The Career Development Policy Group has put together a plan to maintain employment, productivity and progression post-Covid-19.
The Career Development Policy Group brings together a range of organisations who believe that it is important that citizens have an opportunity to access support in their careers. The group works with government and other stakeholders to develop policies and initiatives that support career development.
In the paper we argue that government needs to respond to the Covid-19 crisis by taking the following actions:
• In the short-term: A £26 million fund should be created to ensure that all education leavers, unemployed workers and those being made redundant following furloughing can access high quality career guidance between now and the end of 2020. This money could be channelled through existing agencies and used to take on additional careers professionals to deliver support where necessary. If 1 in 89 people who received a careers interview was able to find and keep a job that they otherwise would not have found, this service would pay for itself.
• In the medium-term the infrastructure for career guidance needs to be enhanced so that career guidance can be more consistently embedded across the lifecourse. A new careers strategy should be published in January 2021 to replace the current strategy which ends in 2020.
• In the long-term England needs a review of the current, fragmented career guidance system and the creation of a more robust lifelong guidance system.
