Retail’s role in helping young people into work is under fire amid accusations of exploitation and pressure to make people do unpaid work, but protesters miss the point, reports Alex Lawson.

Tesco

At a time of high unemployment, especially among the young, retailers might imagine the efforts they are making to introduce the unemployed to the workplace and create jobs are recognised. Not so.

The outrage that greeted Tesco’s participation in a Government-backed work experience programme led to the grocer being denounced for “slavery” and made other retailers think twice about their involvement.

The rumpus, which has now been going on for a fortnight, has infuriated retail chiefs who are concerned about its implications.

“It’s an absolute nonsense,” maintains Waitrose managing director Mark Price. “We are offering people the opportunity to get some experience. There’s a great danger of throwing the baby out with the bath water.”

Price has been angered by the reaction to the Government’s scheme, called Work Experience, over the past two weeks, and is concerned that serious damage has been done to retail’s reputation for attempting to help young people into work. 

Just under 1 million of the 3 million people employed in retail are aged between 16 and 24 and most high street retailers have some kind of formal internship or apprenticeship programme.

But protests by the campaign group Right to Work, who two weekends ago shut down Tesco’s Portcullis House store in Westminster, have obscured the reality of such schemes and led some sections of the public to question retailers’ motives.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) operates the Work Experience scheme, which sits alongside its wider Work Programme to help the long-term unemployed back into work under the Get Britain Working umbrella. Work Experience offers young people under 25 the opportunity to have a six-week placement, with the opportunity to learn the trade and potentially be employed.

If the participant leaves before the end of the first week then their benefits are unaffected. If their departure is later than that, then they potentially lose benefits.

A DWP spokesman says: “Work experience is voluntary. If someone does not wish to go on the scheme, they do not have to, with no impact on their benefits.

“We have an excellent scheme that is popular with young people, with many employers big and small. So much so that the scheme is oversubscribed with people wanting to get on it.”

The DWP reports that, of the 34,000 people who have been through the Work Experience scheme, only about 200 people have failed to complete it and been sanctioned.

But in the light of the furore retailers including  maplin, Argos and Superdrug have suspended their involvement in the scheme and were due to meet with employment minister Chris Grayling. Asda has come in for criticism over its use of the scheme and HMV is reviewing its internal initiative following the row.

And Poundland has suspended its involvement in the Work Programme citing the mandatory nature of that programme as a main concern.

The row prompted former Marks & Spencer executive chairman Sir Stuart Rose to wade into the debate. He called on retailers to stick with work experience schemes. 

He said on Sky TV: “I find it quite baffling and I think it’s very sad. With 20-odd per cent of unemployment around the age of 18, kids are being led to believe that big business is exploiting them, which is nonsense.”

He added: “One or two [retailers] have shown a little less than backbone, if I might say so. I think you have got to stick with it. If there are one or two issues of administration in the process that need sorting out, then let’s sort it out, but it seems to me quite straightforward.”

He said the choice is clear for people on work schemes: “You can come in, you can get work experience and if you like it you can stay here and possibly get offered a job; if you don’t like it after the first week you can go away. I don’t get it, what’s the problem?”

Waitrose operates a two-week ‘Get Into Work’ experience programme in conjunction with the Prince’s Trust to develop a range of skills, and Price believes that critics’ attacks on retailers have been short-sighted.

He says: “People have been ill informed. The focus has all been on the shopfloor, but we offer work experience in all areas – IT, distribution and administration – there’s a whole range of jobs, but what’s focused on is people stacking shelves.”

A skills incubator

Skillsmart, which operates the National Skills Academy for Retail, also says that retailers offer great employment prospects. It works with Job Centre Plus (JCP) to offer the Retail Works pre-employment programme using training providers.

Skillsmart chief executive Anne Seaman says: “Five years ago retailers were saying that the candidates coming to them from JCP did not have the interpersonal skills and punctuality to work on the shopfloor.” Now, she says, 69% of those going through the scheme end up employed, which is a much higher level than the average in the private sector.

Seaman argues retail offers the “perfect breeding ground” for employment inside and outside the industry. “It’s an incubator for jobs,” she says. “Anyone who has worked in retail will always be employable as it gives key skills in teamwork and quick problem solving. Also, jobs are easy to come by as every town has retail jobs and vacancies come up quickly.”

BRC director of business and regulation Tom Ironside says: “Retail acts as a gateway. It has a history of taking on people without top qualifications and putting them in a good position to develop.”

There is plenty of opportunity within retail. 

Skillsmart expects retailers to employ 13,000 apprentices this year and awards those participating an external certificate, alongside the retailer’s internal reference, at the end of the placement.

“Apprenticeships help give a well-rounded view of the business and are a key part of a retailer’s succession planning. Retailers also use them to develop specialist skills such as working on bakery and meat counters,” Seaman adds. Moreover, some of the country’s biggest companies from Tesco to Iceland are run by men who began on the very bottom rung of retail.

An image problem

The work experience scheme’s detractors have cited the allegedly unskilled nature of the work and exploitation of ‘free labour’ as central concerns.

But retailers have assured that they are not replacing paid staff with the unemployed. Price observes: “The assumption is that this is free, but it’s actually an admin and training cost. We do not do it for free labour.”

He brands comments about a lack of skills in retail as “snobbish” and argues: “This scheme is well intentioned. The issue is around the benefits and we have to manage the negativity in the press in case it causes genuine damage.”

It is also worth noting that in white collar industries where jobs are often seen as more glamorous – such as the media – work experience or internship staff are relied upon to ensure the smooth running of the business.

Ironside believes this is not the case in retail. “Retailers are engaging constructively to offer people the opportunity to acquire worthwhile skills they otherwise would not have had,” he says. “Retailers are looking for people who have the skills in paid staff from day one, so would you expect that from work experience staff? The answer is no.”

Repairing the damage created by the Work Experience row may take time but will likely rely on two things: an adjustment of the programme and proof that those retailers that are participating are helping the young into work.

The latter is measurable. The former, an adjustment to the scheme, is likely to mean a reduction in the penalties on benefits if people pull out of the programme – that is what retailers such as Argos want. However, retailers will also be wary of the administrative costs of work experience staff who quit mid-programme.

The Tesco touch

Following the attacks on Tesco, the grocer took the decision last week to create a new scheme alongside the state programme, offering four-week paid work experience and a job interview.

Tesco UK chief executive Richard Brasher says: “This guarantee that a job will be available provided the placement is completed satisfactorily should be a major confidence boost for young people wanting to enter work on a permanent basis.”

A Tesco spokesman adds: “We have a wide range of schemes that help young people into work and improve their skills.

“Regeneration stores and the apprenticeship programme are just a couple of the many ways in which we develop the skills and training of our staff.

“We offer 17 graduate schemes, a trainee managers programme that takes post-A level students to managerial level in just six months, as well as a retail foundation degree. Securing a job at Tesco is just the first step to a career.”

Tesco is offering apprenticeships to over 2,000 staff this year including an NVQ Level 2 in Retail Skills and training in numeracy and communication.

In future, retailers are likely to benefit by emphasising the ambitions that can be realised from working in retail. Buying, customer service, IT, logistics and marketing are just some of the disciplines likely to come to the fore in debating the sector’s worth to youth development.

BRC director-general Stephen Robertson says: “Around 40% of adults had their first job in retail and there’s no doubt how important retail is to people. Ultimately, people have to understand the great opportunities a career in retail can offer.”

As the row of the last few weeks shows, those opportunities are misunderstood at present.

Work hopes for the young

Retailers have embarked upon training schemes of all sorts from which young people can benefit:

  • Sainsbury’s opened the UK’s first retail-led bakery college in Wellingborough in December 2009. The college is open 46 weeks of the year and has trained over 420 bakers and 100 bakery managers
  • Morrisons aims to have trained 100,000 colleagues through its Qualifications and Credit Framework by mid-2011. The grocer offers highly targeted meat and bakery apprenticeships
  • Marks & Spencer runs Marks & Start – the UK’s biggest company-led work experience scheme which has offered 4,000 placements since 2004
  • John Lewis employed the Skillsmart Retail Works pre-employment training programme at its High Cross, Leicester store and has now integrated the programme into other stores
  • B&Q has put 150 trainees through its Apprenticeship in Retail Skills programme alongside the 20,000 employees that have attained a City & Guilds qualification during 2011
  • Boots offers pre-registration to 20% of pharmacy graduates from UK universities and summer placements to around 1,600 pharmacy students

Source: BRC Retail in Society, Britain’s Favourite job report

Jobs in retail

  • Retail is the UK’s largest private sector employer 3 million people are employed in the sector
  • One in every eight households including someone who works in retail
  • Just under a third of employees are aged between 16 and 24
  • In 2011, 13,000 retail apprenticeships were completed and 65% of all employees in the sector were given training equivalent to 14 working days
  • The retail workforce is one of the UK’s most diverse. It comprises:62% women, 13% disabled workers – in line with the UK population, 12% ethnic minority workers in proportions reflective of local populations

Shopfloor to top floor

Some of retail’s best known leaders started on the shopfloor including:

Sir Terry Leahy

Sir Terry Leahy

Sir Terry Leahy

Ex-Tesco

Philip Clarke Tesco

Geoff Quinn TM Lewin

Malcolm Walker Iceland

Andy Clarke Asda

Sir Stuart Rose Ex-Marks & Spencer