Careers Services

History, Policy and Practice in The United Kingdom

David Peck

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2004
• ISBN:
  9781134301454
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Pedagogía
• Subtopic: Educación general

From the pre-war Juvenile Employment Service to the diversity provided by Careers Scotland, Careers Wales, Connexions and Guidance Partnerships for Adults, David Peck analyzes the origins and development of careers guidance over the past one hundred years.

Each new development in U.K. careers services is related to wider changes in social, education and economic policy, with references made throughout to major political figures with an interest in career choice, from Winston Churchill to Tony Blair. Particular attention is paid to the growth of a professional ethic among careers advisers: their training, qualifications and practice.

This is the first ever published work to cover the history of the careers services in the U.K. Wide-ranging and meticulously researched, this book will make a significant contribution to the increasingly urgent debate on the future of career guidance, and for the first time calls the professionals to examine their past in order to improve and inform the future of careers services and their clients.

Practitioners working in schools, further and higher education or with adults and young workers, student careers advisers and their tutors, should find this book an essential and comprehensive resource.

Chapter 1
1902–1948 juvenile employment and welfare
Work that is essentially educational

The year 1902 marks the end of the Victorian era and the beginning of a new age of public and social administration which, of course, includes the provision of career advice. From the beginning there were separate approaches. Herbert Heginbotham, The Youth Employment Service (1951) describes the ‘educational side’ of the argument for an official body to advise young people about employment, gathering strength from the 1902 Education Act and the education authorities which replaced the Victorian School Boards. This was different from the approach of the influential individuals and associations who had originally set up the first ‘registers’. Working within the traditions of Victorian paternalism they had expected to continue to advise young people directly. Staff, where they were employed, were to perform clerical work rather than interview and advise.

But 1902 was also a significant year for an alternative approach to finding appropriate jobs for young people. The Labour Bureaux (London) Act was passed, marking progress within the labour exchange movement. Here again the impetus had come originally from the voluntary tradition through agencies set up on a philanthropic basis to help unemployed men find jobs. The first was the Egham Free Registry, established in 1885. William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, opened several ‘labour registries’ in 1890. He included waiting rooms with tables where registrants could write applications for jobs. Brian Showler in The Public Employment Service (Showler 1976) records that there were 25 public labour bureaux and 17 private bureaux operating nationally in 1893. The ten operating in London were administered by the local authority until 1899 when it was realised that expenditure for this purpose was ultra vires (illegal). The 1902 legislation recognised their value by putting them on a firm statutory basis.

Local authorities outside London were later empowered to follow this lead, through the Unemployment Workmen’s Act 1905: few did so however. William Beveridge, the leading exponent of labour exchanges, was so convinced of the value of a national network that he influenced Winston Churchill, President of the Board of Trade, who consequently introduced the Labour Exchanges Bill, which would become law in 1909. While principally designed for use by adults, labour exchanges would also place young people in jobs.

Churchill’s reputation as a social reformer has suffered at the hands of some historians but his early vision was extraordinary. Roy Jenkins in Churchill (2001: 147) records his letter to Asquith in 1908 when he called for:

1. Labour Exchanges and Unemployment Insurance;
2. National Infirmity Insurance, etc.;
3. Special Expansive State Industries – afforestation, roads;
4. Modernised Poor Law;
5. Railway amalgamation with state control and guarantee;
6. Education compulsory till 17.

There was, however, a general suspicion of the Board of Trade amongst educationalists. Industrialists and employers in general were still seen as the exploiters of workers, especially young workers, a prevalent view in the previous century. The Board was seen as representative of employers, opposed to the continuation of education beyond school and against the raising of the school-leaving age which was then 14 (or 13 in some cases).

The debates on this Bill did much to stimulate the interest of education committees, teachers and voluntary workers in the problems of school leavers and their entry to employment. Gerrold Milsted (Milsted 1960) remembered MPs taking the view that greater efforts to help young people would eventually have the effect of reducing adult unemployment. He was sceptical of Churchill’s assurances that labour exchanges would take special care in the placing of juveniles, setting up advisory committees including representatives of education to oversee the quality of work. Churchill maintained, however, that there was no intention of placing upon labour exchanges the primary responsibility for placing young people in employment: he foresaw a co-operative arrangement with education authorities.

A pamphlet unearthed by Harry Foster of Derbyshire (1965), ‘The Derby Labourers Hire 1903’ commented on the difficulty faced by headteachers in interesting parents in school leavers’ choice of worthwhile work and called for the appointment of one official for each town who would visit all schools, convince some parents to lengthen the period of schooling, advise on the best openings and influence some to enter technical training: ‘For less than £200 per year a fatherly supervision might be exercised that may save many a one from shipwreck and disaster.’ Heginbotham (1951) points out that the movement towards an official organisation to advise young people about employment had been growing steadily in the period from 1902–1909. In 1904 Mrs Ogilvie Gordon produced a detailed scheme for ‘Educational Information and Employment Bureaux’ for young people to be opened throughout the United Kingdom. Each bureau was to be controlled by a joint committee of members of the Education Committee and representatives of Chambers of Commerce, Trades Councils and other interested bodies. The aims of the bureaux would be to lead individual boys and girls towards employment which they would find congenial and financially rewarding and, at a more general level, promote closer co-operation between schools and employers.

Each bureau was to be administered as part of education. The ‘Director of the Bureau’ was to interview and advise children and their parents, keep in touch with the requirements of employers, keep records and work closely with evening institutes and voluntary bodies.

This scheme was submitted to the President of the Board of Education and the Secretary of State for Scotland with strong support from teachers’ associations and trade unions. Edinburgh, Nottingham and Cambridge were among the first to take practical steps to put it into practice.

Meanwhile, the Labour Exchanges Act had become law in 1909 with its own proposals for helping young people. The Board of Education was not satisfied with these arrangements however and introduced the Education (Choice of Employment) Bill. During the debate on this bill Winston Churchill made it clear that he envisaged a system where in some areas the service to young people would be, in Heginbotham’s words, ‘more in the hands of the Labour Exchange and in others more in the hands of the Education Authority’ (1951).

The Education (Choice of Employment) Act (1910) subsequently gave power to local education authorities (normally county councils and county borough councils) to make arrangements, with the approval of the Board of Education, to give assistance in choosing employment to children up to the age of 17. This would involve the collection of information and the giving of information and advice. Similar powers had been given to School Boards in Scotland in 1908. A subsequent joint memorandum from the Boards of Education and Trade urged education authorities to take up their powers and submit ‘model schemes’ for approval. And so through separate legislation passed in successive years responsibility was divided. The two departments concerned then made an arrangement that in areas where education authorities had taken responsibility they should interview, advise and register juveniles. The labour exchange would register vacancies, place juveniles in work and review their progress.

The practical issues arising from divided responsibility soon became apparent despite a joint memorandum from the Boards of Education and Trade

requiring co-operation. Arrangements would vary from area to area. Officers of the education authority and the labour exchange would be expected to co-operate, working sometimes in the same office, but would have different responsibilities. One would be responsible for giving advice, the other for placing in work. The joint memorandum itself laid down procedures to be used in the event of a difference of opinion. As Heginbotham points out:

Under this system a boy who wanted to be a clerk might be advised by the Education Officer to wait for a special vacancy, but calling in the next room for placing, another type of vacancy might be offered. Returning to the Education Officer he might be advised to refuse the vacancy offered.

(Heginbotham 1951: 44)

Despite the awkward administrative framework within which they worked, individual officers were soon engrossed in their tasks. Gerrold Milsted remembers that he and his ‘Board of Trade Co-operating Officer’ agreed that their first loyalty was to the boys and girls they worked for. Working to improve their life chances for them must have seemed straightforward. The approach certainly wasn’t value-free. Leaflets issued by the Edinburgh School Board provide a good example. ‘Thoughts for a Boy on Choosing Work’ (Smith 1911) gives clear instructions:

• Learn a trade if you get the chance.
• Learn to work with your hands – that will make your brain strong.
• Stick to your school ’til the last possible moment.
• Remember that you can receive instruction at day continuation schools.

‘Thoughts for a Girl Choosing Work’ is similarly blunt:

• Choose healthy work.
• Be brave and cheerful in whatever you choose to do.

But both leaflets are clear about the essentials: the importance of careful decision-making, involving parent and teachers and, perhaps most important of all, to young people unused to receiving help, the address of the office (open late on one evening each week) where they could get advice on changing jobs. To many who might previously have known only about casual jobs passed on by friends or family this would be a great step forward.

Before any substantial progress could be made the 1914 war began. The few juvenile employment bureaux which had opened became little more than registration offices for young people entering munitions factories and other essential but often repetitive war work, usually involving little training or choice. By-laws were relaxed and many children left school early. Heginbotham reports that their morale fell and juvenile delinquency increased. But the war seemed to focus attention on a range of social issues. Among these was the need for better arrangements to improve the transition from school to work and deal with the overlap between the Boards of Trade and Education.

The context of ‘choice of employment work’ was changing. Theories of vocational guidance were emerging. Elton Mayo and F.W. Taylor were applying industrial psychology to personnel selection. Cyril Burt, appointed as a psychologist to the Education Department of the London County Council in 1913, was turning his attention to a study of psychological factors relevant to vocational guidance. Developments like these were to set the scene for major experiments in London and Birmingham in the 1920s, both involving the National Institute of Industrial Psychology, founded by C.S. Myers in 1921.

Within this broader context, developments were also taking place out-with the public employment services. Universities had traditionally relied upon their graduates entering a proscribed group of occupations, facilitated easily by personal and social contacts. By 1914, however, Cambridge and five other universities had set up appointments services. Nine more followed between the two world wars (Watts 1996). The example set by Cambridge directly influenced private schools. Headmasters and house masters had always been involved in giving advice but in the 1920s some set up appointments boards. Boys were taught to write letters and how to be interviewed before being submitted to employers. The Headmasters’ Employment Committee, based in London, adopted another approach. Financed by the Ministry of Labour, it provided a placement service for boys from schools within a radius of about 50 miles of the city.

Meanwhile, practitioners in the mainstream public sector were reacting to developments in industrial psychology and elsewhere, and responding collectively to the needs of their clients. Juvenile employment officers were beginning to meet together as early as 1914 when many already believed that ‘our raison d’être was to fight for the idea that the education and training of the adolescent was more important than finding him a job’ (NAJEWO 1928).

The initiative taken in 1918 to form a ‘Conference of Juvenile Employment Officers’ was an acknowledgement of a common identity and the need to apply the use of professional expertise and theory to the needs of young people. This was to lead to the formation of the Association of Juvenile Employment and Welfare Officers in 1922.

By the end of the First World War in 1918 it was apparent that the administrative confusion left by the 1909 Labour Exchanges Act and the Education (Choice of Employment) Act was incapable of delivering a service sufficient to meet the needs of young people in the post-war period. A Ministry of Reconstruction report, ‘Juvenile Employment During the War and After’, revealed that the expected industrial transition would lead to widespread dismissal of young workers. Girls would be especially at risk as men returned from the forces. A new policy was necessary for dealing with juvenile employment overall.

One immediate response was to pass the Education Act 1918, which introduced a uniform school-leaving age of 14 throughout the county and raised the age limit for young people attending juvenile employment bureaux from 17 to 18. A departmental committee then recommended more financial aid to LEAs taking up their choice of employment powers.

But LEAs were becoming increasingly concerned about the attitude of the Ministry of Labour, which they accused of interference and outright competition. A letter from the Association of Education Committees to the Board of Education in 1919 described the competition between the arrangements set up by one government department with those of another as wasteful of funds and a public scandal. If the service was to be made efficient and effective the conflict must cease. Lord Chelmsford was therefore appointed to head an enquiry and make recommendations.

Chelmsford reported in 1921. He found that the 1911 arrangements, whereby LEAs were responsible for advice and labour exchanges responsible for placing in employment, were unworkable and should be abandoned. He believed there was no inherent reason why either the LEA or the Ministry should not carry out the work efficiently, but whichever was responsible should undertake the full range of duties including the payment of unemployment insurance, work for which LEAs should receive direct payment. LEAs should, therefore, be offered another opportunity to take up their choice of employment powers. The reorganisation which followed in 1922 meant that the great majority of county boroughs and most counties became responsible for choice of employment work. The dual system of administration remained but a workable compromise had been reached.

The question of central government responsibility still had to be resolved. The Committee on Education and Industry, under the chairmanship of Mr D.O. Malcolm, was asked therefore: ‘To enquire into and advise upon the public systems of education in England and Wales in relation to the requirements of trade and industry, with particular reference to the adequacy of the arrangements for enabling young persons to enter into and retain suitable employment.’

The Malcolm Committee recommended that the dual responsibility for choice of employment work shared by the Board of Education and Ministry of Labour should be ended and that the Ministry of Labour should assume full responsibility. LEAs should, however, be given a free hand to develop their services individually as far as possible and the Ministry should set up a National Advisory Council for Juvenile Employment on which LEAs should be strongly represented. The government accepted these recommendations in March 1927. Responsibility was transferred to the Ministry of Labour in 1928. The Juvenile Employment Service had at last achieved sensible local working arrangements under unambiguous central direction.

The decade between 1918 and 1928 had seen a steady increase in the confidence, competence and influence of juvenile employment officers. The Association of Juvenile Employment and Welfare Officers had been influential in the debates on the Chelmsford and Malcolm reports and had urged the Association of Education Authorities to press their members to take up choice of employment powers and providing advice on a range of practical issues such as the payment of unemployment insurance benefits. The first volume of the Association’s magazine issued in 1928 opens with a formal greeting from the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Labour, which in itself suggests strong official approval of the Association and its aims. Most of the articles and debates, however, reflect members’ concern about the day to day issues affecting young people: welfare of children employed in the theatre; providing clothing for needy interviewees; farm training and apprenticeships.

The association soon forged a close relationship with the newly formed National Institute of Industrial Psychology (NIIP). Interest in psychometric testing amongst JEOs was extremely strong. Officers in Birmingham began their own research in 1925, immediately after the Chelmsford reforms had been put into operation. Impressed by the work of the NIIP in London schools, Birmingham LEA seconded two officers for training and then carried out a carefully controlled experiment to assess the value of testing in a number of schools. They subsequently trained a number of teachers and JEOs in testing and interpretation respectively. The results and their indications were then passed to JEOs for discussion with pupils and parents at the ‘choice of employment conference’ (careers interview).

Birmingham concluded that: ‘The adoption of scientific methods in vocational guidance improves considerably the advice that can be given to children leaving school’ and that: ‘It is possible to give vocational guidance to all, providing trained teachers are available to apply psychological tests and JEOs are competent to interpret them’ (Innes 1932: 64).

The increasing importance of the Juvenile Employment Service and the National Association of Juvenile Employment Officers continued during the period 1929 to 1939. The Association held two conferences each year and attracted speakers such as R.H. Tawney and the President of the Federation of British Industry.

The King and Queen visited the Cardiff bureaux in 1931. In 1937, conference was addressed by Ernest Bevin who was to become Minister of Labour, a member of the war cabinet and, later, Foreign Secretary. The advice of JEOs and their association was sought by Select Committees on the Shops Acts and by the Government when considering further education, industrial legislation and a variety of other employment topics. They were able to influence the age of entry to insurance which was subsequently lowered to include young people aged 15 by the Unemployment Act of 1936 (although its implementation was to be delayed by the outbreak of war in 1939 and postponed until after the war or ‘for the duration’, as it was often expressed.)

By no means all the work of the JEOs involved innovation. County Durham’s Handbook for the Use of Officers in Juvenile Employment Bureaux, written in about 1936, gives a useful insight into their more routine work. Descriptions of the duties of the JEO and the ‘Woman Officer’ (work with boys and girls was largely confined to officers of the same sex) show the importance of unemployment insurance work and the amount of time and effort devoted to claims for benefit. The links between the officer in charge and headteachers together with the careful arrangements for inviting pupils and their parents to interviews in schools demonstrate how far the service had become part of the educational scene. Clear notes on employer visiting, vacancy filling and placing of young people ‘in other districts’ show systematic attention to the needs of young people and employers.

Other examples, taken at random from records held in Dundee and Warrington in the 1930s, reinforce the quality of occupational knowledge and information. Dundee’s annual summary of local occupations for juveniles covered wages, holidays, training and promotion prospects for...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Careers Services
• Acknowledgement
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: 1902–1948 juvenile employment and welfare Work that is essentially educational
• Chapter 2: 1948–1974 youth employment Capacities, inclinations and opportunities
• Chapter 3: 1974–1994 careers A progress through life
• Chapter 4: 1994–2000 careers companies
• Chapter 5: 2000–2001 Connexions and disconnections The best start in life for every young person
• Chapter 6: Diversity and divergence
• Chapter 7: Some conclusions
• Addendum
• Bibliography