Milburn Review Calls for Subsidised Jobs for Disabled Young People

Alan Milburn’s review calls for the British state to create and subsidise paid jobs for thousands of disabled young people.

By Career Ahead AI · United Kingdom — AI-assisted, fact-verified against cited sources. Readers should verify key facts.

Flexi-jobs would let disabled workers set their hours

The review is due to report this month, and a full report is expected this autumn. It recommends a Danish-style “flexi-job” scheme alongside employment subsidies and intensive skills support for disabled and chronically ill people aged 16 to 24. The scheme guarantees participants employment while letting them set hours to suit their capacities; in some cases, work can start at four hours a week. The government tops up wages.^¹²³⁴⁵

The proposals also include “job carving”: dividing an entry-level job into its component tasks and matching young people to the work they can do. A retail role combining stock-filling, till work and locking up could become separate job opportunities. The review’s approach is to shape roles around individual capabilities, rather than require each worker to take on every task in a standard job.^¹²³⁵

The review also urges large employers to adopt voluntary employment targets for disabled people aged 16 to 24. It stops short of recommending statutory quotas. That approach places the proposed hiring targets with employers, while the job subsidies and skills support would be government measures.^¹²³⁴⁵

Disabled young people face higher risks of being out of work About a million young people are classified as Neet, meaning they are not in education, employment or training.

Disabled young people face higher risks of being out of work

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About a million young people are classified as Neet, meaning they are not in education, employment or training. Nearly half of them, 45%, are disabled or in ill health. Disabled young people are three times as likely to be Neet as their non-disabled peers. Alan Milburn, the review’s author and a former Labour cabinet minister, has called rising Neet numbers a moral and economic crisis and warned of a “lost generation”.^¹²³⁴⁵

The review was commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions to examine the causes of rising economic inactivity among young people. Its interim report set out initial findings across the labour market, education, health and welfare systems. It also found that the number of young people with disabilities, mental health issues, and school suspensions and exclusions had grown by more than 75%.^¹²³⁴⁵

In 2024/25, nearly half of young people reported having a disability, more than double the 21.1% recorded in 2013/14. Young people considered to have special educational needs or disabilities are around 80% more likely to be Neet. DFN Project SEARCH said the disabled Neet rate had nearly doubled since 2011 and that young people with an education, health and care plan were 80% more likely to become Neet.^¹²³⁴⁵

The review links employment support to benefit spending

Depression, bad nerves or anxiety were the most commonly reported conditions among disabled Neets, at 23.8%. Autism accounted for 22.7%, while other health problems or disabilities accounted for 18.5%. Nearly half of 24-year-old Neets had never worked. Milburn argued in his interim report that abandoning young people from the Covid era who faced depression, anxiety, autism and ADHD risked scarring their life chances and lifetime earnings.^¹²³⁴⁵

Milburn has proposed redirecting some of the £4bn a year spent on disability benefits for young people into comprehensive employment and training support. The proposals echo Remploy, a postwar scheme that created state-funded workplaces providing sheltered employment for disabled ex-service personnel. Remploy had 90 factories across the UK at its height; the last closed in 2013.^¹²³⁴⁵

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Milburn has rejected what he called myths about young people being “snowflakes”, saying the crisis in youth mental health is real. Sense chief executive James Watson-O’Neill said disabled people should not have to fit around systems that were not built for them, and called on government, employers and public services to create environments where they can contribute and live with dignity. Disability Rights UK’s Bethany Bale said the organisation did not support the report’s backing of the Government’s SEND reforms, citing concerns about limits to school support and Universal Credit cuts for people under 22.^¹²³⁴⁵

Young people considered to have special educational needs or disabilities are around 80% more likely to be Neet.

Flexi-jobs signal new hiring norms

If you are a disabled or chronically ill worker aged 16 to 24, the proposed Danish-style flexi-job scheme changes what you can ask for: guaranteed employment with hours starting at four per week and government-topped wages. When negotiating, cite the model of shaping roles around your capacities rather than fitting a standard job, and ask whether an employer can carve tasks like stock-filling or till work into separate opportunities. This gives you a concrete template for part-time or task-specific roles that previously seemed unavailable.^¹²³⁴⁵

For employers and recruiters, the review's voluntary targets for hiring disabled young people signal a shift toward measuring inclusion by outcomes, not just policies. With nearly half of Neets disabled or in ill health and the disabled Neet rate nearly doubling since 2011, hiring managers should plan for more candidates with mental health conditions or autism, the most reported categories. Expect pressure to redesign entry-level jobs into modular tasks and to pair subsidies with intensive skills support, so budget for flexible scheduling and task-based role design.^¹²³⁴⁵