National Minimum Wage (Workplace Internships) Bill — House of Commons, 2016-11-04
Topic: Labor
Alec Shelbrooke (Conservative, Centre-right): I am sure my hon. Friend speaks from experience The disparity between words and action is starkly highlighted by the Institute of Directors, which describes itself as an organisation that opposes long-term unpaid internships yet publishes a model contract for members to get round minimum wage legislation I come to some of the points that my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby raised According to YouGov, 39% of young people—almost two in five—have turned down an offer of an unpaid internship for financial reasons, and only 4% believe they could definitely afford to do one. That is an important statistic, because all the examples I have heard about the opportunities people have been able to exploit, and some of the interventions that have been made on me, have almost tried to paint a picture suggesting that I am removing opportunity and bringing forward just circumstantial evidence. However, almost 40% of people offered an internship have had to turn it down because they cannot afford to live. That is not an insignificant statistic, and it is not insignificant in terms of the value of this argument Some 43% of young people aged between 18 and 24 believe that the need to do an unpaid internship acts as a barrier to their career choices. I genuinely fear that the opportunities available to young people today are decreasing; they are certainly much harder to acquire than they were for me. Like most young people at our local comprehensive school, my sister and I were taught that hard work and determination would help us make something of ourselves in the world of work. Our supportive parents made us work part-time jobs around our education—something that taught us the real value of money, something that we had to do to run our first cars, and something that taught us how to budget, which was a valuable lesson for later life. Unpaid work was simply not an option for me or my sister. Had an unpaid internship been a prerequisite for access to our chosen professions, it would have been a barrier to our getting into the workplace The Sutton Trust estimates that expenses-only internships in London cost a young person around £1,000 per month, but there are still people who believe that they are being generous by offering lunch expenses. With 81% of law internships and 61% of PR internships in London, what example does that send to firms carrying out internship programmes It is not just those who cannot afford to do an unpaid internship who miss out; it is also businesses and, ultimately, the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Louth and Horncastle (Victoria Atkins) made it clear that the legal profession recognises that point as well. Essentially, creating a system in which only 4% of people feel they would face no financial restrictions to entering unpaid employment could mean that a talent pool of 96% of the rest of the market remained untouched It is well recorded that private schools in this country give a marvellous and privileged education to those lucky enough to attend, but in every job I have worked in so far it has been apparent that those with state educations have been just as capable as, and in many cases more capable than, those whose parents were rich enough to send them to a fee-paying school. I do believe there is a role for private schools in the UK, and I believe in parental choice, but it is also the responsibility of the state—