Britain’s schools are failing its young people – and 1m Neets are paying the price | Simon Jenkins
Columnist Simon Jenkins argues that England's schools bear much of the blame for the rising number of young people classed as Neet (not in education, employment or training), warning that an exam-obsessed system devoid of vocational and life skills training leaves school-leavers unready for work. He draws on Alan Milburn's May report describing a generation of mostly poor Britons faring worse than their parents, and on employer surveys highlighting a mismatch between what schools teach and what the world beyond their gates requires.
The number of Neets, currently one in eight of 16- to 24-year-olds, is projected to reach 1.25 million by 2030, with state benefits for this group costing £8.1bn; a third have "good GCSEs" yet 44% remain on benefits, and special educational needs diagnoses have doubled in a decade. A Department for Work and Pensions employer survey found over 90% wanted more vocational pathways, citing gaps in motivation, teamwork and time management, while Jenkins also blames declining self-confidence, smartphone use and a lack of oracy teaching, and cites Jonathan Haidt's research on social media's effect on young people's conversational skills.
- Neet numbers set to hit 1.25 million by 2030, costing £8.1bn in benefits
- Columnist blames exam-focused schools for lack of vocational and life skills
- Employers want more focus on teamwork, motivation and oracy, survey finds
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Advocates of Jenkins's argument contend that an exam-centred curriculum, narrowed further by accountability pressures and league tables, genuinely fails to equip many school-leavers with the practical and interpersonal skills employers demand, such as teamwork, motivation and time management. They point to the scale of the problem, an eighth of 16- to 24-year-olds classed as Neet and projected to reach 1.25 million by 2030, alongside the striking fact that a third of Neets hold good GCSEs, as evidence that academic attainment alone is not translating into readiness for work or further training. On this view, schools have a duty to prepare young people for life beyond exams, and reforms such as greater vocational provision, oracy teaching and life-skills education are a proportionate, evidence-based response to a system that has drifted too far towards narrow academic measurement.
The case against
Others argue it is unfair and overly simplistic to lay the blame for the Neet crisis primarily at schools' door, when the causes are plainly wider and more structural. They would point to economic factors such as weak entry-level job markets, regional deprivation and the cost of living, to the doubling of SEN diagnoses reflecting genuine unmet need rather than curriculum failure, and to broader social trends, including smartphone use and youth mental health decline, that schools alone cannot reasonably be expected to counteract. From this perspective, schools already operate under significant constraints on funding, staffing and curriculum flexibility, and asking them to solve what is fundamentally a cross-departmental problem involving welfare, employment policy and public health risks scapegoating educators for failures of wider government and social policy.