The Kickstart Scheme was set up by the government to help create work placements across England, Scotland and Wales. Each placement must provide 6 month’s work in a business in England, Scotland or Wales. The scheme is aimed at providing skills and jobs for 16 to 24 year olds who are on Universal Credit and deemed to be at risk of long term unemployment.
Eligible 16 to 24 year olds are allocated work placements with relevant employers. Employers can choose to employ the person or not.
The funding will be paid to the employer once the person is employed and being paid via PAYE. The funding for each job will cover 100% of the National Minimum Wage for 25 hours per week. It will also cover the employer's national insurance and work place pension contribution.
There is also an extra £1,500 available for each placement to help cover setup costs, support and training. Once the placement is set-up, a second person can take over from the first person once they have has completed their 6 month’s placement.
Any organisation can apply for funding under the scheme. The job placements created under the Kickstart Scheme must be for new jobs. They must not be to replace existing or planned vacancies or cause an existing person to lose their job or have their hours reduced.
The placements must be for a minimum of 25 hours per week, for six months and the persons must be paid at least the National Minimum Wage for their age category. In addition, the role should not require persons to undertake extensive job training before being able to start the job.
Each employer application under the scheme must demonstrate how it will help the person to develop their skills and experience, including support to look for long-term work e.g. careers advice and setting goals; support with CV writing, interview preparations and basic work skills e.g. attendance, timekeeping and teamwork.
An employer creating more than 30 placements as part of the scheme can submit their application directly through the HMRC website.
If an employer does not have positions for at least 30 people then they would need to apply via a partnership with other organisations to create a minimum of 30 placements between them before being able to apply. They could see their local Jobcentre for help with the latter.