Olly Glover

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I pay tribute to the hon. Member for Amber Valley (Linsey Farnsworth) for securing this debate and the powerful points that she made, especially about how young people are often lazily demonised as being an idle generation. That view fails to take into account how much has changed since many of us here were young—which was more recently in some cases than in others, but let us move on from that quickly. In my Oxfordshire constituency, despite having perhaps the highest levels of house building in the country, housing costs remain completely out of reach for people on low incomes, and particularly young people. There is a real shortage of affordable housing, particularly for one and two-person households, with many houses having four, five or even six bedrooms. Transport costs are also very high. The world of skills is changing. I have a lot of high-tech, scientific industries in my constituency—space, biotech, fusion and so on—and we need to help young people to acquire these skills. As has been mentioned, NHS waiting lists can be a barrier to people entering the workplace, and I have many people in my constituency who are young carers. I am pleased that Be Free Young Carers supports them. I am not alone in my concern about this issue: Didcot B power station in my constituency cites housing costs as the biggest barrier to retaining talented people. As a result, therefore, many young people continue to live at home with their parents. In some cases, I am sure they love that, but in others, it could be a barrier to expressing their freedom and creativity as a young person. I am really pleased that Oxfordshire county council has an education, employment and training service supporting any young person in year 12 or 13 who is NEET or at risk of being NEET. I know the Government have a lot of ideas and good intentions on this, and I would be very keen to hear what the Minister will do to help young people not in employment, education or training in my constituency.