Policymaking must be informed by the reality of children's lives

Esther McVey, the Work and Pensions Secretary, says that teenagers should be encouraged to take up Saturday and after-school jobs to help them develop a work ethic. I'm not against this in principle - both my wife and I had jobs when we were at school, as did our children and, as a long-time advocate of work experience, I'm certain that there is something valuable in the discipline of doing something for pay. There is, though, a serious reality disconnect in the proposal. The truth is that there are just not that many part-time jobs around! Our local newsagent has stopped newspaper deliveries, the retail sector generally is contracting if not collapsing and certainly not seeking more part-time employees, and jobs like supermarket shelf-stacking are already being done by young people on the minimum wage or zero-hours contracts. The only reason for employers to take on school students would be that they are even cheaper, and the effect could be that some older young people would be displaced into unemployment. So, a good idea in theory, but unworkable in practice.