Billed as one of the key planks of the Youth Matters green paper, the card promised to put "buying power directly into the hands of young people". But pilots of the scheme with 10 local authorities, which were scheduled to begin in autumn 2006 and run for two years, never got off the ground.
Reality check
Beverley Hughes, minister for children, young people and families, told Young People Now that the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) had been forced to "look coldly" at the reality of the situation, which it deemed to be ridden with undue "risk and uncertainty".
"Before committing more public money we had to look at whether a viable off-the-shelf technological solution is available, and it isn't," she said.
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