There was a time when getting your first Saturday job or summer job was almost a rite of passage. You earned a few quid, learned that turning up on time mattered, discovered pretty quickly that the boss expected you to actually work, and experienced for the first time the satisfaction that comes from earning your own money. I worry that, somewhere along the way, we have started to lose that.
My own working life started when I was just 12 years old, unloading boxes at Coalville Market for one of the traders. It wasn't glamorous and it certainly wasn't going to make me rich, but looking back, some of the lessons I learned there have stayed with me throughout my life. I later went on to work at Roger Bolstridge's shop in Coalville and, again, it was about far more than the money in my pocket at the end of the week. Those early jobs taught me discipline, independence, responsibility and, perhaps most importantly, a strong work ethic.
You learned that if you were supposed to start at a certain time, you arrived before that time. You learned that sometimes you had to do jobs you didn't particularly enjoy. You learned how to speak to customers, how to work alongside people of different ages and backgrounds, how to take instructions and how to accept that occasionally you would get something wrong and have to put it right. These are lessons that no classroom, however good, can completely replicate.
That is why I strongly support Conservative plans to save the summer job and make it easier for businesses to employ young people. At the moment, Britain has a complicated collection of rules governing when young people can work. The Conservative proposal is to simplify those rules, particularly for 16 and 17 year olds, giving them greater flexibility to work evenings, weekends and during school holidays.
This isn't about throwing sensible protections out of the window. Young people should quite rightly be protected from exploitation and nobody is suggesting otherwise. It is about recognising that regulation, even when introduced with good intentions, can have unintended consequences. If employing a teenager becomes too complicated, too expensive or requires too much additional paperwork, the reality is that many employers will simply decide that it isn't worth doing. Ultimately, the young person looking for their first opportunity is the one who loses out.
That should concern all of us because we have a serious problem developing in this country. More than one million young people are currently not in education, employment or training. Behind that statistic are real young people who risk becoming disconnected from the workplace before their working lives have even properly begun. Once that happens, getting them back into employment can become considerably harder. Surely it makes far more sense to help young people develop the habit and confidence of working in the first place.
For most of us, our first job wasn't our dream career. Mine certainly wasn't. But that isn't the point. The first job is about getting onto the ladder. It gives somebody their first employer reference, their first experience of answering to a boss, their first payslip and their first taste of genuine financial independence. There is something incredibly important about receiving money that you have earned yourself. You begin to understand that if you want something, you can work towards it. You start making choices about whether to spend or save and you develop confidence because you are contributing and becoming more independent.
Having run a business myself for many years, I also understand this issue from the other side of the counter. Employing somebody is a responsibility and, for a small business, taking on another member of staff is a significant decision. Small businesses don't generally have enormous human resources departments or teams of people dealing with regulation and paperwork. Often it is the business owner dealing with all of that themselves after they have finished the actual day's work.
Every additional regulation, cost and administrative burden makes the decision to employ someone slightly harder. That is particularly true when taking on somebody young who may naturally require more training and supervision. Yet it is precisely our small businesses that have traditionally provided those crucial first opportunities. The café that needs somebody for a few hours on Saturday, the restaurant needing an extra pair of hands during the summer, the local shop looking for weekend staff or the leisure business needing help during the school holidays. These are the places where generations of young people have taken their first steps into employment.
Government should be helping those employers to say yes. Yes, we will give you a chance. Yes, we will teach you. Yes, we will give you your first opportunity to prove yourself. Too often, however, we have created a system which gives employers another reason to say no.
There is also a wider cultural issue here. For too long our national conversation about young people has focused almost entirely on academic qualifications and university. Education is incredibly important, but work is an education too. Not every valuable lesson comes from a textbook. Learning how to deal with a difficult customer is an education. Learning to manage your first wage is an education. Learning that your colleagues are relying on you to turn up is an education. Learning that sometimes you have to get out of bed and go to work when you would rather stay there is an education too.
Those experiences help create resilient, confident and independent adults. They instil an understanding that work isn't simply something that provides a wage. It provides purpose, opportunity and the ability to build your own future.
That is why saving the summer job should be part of something much bigger. We need to rebuild a culture in Britain that celebrates work, rewards aspiration and encourages independence. Government cannot legislate a work ethic into existence, but it can make sure that unnecessary legislation doesn't stand in its way.
Our Conservative plan to cut red tape and save the summer job will give employers the confidence they need to take a chance on the next generation. It will make it easier for young people to get that first foot on the ladder and start developing the skills, habits and confidence that will serve them throughout their working lives.
I started at 12, unloading boxes at Coalville Market. I couldn't possibly have known then where my working life would eventually take me, but I do know that those early experiences helped shape the attitude towards work that I still have today.
A summer job might only last a few weeks, but the lessons it teaches can last a lifetime. Making it easier for young people to experience that opportunity is not just good for them and good for local businesses. It is an important part of our Conservative plan to Get Britain Working Again.
