Nationally, the number of young people not in employment, education or training peaked at 77,600 in September 2020. In September 2022, it was 66,200.
“This is around the same level as before Covid-19 in September 2019, but considering that other unemployment measures are sitting well below pre-Covid-19 levels, this only serves to highlight the continuing ineffectiveness of our employment market to integrate and upskill young people, despite historic low unemployment and labour shortages,” the report said.
Additionally, “urgent housing” continues to be “particularly problematic” in the Bay of Plenty region.
The report compared the public housing register to the number of public tenancies and found the Bay of Plenty, together with the Central and Taranaki regions, had the biggest demand for public housing.
It showed there were 2025 applicant households on the register as of September 2022 and 2952 public housing tenancies.
The Salvation Army’s social policy and parliamentary unit senior social policy analyst Paul Barber said the report was about looking at the state of the nation from the perspective of people on lower incomes or in marginalised communities.
“So we’re looking at the things that make a difference for them.”
Looking at the figures of young adults not in education, employment or training, Barber said it was “striking” how big the differences were regionally.
“If you look at the achievement rates, for instance, for students leaving school in the Bay of Plenty, they are among the lower achievement rates in the country as well. So you’re getting a kind of flow on, I guess, from not completing school with at least NCEA one ... and that makes it much more difficult for you to move on into other training or education or employment once you’re leaving school.”
Barber said there was a “strong link” between this and the “really high rates” of those who needed social housing in the Bay of Plenty.
“Many young people will be living in houses that are ... maybe uncertain, that maybe moving around a lot and that’s affecting their education and also their ability to find and hold work or pursue training.”
Barber said there were just over 2000 people waiting for social housing in the Bay of Plenty, with 2952 homes.
“Social housing doesn’t turn over that fast. That means long waiting times.”
He said the average wait time for a house in New Zealand was around 10 months.
Barber said it was a “real struggle” in the rental market for people due to rising costs.
“There’s a challenge ahead to make sure that we’re supporting people to try and get into private rental tenancies and look at how things like the accommodation supplement can be made to work better to help people stay in their tenancies or even find a place that they maybe don’t need to get into social housing.”
Barber acknowledged progress had been made with an increase in welfare assistance and people’s wages rising. Additionally, the number of those on the social housing waitlist had fallen nationally by 4000 since April.
“So there’s a real sign that perhaps we’re beginning to see some easing but we’ve still got a long way to go.”
