The Save EMA campaign in responding to the government’s new plans to allow firms and charities to bid for a payment-by-results scheme to try to get “Neet” teenagers into work or training, has pointed out that this money is similar to the amount that should have been spent on EMA.

The government’s plan on 16 and 17 year olds is a smoke and mirrors way for a poor attempt at reversing their policy on EMA, and instead risks wasting more government money.

The average annual payment to EMA recipients receiving £30 a week was £792.01 (over an average of 26.4 weekly payments). The contractors under the government’s new scheme will be paid £2,200 per teenager. When this £126M scheme is combined with the £180m EMA replacement scheme it totals over £300M which is close to what it would of cost to keep the £30 payment scheme for the poorest teenagers.

The steep rise in the youth unemployment rate is what has sparked this government initiative.

The below chart shows the spike that has occurred in the youth unemployment rate for those aged under 17 since EMA was scrapped last September:

• January’s unemployment figures show that since October 2011 Under 17 year-olds unemployment is up by two thirds, that’s a 6% change in increase on the same time period last year.
• For 17 year-olds unemployment in January was up by 4% since October 2011 and 9% since November 2011.

The graph below shows the percentage change each month since October:

The government is right that youth unemployment is a ticking time bomb, something we at Save EMA have said all along, but sadly this government is cutting the wrong wire. This new scheme is a shoddy patchwork version of the EMA that risks costs the tax payer more and does less.

The Education Maintenance Allowance was a tried and tested government scheme. Recognised by a plethora of organizations, like the independent IFS, who argued that EMA help to get those classed as ‘Neet’ into the work place; in contrast this is a shot in the dark, and if anything, it is a smoke and mirrors attempt at trying to correct the mistake of scrapping EMA.
Teenagers need qualifications to enter long term well paid work, this scheme of mop and bucket incentives will not do that. If they are lucky they will get short term low paid work.

For the almost the same amount of money they could of continued the payments of £30 a week like they have done in Scotland and Wales. But scrapping EMA was about the best politics and not the best policy.

Young people are having to choose whether to eat or travel to college thanks to the government’s “disastrous” decision to axe the education maintenance allowance, according to a report (pdf) released today by the children’s charity Barnardo’s.

The report not only criticises the government’s decision to axe the weekly grant – worth around £30 a week to the poorest students – but also describes the EMA’s replacement as insufficient to meet students’ needs.

It is shocking that youngsters have to skip meals to get to college. Lecturers want to be encouraging students to maximise their potential and they need to at least be fed when they turn up for class.

Sadly, the findings of today’s report do not come as much of a shock to those of us at SaveEMA. We have argued from the start the government’s drive to cut EMA was an ideological move backed up by spurious evidence with absolutely no regard for the policy’s likely impact.

We produced a number of reports at the time that highlighted just how vital the money was for students. However, the government opted to cherry-pick its evidence from a survey that included hardly any students who actually depended on the EMA.

While we questioned how a cabinet of millionaires could have any understanding of the difference a few pounds a week makes to the poorest in society, the education secretary, Michael Gove, axed the grant, despite not having visited a single further education college.

Embarrassingly, but not surprisingly, the government’s evidence was later discredited by the man the government frequently cited to call the EMA a “deadweight cost”. Giving evidence to the education select committee in the summer, Mr Spielhofer said he was not happy with the concept that EMA had a deadweight cost of 88%.

He was also unhappy the axing of EMA had been based on his research and said ministers should have paid closer attention to other evidence, including work by the Institute for Fiscal Studies which showed that EMA paid for itself. The select committee described the axing of the EMA as rushed and ill-though through.

After failing to listen to the evidence when axing EMA, the least the government can do now is take note of today’s findings and provide the financial support required to give the poorest teenagers a fair crack at an education. There is no benefit in consigning them to the ever-increasing number of young people on the dole queue.

Speaking to the Guardian newspaper about LSE research into the causes of last summer’s riots, in which they say the removal of EMA was an issue, the Labour leader hinted that he is considering restoring EMA at the next election.

See below for more info:

Of course Save EMA would just like him to say he would restore it or provide a better alternative to the current replacement, but this is at least a good start.

The Government risk making today’s GCSE winners next years NEETs by scrapping EMA. On the day hundreds of thousands of the poorest teenagers receive their GCSE’s results they will also be uncertain of their future now the scheme has been scrapped.

As 90% of pupils on Free School Meals go on to receive EMA, the Government should not be narrowing or even risking their educational prospects. The Government say the EMA has not yet been cut and we cant tell what effect it will have, but they forget that those planning to start courses this September may not be able to without prior knowledge if they will get funding. According research by the trade union UCU 40% of EMA recipients would not have even started courses without the funding. A further 70% said they would have dropped out without receiving EMA.

It is widely accepted by independent research centrers like the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) that the EMA is better than the new Government’s bursary scheme.

This is how the IFS describe the Government’s new bursary replacement:

“…any children on free school meals are currently entitled to the full £1,170 for EMA, if their circumstances do not change. It must be the case that most such students would be worse off under the bursary scheme that they would have been under the EMA - on average, to the tune of £370 a year.”

This is how the IFS describes the EMA:

“The EMA significantly increased participation rates in post-16 education among young adults who were eligible to receive it. In particular, it increased the proportion of eligible 16-year-olds staying in education from 65% to 69%, and increased the proportion of eligible 17-year-olds in education from 54% to 61%. The simple cost-benefit analysis mentioned above suggests that even taking into account the level of deadweight that was found, the costs of EMA are completely offset.”

There is a clear divide between what went before for the poorest teenagers and those today looking at entering further education.

Although today will be a good day for many in this country, there will be hundreds of thousands of the poorest teenagers who for no fault of their own and regardless of their desire for an education but due to bad government policy will see their choices narrowed and their incomes cut. What’s even more disgraceful is that across the country there will be households now where one child is getting support to stay in education but the younger brother or sister, who should be starting college in September, is now instead in limbo and unsure of their future due to this Government’s actions.

In a week when the number of NEETs (those Not in Education, Employment or Training) has risen the government should not by scrapping EMA risk creating more NEETs otherwise it only helps create a lost generation of unqualified and unskilled young people, who feel that the government is against them and that they are not worth investing in. Recent weeks should show that’s not a good idea.

The government should while there is still time reverse their decision on EMA or at least put off scrapping it for another year until they have something better in place. It won’t cost anything other than face.

As pointed out previously, the Government are against the bulk of research which supports EMA, leading economists in the country and if recent polls are accurate, a Tory Chaired Select Committee, and they are also against public opinion. Even the author of the report, which the government originally based its entire case for scrapping EMA on, has come out and said he opposes the abolition of EMA.

It’s truly shameful to think that when it comes to education cuts, a Prime Minister and an Education Secretary, who were both privately educated, are not looking first at the gold plated subsidy to the private school sector, but instead to the pockets of the poorest teenagers.

The government are selling out the poorest teenagers in this country. It’s just another warning the education system in our country post 16 risks being one where a pupil’s finances and not their ability will determine how far they can go in the education system of our country…

If the Government got grades in the post today on this policy, it is clear they would have been failed…

The Save EMA campaign has warned previously that an increase in youth crime could be seen if the EMA is abolished, as some cuts can help cause crime. Talking to Sky News today, Diane Abbot MP and many others on other media platforms, have said today that many teenagers rioting have been spurred on by the abolition of EMA.

Now, Save EMA doesn’t fully agree with that view, but it does have a kernel of truth to it.

In the areas where riots took place last night involving teenagers there was almost 16,000 teenager in receipt of EMA. Those same areas which experienced riots over the weekend are also amongst the areas with the highest number of EMA recipients in London:

Lambeth (Brixton) has 3,799 recipients

Enfield has 4,424 recipients

Haringey has 3,689 recipients

Waltham Forest has 3,756 recipients

Total Number of EMA recipients: 15,934

Compare these figures with more tranquil areas such as Richmond-upon-Thames or Chelsea and Kensington who have only 900 EMA recipients each.

If you add to this the disturbance occruing in Hackney the 3,647 teenagers on EMA there, then this pushes the total number in receipt of EMA up to 19,581. This means almost a quarter of the total number of EMA recipients in London lived in areas experiencing rioting teenagers…

The Save EMA campaign believes in peaceful protest and completely rejects violence in all its forms. There is no excuse whatsoever for stealing or criminal damage. And Save EMA has previously condemned all such actions seen following education demonstrations. However, it also believes that some cuts can help cause crime by creating an environment in which it can grow.

There was no excuse for the violence over the weekend, and we must remember those teenagers who did not take part in any criminal activity at all. But as we survey the damage we cannot ignore that the environment which was created that made riots more likely in places like Brixton than in places like Belgravia.

For example, as the figures above show, there are four times as many youngsters on EMA in Haringey than in Richmond-upon-Thames and there are four times as many youngsters on EMA in Lambeth than in Chelsea and Kensington. Is it hard therefore to wonder why we see more teenagers involved riots in some parts of London than others? The figures above of EMA recipients London highlight the disparity in poverty levels in those different parts of London.

It is hard to prove that removing EMA alone will increase crime, however, if it leads to lower levels of participation in education amongst 16-19 years olds then this is what one well respected academic, Mick Fletcher, who has advised the government has said the effects can be:

Youth Unemployment in London is above the national average, and combined with cuts to youth services and the abolition of the EMA there is an abandoned army of young people set adrift, one just has to ask any youth worker or sociologist or criminologist and they will tell you this is the environment that breeds crime.

The Save EMA campaign has met many young people over the last year and as the videos like the one below shows, many of them have been saying that if they don’t have successful schemes like EMA then they are more likely to get into trouble.

Although the Save EMA campaign doesn’t fully agree with Diane Abbott MP’s view that cutting EMA has led to the disturbances in London, we do share her fears that last weekend maybe a sign of more things to come if the abolition of successful schemes like EMA goes ahead.

The government should not risk creating a lost generation of unqualified and unskilled young people, who feel that the government is against them and that they are not worth investing in, otherwise it only helps create such scenes already seen…

Save EMA sends its sympathies to those who have been hurt or affected by the riots!

UPDATE: Following recent out bursts of violence in London, the figure has been revised up to over a third of EMA recipients in London living in riot hotspots.