Workers will help youths

Committee approves 8 positions

Councillors have approved the recruitment of eight additional development workers in a bid to continue to help disadvantaged young people in Rutherglen and Cambuslang succeed in life.

An executive committee last week gave the go ahead to recruit a further eight ASPIRE Vocational Development Workers.

They wi l l p rovide youth employability support to young people identified as being at risk of struggling to achieve and/or sustain a positive destination on leaving school.

There have been changes to the criteria of Youth Employability which now enables councils to offer support to all secondary establishments in South Lanarkshire.

There has also been a decision by the Scottish Government to change the criteria for referrals for Activity Agreements and the council are now able to offer support to young people during the last six months of school as well as post school to their 18th birthday.

The project will be called APSPIRE Youth Employability and it will operate in two parts to meet the funding criteria.

It will be funded by the current Scottish Government Activity Agreement Grant of £234,000 and core funding from education of £17,000 on top of a £220,000 from the European Social Fund.

The temporary posts would be for 24 months from this September until October 2018.

The council are also in the process of establishing an employer- led partnership with North Lanarkshire and East Dunbartonshire to help develop the young workforce.

Councillors approved the creation of a six-person executive team for the project, which is fully funded by the Scottish Government.

The partnership will include thousands of businesses and will cover and area with a population of 757,000 people and 48 secondary schools.

The posts will be in place for a fixed period of three years.