that we have had 20 years of different programmes and schemes, but it hasn’t worked basically). So what next?
But… NEETs… this is massively important… as Milburn highlights the long-term effect of being NEET. He actually calls it the ‘Scarring effect’ of being NEET in early adulthood into midlife. In Olly’s article, he unpacks this further: individuals who experienced even relatively short periods of being NEET between age 18 and 24 were significantly more likely to be unemployed, report poor health or psychological distress by age 51. This needs sorting!
Milburn also highlights the importance of Careers advice… the current poor provision, but when it works, it is cracking. He even highlights the importance of starting young…. Like Primary school, young!… interestingly, the Career Development Institute wrote an article unpacking their recent research, which found that 46.4% of 15-year-olds in the UK are uncertain about their career options. That is up from 24.6% in 2018, which means we have nearly halved young people’s confidence in their career futures in under a decade. Out of 80 countries surveyed, the UK sits near the bottom of the table. That isn’t a drop the ball moment, but a slow and painful decline.
A whole-system failure for young people
Milburn highlights a whole-system failure for young people… this is pretty sobering to be honest… and a home truth that ‘The Post 16 System is confused, fragmented and designed around institutional convenience’.. not designed for the learner… nor the employer.
So we have had fatigue on constant change, curriculum reform, qualification reform… over two decades of intentional intervention, but it is not working. So… more reform to come (and what is it with the Labour Government using the word ‘Reform’ all the time as the word to fix all the problems)… stepping back a minute, it is also the name of their biggest political rival.. and saying the Reform will fix this… dunno, maybe wise for them to find new lingo on these reports (as they love to word cliff edge as well)!
Young people claiming PIP has risen to 64% (Jan 26), up from 49%
SEND and Neuro-inclusion has a massive part of the review… mental health. Milburn highlights that the combined share of anxiety/depression, autism and ADHD as the primary condition for 16–24 year olds claiming PIP has risen from 49% in January 2020 to 64% by January 2026. So you can also see the drivers for the Government’s review on SEND, and looking at welfare reform… it isn’t just out the goodness of their heart. There is a long term cost saving they are looking at and for solutions.
Fork in the road, the next steps and path is vital
Most importantly, this week highlights a fork in the road, a review by Government looking at NEETs holistically, highlighting that funding in FE and skills (for 16-18 year olds is broken), what isn’t measured, isn’t treasured (but is important, like pastoral care for young people by FE Lecturers.. but again, misses the importance of Apprenticeship delivery) in the research and data (when will these research teams pick up that ITPs deliver 70% of Apprenticeships)? If we are looking at this expensive puzzle, and Milburn has looked at health, mental health… in addition to FE and skills… to miss out ITPs and Apprenticeship delivery, seems a bit of an oversight to be fair!
A million NEETs, costing £125 billion a year
A million NEETs, costing £125 billion a year. A system designed around institutional convenience rather than the young people it serves, or employers. We’re at the fork in the road… and the direction we choose next matters more than any report.
I hope you enjoy FE Soundbite this week… and a massive thanks to Enginuity and EAL for Sponsoring FE Soundbite this week. Have you put Vocational Celebration Day (6th August 2026) into your diary yet?
Epic Exclusives Thought Leadership Articles
Our Top 3 Thought Leadership Articles This Week
Young People Are Not Lazy. I’ve Heard Their Voices, and the System Is Letting Them Down By Associate Professor Deirdre Hughes OBE, Co-Founding Director, CareerChatUK, Legacy Fellow, UK Career Development Institute, Former Chair of the National Careers Council, England
Defunding Access to HE Diplomas for 16 to 19 Year Olds is a Mistake By Heather Akehurst OBE, Chief Executive at Open Awards
Half Our Young People Don’t Know What Future They’re Walking Into By David Morgan, Chief Executive at the CDI and Stephen Plimmer, Research Manager at the CDI
This week, we also had some other Epic Exclusives!
I’m A Self-Assessment Evangelist: The Water Companies’ Sewage Scandal Reminds me of the inherent risks By Lou Doyle, Co-Founder and Director at the SDN Mesma Group
A New Youth Jobs Crisis Demands System Change By Mark Morrin, Principal Research Consultant at the Lifelong Education Institute
Apprenticeships: A Fixed System in a Dynamic Economy By Simon Lewis, Group Head of Customer Services and Operations – Apprenticeships, NOCN Group
From Insight to Impact: Why Management Research Matters More Than Ever By Flora Hamilton, CEO of the Chartered Association of Business Schools, Jack Harrington, CEO of the British Academy of Management and Petra Wilton, Director of Policy and External Affairs of the Chartered Management Institute
What’s New in the World of FE?
Milburn Interim Review Deep Dive: What it means for FE
Announcements
May 2026 ONS: NEETs Pass One Million as Inactivity Climbs Again
Student loans: More than 52,000 responses to Treasury Committee call for evidence By the Treasury Committee
Employment lifeline for young people across the country as Government offers 300,000 new work experience and training placements By Department for Work and Pensions (DWP)
Report
Milburn interim review warns of ‘generational fault line’ as NEET numbers could hit 1.25 million without reform By Department for Work and Pensions (DWP)
Social Work Degree Apprenticeship Working as a ‘Grow Your Own’ Route, first major study finds
Voices
We Can’t Address The NEETs Crisis Without A Collective Approach By Olly Newton, Executive Director, Edge Foundation
The Numbers and Drivers Behind Milburn’s Young People and Work Interim Report By Gavin O’Meara, CEO and Founder FE News
In The Know
The timing for Tuesday’s Breaking Barriers Collective event in partnership with Edge Foundation, working together collectively to solve the NEET puzzle… couldn’t be better. We only have a few tickets left
This isn’t a conference; it’s a collective. It isn’t a chalk-and-talk event, but an interactive one. It’s rolling up your sleeves and making real change, where you get involved and actually give real input. Join us and help shape the sector!
By Danny O’Meara, Operations Manager, FE News and