Dual Control in the Youth Employment Service
| Author | K. H. B. Frere |
| Date | 01 June 1953 |
| Published date | 01 June 1953 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1953.tb01679.x |
Dual
Control
in
the Youth
Employnamt
Service
By
K.
H.
B.
FRERE
I’his
entry @as awarded the Haldane Essay
Prize
for
1952.
Mr.
Frere
is
in the
Bristol
Regiozal Office
of
the Ministry
of
Labour
and
National
Service.
REAT
Britain’s most valuable economic asset is the aptitude and ability
G
of its working population, and the country’s future depends almost
entirely on the use-which is made
of
its brain power and manual skill. The
Youth Employment Service
is
the agency charged by Parliament with the
responsibility
of
guiding young workers into the employment which will
satisfy them and at the same time use their aptitude and ability to the full.
When we look at the organisation of this important Service, however,
we find that
it
has been designed as much to satisfy the demands of central
and local government as to do its work in the most efficient manner. The
structure
of
the Youth Employment Service, like that of Parliament or the
M.C.C., can be seen as logical only in the light of its history.
Development
The social patterns of the nineteenth century
so
often dictated a boy’s
choice of employment that we have no record of any official help until the
first years of the twentieth century. Specific
“
choice of employment”
powers were given to the Scottish School Boards by the Education (Scotland)
Act, 1908, of which the Edinburgh School Board took advantage; some
authorities in England had used their powers under the Education (Provision
of Meals) Act, 1906, to associate themselves with the social problems
of
pupils
in their schools.
In 1909 the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws recommended the
establishment
of
Labour Exchanges to reduce the incidence of unemployment
among adults. At the same time
it
recognised the need for tackling the
problem at source and advocated the development, in connection with the
Labour Exchanges, of
“
a special organisation for giving boys, parents,
teachers and school managers information and guidance as to suitable occu-
pations for children leaving school.” As a result of the Labour Exchanges
Act, 1909, the Board of Trade began to set up or take over Labour Exchanges,
but the Act had made no specific provision for young people, and
it
was left
to the Boards of Education and Trade to devise a working arrangement.
This arrangement was the beginning of the present system of dual control,
since it allowed an education authority offering
“
choice of employment
”
facilities which were approved by the Board of Education to continue to do
so,
while in other areas the Labour Exchanges were to provide these facilities
through Special (Juvenile) Advisory Committees. In all areas the Exchanges
retained their power to register vacancies for juveniles notified to them.
The education authorities in England and Wales had no formal power
to offer any employment facilities, until the Education (Choice of Employment)
145
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