Mr Upton asserts jobs to end

Press, 30 May 1985, Page 4

Mr Upton asserts jobs to end

PA Wellington The number of jobless to be allocated for future Government employment programmes will be announced tomorrow. The Opposition's spokesman on employment, Mr Simon Upton, yesterday asserted that job-creation schemes managed by the Labour Department were about to be axed. He said the schemes included the Project Employment Programme, the Work i Skills Development pro- ' gramme, and the VoluntaryOrganisations Training Programme, he said. The Minister for Unemployment, Mr Burke, was unavailable for comment but a spokesman for his office said that last month the Government had an-

nounced the phase-down of some employment programmes. The Government said then that no new project or additional places would be approved for the Work Skills Development Programme. The phase-down of existing programmes would complement the development of new ones, the spokesman said. Details of numbers to be allocated for different work schemes in each labour district would be announced tomorrow. “The allocations are not being axed,” he said. Mr Upton said that the Government intended to slash its involvement in providing work for the unemployed. District offices of the

Labour Department were to oversee a “managed reduction” in the numbers on those schemes. Targets were being set that might involve a cut of up to a third by March with more to follow, he said. The decision represented a crushing defeat for Mr Burke “at the hands of the Treasury Minister.” The Treasury had persuaded the Government that since subsidising private sector job-creation was much cheaper, big savings in Government expenditure could be made by cutting back on public sector schemes such as P.E.P. Cuts in the Work Skills Development Programme in particular would be a disaster for the young and underskilled, Mr Upton said.