Hales Group is playing a crucial role in supporting young people into work through the Government’s Kickstart scheme.
In what has been an extraordinary 12 months, thousands of young people have been faced with unemployment and a lack of job prospects, especially those coming straight out of full-time education. Hales Group recognised the scheme as an incredible opportunity to help young people back into the workplace or into their first role and has created 30 vacancies with 10 trainees already in post.
The £2billion Kickstart scheme, announced by the Chancellor, Rishi Sunak, enables employers to offer six-month job placements for 16-24-year-olds at risk of long-term unemployment with support to employers towards the costs of recruitment and training.
Kate Parkington, Director of People Services, said “Hales Group is so pleased to be offering young people the chance to gain valuable work experience in our Homecare and Recruitment divisions as well as our Finance and Property teams. And it allows us to bring young talent into our ranks, so it’s win-win! Within the first month of the scheme going live, we have recruited ten people into the ranks and we are actively recruiting the other twenty vacancies. We’re excited to provide unemployed people with an opportunity to carve a long term career and to see how they progress. We are hoping to gain approval for additional roles including in our HR and Marketing teams following the initial success of the project, so we can help more young people in what they perceive to be a very bleak job market.”
New employee Ellie, who joined Hales Group’s Homecare division at the end of November via the Kickstart Scheme said: “I’ve really enjoyed my first two weeks. I lost my job in hospitality and was feeling quite downhearted about my future. This placement has given me a confidence boost and some real hope that I can have a successful career. I hadn’t ever thought about working in care but it’s an amazing feeling to be helping the most vulnerable people in our society. I’m thankful to Hales for offering me such a incredible opportunity and I would encourage anyone who is unemployed to ask their local Job Centre about this scheme”.
Hales Homecare are one of the UK’s leading care service providers with branches across Hertfordshire, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambs, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire, Humberside and Tyneside. They have been providing market leading person-centred care to enable adults to lead a fulfilling life for over 20 years. For more information see www.halescare.co.uk.
