A project aiming to produce 100 ‘creative digital’ jobs for unemployed young people is being set up by New Deal of the Mind. Partner organisations, with a particular focus on archives and libraries which need material digitised, are currently being sought for the Digital Doomsday scheme. The first collaboration, with Bristol Old Vic, will employ young people to collect stories for its ‘Heart of Bristol’ project. Other partners on board so far include Uncommon People in Sheffield, the British Council think-tank Counterpoint and Screen England.
Meanwhile, Creative & Cultural Skills (CCS) has reported that more than 100 young people in long-term unemployment found work in the creative and cultural sectors last year through the now defunct Future Jobs Fund. Each employer received around £6,000 towards the young person’s salary for six months. With that funding now scrapped, CCS states it is “not currently in a position to offer employers the same level of funding to take on an unemployed young person”. Catherine Large, Director External Relations, told AP that CCS hopes to be able to continue to “unload some of the bureaucracy of taking on apprentices, by acting as employer for the apprentice, issuing the contract and managing all the details of salary payments”. CCS confirmed that “all employers have to do is pay the apprentice’s salary through us, plus a standard charge to cover the paperwork”.