12/10/2011 Newsnight Scotland

boadsheet and tabloid, which amused me. I'll be interested to see what

Tonight on Newsnight Scotland - with youth unemployment at a high,

could we be creating a new lost generation? And the Supreme Court

may have given the Government the decision it wanted over asbestos

compensation, but did they leave a stinging rebuke for ministers

hidden in the small print? Good evening. Maybe plan McB is

working or maybe the Scottish economy is lagging the UK, but the

unemployment figures aren't as bad here as south of the border. That

will be little comfort to the thousands of young people finding

the search for a job particularly hard. Youth unemployment is so high

there are fears of a lost generation, comparable to that

created in the recession of the 1980s.

I thought it would be a lot of jobs going, but there's near enough

nothing going. I thought it would be easier. I got out of school with

some highers. But it's hard. I've had quite a few interviews for

apprenticeships, but after the interview, just not been successful.

I thought it would be pretty easy to find a job. I wasn't used to way

it is in the real worldment last time the real world was this

tough for young people was in the 1980s, though official records on

unemployment for 16 to 24-year-olds only started in 1992. Some

eeconomists are now reviving a word from those days to describe the

If you haven't entered the labour market and you don't get a job for

a significant period of time, then you won't develop the basic skills,

the basic character skills, the basic go to work skills that

everyone takes for granted. That means that you might never properly

get into the labour market. While the Scottish Government says

Scotland is outperforming the rest of the UK, the figures are up 7,000,

with 7.9% of the population in Scotland out of work. The worst

affected areas by local authority are north Ayrshire, west

Dunbartonshire, as well as the cities of Glasgow and Dundee. Both

the Scottish Government and the Scotland office say tackling youth

unemployment is a top priority. This Dundee engineering firm has

helped some young people by offering apprenticeships. I thought

it would be not all that hard. When I left in fifth year, applied for

jobs, got to the final stages of some, but again, other people got

the job. Then the following year, again, before I started college, I

applied again and still not having any luck. After I went to college,

once people seen that you had a qualification in that area, they

were a lot more willing to take on. For me, being on the machine all

the time learning all the different materials, that was really a big

experience for me. Having the people who work here as well, 20,

30 years experience giving me their knowledge was a big factor in me

learning. NGA engineering say they could do with more help. It's

difficult, aye. It's a struggle. You don't get much financial help.

It's a way forward. There's nobody training apprentices. We have to

bring apresents through here. thankless task of working out your

strengths and weaknesses and filling in forms can be soul

destroying. But it has to be done. This company helps young people to

aim high, but realistically. A lot of young people want to move into

the trades, we have to be real with them about what the expectation

should be in terms of what jobs are out there and trying to look at

transferable skills for things like a call centre industry, hospitality,

retail, places where there's real jobs for them to move into. It's

hard trying to find work, there's so many people unemployed these

days. So many people are going for the same job. There's usually

someone better than you for a job. It's hard to get a job. I'm looking

for an apprenticeship for a mechanic. I've just applied for one

for the council. If you don't get an interview... It's disappointing,

it is. Because there's nothing going on. You're just sitting about

looking for jobs, sitting on the computer looking for jobs, out

handing CVs, filling in application forms. You get no replies quite a

lot. You feel like you're on your own. You feel like giving up.

riots in England show the dainkwher a young population feel it's has no

stake in mainstream society, nothing to gain from playing by the

rules and therefore nothing nouch lose either. Some economists are

warning there's a potential disconnect in Scotland in terms of

job creation, that job creation alone isn't the whole story. Have

you to factor in the availability of labour, for example, matching

jobs to people. That's particularly important when it comes to youth

unemployment. The working population is rising. Job creation

is not keeping up with that growth in working population. The labour

supply is increasing and this means there's effectively going to be

increasing competition for jobs. That means that what you might call

more marginal workers, those workers without the skills or

recently into the labour market, are more likely to be squeezed out.

It's hard to get a job. I thought there would be a lot of jobs going.

But there's near enough nothing going.

I'm joined by Professor David Bell and by Ronnie Knox, who is

principal of North Glasgow College. Professor David Bell, we don't have

the detailed figures on youth unemployment specifically for

Scotland. Nrlly a million across the UK, are we getting into the

kind of territory we were in in the 1980s? We are, we know that's true

in some areas like north Ayrshire where prospects are really very,

very poor for the young. Then you get into this long-term scarring

effect, where not managing to get into the jobs market early on

actually has a bad effect on you almost throughout the rest of your

working life. We have traced people who started in the 1980s and are

able to show they have higher unemployment, lower incomes and

also, other social factors like poorer health and so on. And the

risk of this becoming, as it did in the past, multigenerational, in the

long-term? Indeed that's so. We're a little better now I think at

designing schemes for them to help them make themselves more

approachable for employers, but on the other hand, there just aren't

many jobs out there. Ronnie Knox, you're trying to train people up

for jobs. Is it getting more difficult? Are you measuring

whether the people are going through your courses are, what

happens at the end of it? I think this is the issue now. We are

training. We're training well. Scotland's colleges deliver, we

believe, a product suitable for industry. The difficulty is there's

an infinity number of people coming through the programmes and a finite

number of jobs. There's potentially some answers. One being that

perhaps considering that Scotland's big driver now is small to medium

sized enterprises. In that area we need to spend more time encouraging

these small businesses to try and deliver more programmes on former

traditional type of apprenticeships. Realistically, given that they are

themselves struggling at the moment, there would have to be Government

money. There would have to be incentives to allow that happen.

That's most definite. Do you have any numbers? Have you investigated

say the last cohort of people who went through your apprenticeship

programmes, how many of them have got jobs yet? There's a couple of

pathways here. One is the ones that's gone through the traditional

apprenticeship route, which tends to be quite successful in Scotland.

People in refrigeration, automobile engineering... They get jobs?

do. In some cases they are in employment when they come for the

apprenticeship programme. It's the other people seeking to enter the

market and there's a finite number of places. So it's people with

perhaps no skills or particular background. They are coming into

college because they have an interest in a particular programme.

The job that colleges have got and often the big challenge is we get

them in. We're training them through traditional programmes,

both practical and theoretical. But they need work experience, even

during that time. Whilst it's not a formal apprenticeship, per se,

we're still trying to link with industry and it's quite successful

in many aspects. There are other areas where it's extremely

difficult. Extremely difficult because presumably there's a

squeeze downwards. Once up get, as anecdotally we're told graduates

can't get jobs. They end up working in bars and cafes. So the people

who would normally work in bars and cafes, perhaps younger, less

skilled people, are not getting the jobs and they get nothing. Yes,

I've done work on this and it's certainly true since 2008 that the

better qualified are trading down in occupational ladder, which makes

it tougher for those at the bottom. You've done research in this. So

what extent? Is it true you have well qualified graduates doing what

effectively would have been thought of as service labour? Yes. I think

that's true. We have found substantial effects since the

beginning of 2008 indicating that that's the case. And where does

that leave us? We put so much effort and energy, over the past

ten years, in this idea that we want to get as many people as

possible into further education. We have almost half of young people

going into further education. They must be feeling a bit betrayed

after all the rhetoric that they come out the other end and there's

nothing for them. Yes. One of the things here is self-esteem and the

idea that frapz you do get a lost generation, if people are

repeatedly applying for jobs and getting nowhere. They gradually get

discouraged. Is that what happens? Yeah I think it is. The other

problem is that the other youths which are looking at these people

going through that's not an interesting role model. As they

watch their friends coming out the other end they're disincentivised.

We know in developing countries the issue of the knowledge economy is

extremely important. That's another angle to look at now is making sure

that the youth of this country, the young people are actually getting

the opportunity to see the benefits of education at the other end.

are they telling you? If you are someone now who is in the other

half of the population, who leaves school at 16, and maybe has a few

GCSEs, but that's it, the prospects must be pretty awful, aren't they?

Well, the ability to enter further education, that's not a stumbling

block. They're taken in at various levels. Even people with low

performance, on some cases, no school qualifications, particularly

in the North East of the city, that's a big, big problem. But

we're still open to taking people in with little or no skills and

developing that. Actually it doesn't matter at that level

whether it's a particular discipline. It may not meet the

immediate employment. It's about social skills. Of course it is.

Thank you both very much. Now, the Supreme Court giveth and

they taketh away. The SNP government was cock ahoop today

when the court ruled in its favour over asbestos related pleural

plaques. It said that Holyrood can make social laws as it wishes

within reason. But there was a sting in the tail. A warning this a

danger of a majority government at Holyrood might decide to legislate

to remove judges' rights to review sledge slaigs and said that wonts

be acceptable. In the UK's Supreme Court, seven

justices have been considering a case about the ability of Scots to

claim compensation for an asbestos- related condition. Pleural plaques

are scarring to the lining of the lungs, which indicate earlier

exposure to asbestos, in themselves they're not a disease, but

sufferers fear they can lead to more serious conditions. Judgment

in the appeal... The court ruled workers could sue their former

employers, but the case had much wider implications. Could the court

effectively strike down an act of the devolves Parliament? In issues

involving questions of social policy, which this case is, the

court should respect the judgment of the elected body as to what is

in the public interest unless that jiplt is -- judgment is manifestoly

without reasonable foundation. sovereignty of Holyrood is

apparently guaranteed. That's welcomed by ministers who claimed

in earlier spats with the Supreme Court over police interviews with

suspects and in the Gnat Fraser case, that the independence of

Scots law was being threatened. But Lord Hope still have a warning for

the Government. It is not entirely unthinkable that the Government

might seek to use this power to abolish judicial review or diminish

the role of the courts in protecting the interests of the

individual, whether this is likely to happen isn't the point. It's

enough that it might conceivably do so. He went on, the rule of law

require that's judges must retain the power to insist that

legislation of that extreme kind is not law, which the courts will

recognise. So the Supreme Court will continue

to monitor the laws passed by MSPs. Lord Hope has indicated it won't be

cowed by criticism of its decisions, even by elected politicians.

I'm joined by the editor of the firm magazine, Steven Raeburn. The

main thing was this judgment was good news for people with pleural

plaques. But there is a sting in the tail. Explain to us what the

significance is. In many ways, it firmly for the first time, explains

the clarity aware the Scottish Parliament sits in the framework of

the power structure of the UK. It states clearly there's a

Westminster Parliament, the mother of all parliments, then the courts

and then the Holyrood Parliament. That harks back very much to the

arguments over the Supreme Court in the summertime, where the Justice

Minister and the First Minister Alex Salmond which made remarks

about the framework of the rule of law. And did the Supreme Court even

have these powers. The language today was very interesting. Lord

Hope who was the recipient of the criticism in the summer time, gave

the judgment today. They made it clear that sort of talk won't be

tolerated by the court. argument is that while Westminster

is a sovereign body and that the courts, he seems to say the courts

may or may not have powers over Westminster in certain

circumstances. He's adamant in saying the Scottish Parliament was

set up by an act of the Westminster Parliament. That's the key

distinction there. It really has perhaps settled the debate which

really caught fire over the summertime between the judiciary,

the operation of the rule of law, whether the separation of powers

was a reality. The political interference in the courts was

alarming. It provoked very, very real joint statement from the Dean

of the Faculty of Advocates and the President of the law society who

said this dialogue is sort of political involvement in the rule

of law and it couldn't be tolerated. They warned of the danger of that.

I think Lord Hope is carefully and calmly and precisely had the last

laugh here and delivered the last words. In this judgment, the

Supreme Court has set out for good where the Assembly sits in the

framework. There is north side to this. One of the effects of the

specific decision on pleural plaques is it was couched in

language which basically said the Scottish Parliament can make

decisions on things that are broadly within its competence and

unless these are clearly unreasonable or ultra- varies

decision like we'll decide to do something with say, foreign affairs,

but which is not in their remit, maybe in grey areas we'll give them

the benefit of the doubt. It's drawn a large circle for the

Parliament to play in. The act only lifted a few exemptss about what

the Scottish Parliament would not be able to legislate for and left

it open. This has drawn the boundaries extremely widely and

they're far reaching. The judgment made it clear. I imagine while

obviously the Scottish Nationalists might not like some of the language,

this idea of a reasonable test, they might rather welcome. There's

something in this which they might not welcome though. It can't be co-

incidental that this evening, the Scottish affairs committee in

Westminster has issued two inquiries of its own about the

referendum on independence. There's a line in there as well. We have to

leave it there. We don't have time for the papers tonight. That's all

Hello there. We have a residue of cold air in Scotland and north-east

England. A bit chilly here first thing. But milder elsewhere under

the cloud. For most of us it is a grey start. The cloud tends to lift

and thin. Any rain and drizzle petering out. Some of us seeing

sunshine. It looks like it will be cloudy across northern England, but

drier in the afternoon. Not as chilly as it was today. Brightening

aup cross East Anglia. Not much sunshine through the Midlands or

the south-east. Through the West Country that could be a favoured

spot to see sunshine in the afternoon. For most of the day

Devon and Cornwall could be cloudy. Drizzle for a while over the moors.

For Wales, the north coast and maybe the marches could see

sunshine during the afternoon. It should be dry as well. It's been a

better day in Northern Ireland. Again, it should be dry tomorrow

with some sunshine, especially near the north coast. Some of the

sunniest weather around the Murray Firth and Aberdeenshire. Generally

cloud yay cross Scotland, but not as cold as it has been.

Temperatures rising over the next few days to 17 degrees.

Further south, we will see a lot of cloud on Thursday. Not much

sunshine. Better chance of seeing sunshine on Friday. As the cloud

breaks up as we introduce drier continental air. Sunshine