Youth inactivity is not a marginal issue, it’s a defining fault line in our economy, and the places feeling it most sharply are cities like Bradford.
Leeds and Bradford are neighbouring cities with a shared history and a connected labour market. But the opportunities open to young people in each look very different.
Leeds is moving ahead, buoyed by high-value industries and clear routes into professional work. In Bradford, for all its creativity and cultural strengths, too many young people still face limited progression, lower wages and fewer opportunities for social mobility.
This is not a failure of ambition. Bradford’s young people simply lack access to the routes that turn aspiration into opportunity.
The national data backs this up. Youth inactivity and unemployment remain higher in Bradford than Leeds, with some wards showing alarmingly high levels of disengagement among 16 to 24-year-olds.
This translates into long-term scarring in earnings, health and confidence. In a city that has just marked its year as UK City of Culture, that contradiction should concern us all.
Alan Milburn’s review is rightly focused on the scale of the problem. But the real test will be whether its conclusions recognise that youth inactivity is deeply place-based. National policy alone will not solve it.
The decision to move responsibility for skills into the Department for Work and Pensions is one of the most significant shifts in a generation. In theory, it offers an opportunity to better connect training with jobs and reduce the numbers of young people drifting out of the system. In practice, it could just as easily entrench short-term, work-first approaches that push young people into low-progression roles.
Whether this change helps or harms places like Bradford will depend on whether the government’s £820 million package of place-based employment support for high-need areas is matched by a clear commitment to skills development and progression, rather than treating entry into any job as an adequate measure of success.
Bradford’s challenge is not that work doesn’t exist. It’s that the pathways into good work are fragmented, poorly signposted and too often disconnected from the realities young people face. Colleges, employers, health services and employment support still operate in silos, even though the barriers young people experience are rarely a single issue.
Skills provision has to intervene early, support learners holistically and stay connected to the labour market beyond the first job.
In Bradford, that means making professional and technical pathways visible and local. High-value work exists across West Yorkshire, but too often young people feel they have to leave their city to access it. Skills routes into digital, health, green construction and the creative industries should be designed with regional employers and delivered in ways that feel attainable, not abstract.
It also means building ‘earn and learn’ routes that reduce risk. Short, paid pathways that blend learning with real jobs can be the tipping point between staying engaged and walking away, especially for young people who simply cannot risk studying without an income.
We must also fix the transition points where young people are most likely to disengage. The move from compulsory education into further education or work remains fragile for those facing disadvantage. Literacy, numeracy, confidence and wellbeing need to be embedded from the start.
Health cannot sit outside this conversation. Anxiety, long-term conditions and caring responsibilities are major drivers of inactivity.
Milburn’s review into the cause of rising numbers of NEETs must look beyond national levers and employment metrics. It needs to recognise that places like Bradford are not problems to be fixed, but systems to be enabled.
Real change will not come from redesigning benefits rules alone. It will come from skills systems rooted in local economies, connected to employers and designed around the realities of young people’s lives.
Bradford doesn’t need expectations to be lowered. It needs coherent pathways, joined up support and the confidence that investing in skills is about building futures, not just filling vacancies.
If we get this right, Bradford will not just close the gap with Leeds. It will show how skills can be our most powerful tool for tackling youth inactivity and restoring faith in opportunity.
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