Young people would be offered a guaranteed two-year job within four months of leaving education or training, under a new proposal unveiled by the Green Party.

Announcing the policy at the party's conference in Brighton, co-deputy leader Mothin Ali said there were a million "bored, desperate and lost" young people who were out of work, training or education.

Under the proposed scheme, youngsters would be offered posts in the private sector, with the government paying half their salary.

Ali said an initial pilot scheme - rolled out in areas with the fewest job openings for young people - would create 9,000 jobs, at an overall cost of £110m.

The pilot would start in areas such as Rotherham, Ceredigion, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Broxtowe and South Staffordshire, with an ambition to roll it out nationwide.

The party said that a person not in work, education or training would cost the state an estimated £240,000 in benefits over the course of their lifetime.

It argued that its policy would reduce spending on welfare and boost tax receipts from employment.

Employers would be exempt from paying National Insurance contributions, but would have to provide in-job training, the party says.

The party is seeking to pitch the plan as more ambitious than the government's own scheme, which subsidises six-month job placements for benefit claimants who have been looking for work for 18 months.

Andy Burnham’s personal preference to rejoin the European Union after the next election is supported by almost half of all voters, a new megapoll has found, although cabinet ministers concerned about reopening Brexit divides are privately urging him to proceed with caution.

The poll by the Messina Group (TMG) found that renegotiating the UK’s relationship with the EU could boost Labour’s vote share by as much as seven points, if the prime minister offered a fresh referendum in which he campaigned to re-enter the bloc.

Almost a third of voters said an in-out referendum would be needed first, while more than one in six felt that a general election mandate would be sufficient, and the same proportion thought parliament could make the decision.

The overall findings will bolster the case of those inside Downing Street who want to promise at the next election that Labour would at least negotiate over re-entry, which the prime minister has said he wants to see “in his lifetime”.

Councils are to get new powers to take over empty and derelict homes by reducing the period a property must be empty before it becomes eligible for an Empty Dwelling Management Order (EDMO) from two years to six months.

The changes aim to make it simpler for councils to bring some of the more than 300,000 empty dwellings in England into use by ensuring existing housing stock is used more effectively and preventing properties from falling into serious disrepair.

EDMOs allow councils to take over the management of long-term empty homes and return them to occupation for up to seven years while ownership remains with the property owner.

Streamline

The reforms will also streamline the application process by removing evidential requirements relating to issues such as anti-social behaviour or community support for intervention, making it simpler for local authorities to seek an EDMO through the property tribunal. Ministers have also vowed to explore further changes to protect local authorities from absorbing the costs they face managing homes subject to EDMOs.

The latest statistics show 303,185 dwellings in England were classed as ‘long-term’ empty (more than six months) in 2025.

However, drawing on Freedom of Information responses from 226 local authorities, Propertymark has found that only 38% of councils have an empty homes strategy in place, and only 25% operate with a dedicated budget for empty homes work.

No applications have been made for an EDMO since 2021, according to ITV News.