DWP’s McFadden wants more kids on paper rounds – we might be able to help

Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) chief Pat McFadden has blamed youth unemployment on the fact that nobody has a paper round anymore.  Which is why it’s pretty lucky that the Canary has just launched a newspaper.

DWP unemployment review is a farce

Later this week will see the release of the Milburn Review interim report into youth unemployment. As part of its mission to prove that young people are faking disabilities for benefits, the government commissioned a review into ‘rising youth inactivity’. The review will tackle young people Not in Employment, Education of Training, handily nicknamed NEETs.

The review is authored by former health secretary Alan Milburn, who, in 2024, also wrote a report which called for disabled people to be pushed into work. It also called for the government to cut benefits except for those with “severe disabilities”. This was, of course, adopted as part of the Universal Credit Act last summer.

The interim report of the review is expected to be released this week, and in classic DWP fashion, the corporate rags are full of benefits hate and calling young people lazy wasters.

McFadden’s hard paper round

There’s also a fair amount of ridiculous comment pieces by clueless current and former DWP gobs on sticks. Esther McVey, for example, is in her Express column saying there’s actually a REAL reason why youth unemployment is so high and that reason is that employment is so expensive. Yeah, I haven’t got a clue either.

Current DWP boss Pat McFadden, however, is in the Telegraph talking about how kids today just don’t know the meaning of hard work.

It says it all that a government minister, and one in charge of such a scrutinised department, is allowed to write for such a discriminatory paper.

Writing in the Telegraph, he said:

Everyone remembers their first job. The first time they got paid. Money that they earned – not money they were given. It’s a great feeling, but one that too many young people today are not experiencing.

My first job was aged 13, delivering newspapers before school. Later, I stacked shelves in the local supermarket and cut people’s grass.

He carried on:

But many of the routes I and my generation had are not there or harder to get to now. News is online now, and retail employment has been in decline for a decade as we change our shopping habits.

That activity of getting up in the morning, going to work, being told what the job is, meeting your colleagues, making friendships is a critical part of growing up.

And he still continued:

And on that first rung is work experience – getting the chance to get into the structure and rhythm of the workplace. It has declined over many years, and the pandemic generation missed out altogether.

So basically, the reason more kids are on benefits is that they don’t have paper rounds. Not because they’re a generation that’s besieged by mental health issues, and are products of the world they’ve grown up in.

We can help you

Well, if you want more kids getting back into paper rounds, do we have some good news for you, Pat. This week saw the Canary launch a daily physical newspaper, which will be in over 8,000 newsagents across the country.

However, it almost definitely won’t be the type of news McFadden wants to read.

As the launch article said:

After 10 years of bringing you truth without agenda online, the Canary has now done what no left-wing media outlet has done in decades: launch a daily print newspaper. It is set to challenge every mainstream media outlet. Plus, it will bring the Canary’s no-nonsense news that disrupts power to a wider audience. And, you just know the MSM and establishment are going to hate it, too.

So if you want to ‘rescue’ young people from unemployment, we’re here. But considering just how much the Canary has held the DWP to account, we won’t be counting on him as one of our readers.

Featured image via the Canary