Number of Neets passes 1m
The number of Neets, otherwise young people not in education, employment or work, jumped past 1m in the first three months of 2026, official data has revealed.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has said that there were 1,012,000 young people between the ages of 16 and 24 out of work in the first three months.
This is a rise from a previous figure of 957,000 in December 2025 while former health secretary Alan Milburn warned that the figure could reach 1.25m within five years in a report to be published on Thursday.
In his review on Neets, he is set to warn that Britain is at risk of creating a “lost generation” of young people as public money spent on benefits for under-25-years dwarfs investment in getting them into work.
The Blair-era health secretary will say that the country faces a “generational fault line” unless it confronts what he described as a whole-system failure, particularly around welfare.
The review found that for every £1 the Department for Work and Pensions spends on employment support for young people, around £25 is spent on benefits, which Milburn said reflected a welfare state “exacerbating inactivity” rather than building the capability needed to get young people into work.
He called for a shift to what he described as a “working state,” arguing that new programmes layered on top of a broken system could not work.
“We are at risk of a lost generation,” he is expected to say at the launch of the report on Thursday.
“The first rung of the career ladder has thinned. For too many young people it is now simply out of reach. That places them in a hopeless Catch-22 where employers ask for work experience but the opportunities for young people to gain it have narrowed or gone.”
Neets crisis is ‘shocking but not surprising’
The findings flatly rejected the idea that young people are unwilling to work.
Some 84 per cent of Neets surveyed said they wanted a job or training, but the system was failing to help them find one.
The review pointed to a labour market that has progressively closed off its entry points.
Some 1.6m fewer low and medium-skilled jobs exist in the economy than in previous decades while apprenticeship starts among young people have fallen 35 per cent over the last decade.
Milburn has also lamented the decline of Saturday jobs and lower vacancy levels across the hospitality sector.
Work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden said the report was commissioned to understand the factors driving youth unemployment.
He said: “We know there is more to do. I will work across government and with employers, charities and young people to drive real change, so more young people are earning or learning, not left behind.
“I look forward to working with Alan as he brings forward his final recommendations later this year.”
Marks & Spencer chief executive Stuart Machin said the findings were “shocking but not surprising,” adding that a Saturday job in retail had changed his own life and that there remained “a chance” to provide a similar path to every young person.
Several business executives have recently blamed the Labour government directly for deepening the Neets crisis. Next boss Lord Simon Wolfson said Reeves’ tax rises had squeezed entry-level jobs.
Phones 4u founder John Caudwell said AI would hit the jobs market “like a tsunami” while increases to the minimum wage and new red tape had already made youth unemployment “dreadful”.