Tinder Foundation Employability Specialist Network Event - 25th June 2014 Presentation from Julia Lyford (NCDNetwork)

1. Rural Employability Support Online

2. About NCDN
• Supporting people who support communities
• Networking and partnership-working
• Targeting groups experiencing discrimination
• Creating a voice for and with excluded people
• Skills and Learning
• Information – sharing
• Employability specialist - Dyscovered

3. Key Facts about Northumberland
• Home to 316,000 people and covers an area 5013km2
• With 97% of its area classed as rural, the county is
sparsely populated with 63 people per km2
• Half of the county’s population live in the 3% of urban land
found in the south east of the county
• In-migration keeps the county’s population growing
• 9,000 residents (3%) classify themselves an non-white
with the greatest number of these being Asian
• 30% of the adult population are economically inactive
• Unemployment levels are broadly consistent with the
national average
• Almost one in ten of the population live in one of the most
deprived areas of England

4. Connectivity
• NCDN works with
iNorthumberland ii a
partnership initiative
with the aim of bringing
superfast broadband to
homes and businesses
across the county.
• The following shows the
current state of play, and
illustrates the extent of
the issues for people
living in deep rural areas.

5. Rural unemployment
•Transport and access
•Accessibility of training /work / apprenticeships
•Casual / low paid work
•NE focus on growth businesses
•Housing issues for young people leaving home
•55+ age group growing
•Over 17,000 sanctions in Northumberland

6. Barriers and Challenges
• Connectivity
• Too sparsely spread to sustain groups
• Village culture – difficult to disclose
• Rural / urban divide
• Lack of local specialist support e.g. for unemployed
people with additional learning needs
• Welfare reform changes too much to take in at once
• Our volunteers’ knowledge and experience
• Volunteer travel

7. Example from our blog...
• A lady has been unable to attend other
sessions due to poor transport, last week she
did manage to call into the Post office to ask if
an earlier session could be held on the
morning other sessions are held. But she can
only stay for approx. 45 mins due to transport
problems. The digital volunteer agreed but
now the session / travel take over 8 hrs.

8. Universal Job Match
• Access to online facilities
• Access to equipment
• Connectivity
• Access to print facilities
• Support for following up
• Access to ‘local’ job opportunities
• Other needs of less literate clients
• Volunteer knowledge

9. Solutions
• 1 to 1
• Offline
• Links to wider employability support
programme
• Volunteer training
• Targeted pro-active interventions
• Partnership – JCP, Libraries,
• Cafe culture - Private sector backing

10. Solutions
• 1 to 1
• Offline
• Links to wider employability support
programme
• Volunteer training
• Targeted pro-active interventions
• Partnership – JCP, Libraries,
• Cafe culture - Private sector backing