Nick Clegg today launched an attack on “informal internships” in an effort to end the culture of “who you know.”
The Deputy Prime Minister said that these informal internships would be stamped out altogether in Westminster, and he called on businesses to do the same.
He pointed out that the many young people enjoy unfair advantages because of who they or their parents know. He called for an end to preferential treatment because of acquaintances “at the tennis club or the golf club.”
The government is calling on businesses to sign a “compact” that commits them to ensuring that internship schemes offer opportunities “to the broadest possible spectrum of society.”
Thousands of businesses across the country currently use unpaid interns. These positions are often illegal, with many interns in fact being entitled to be paid the National Minimum Wage.
But the government has been unwilling to enforce internship law as both Westminster and MPs’ constituency offices are run on unpaid internships.
The government will launch its social mobility and child poverty plans today.
Image courtesy Liberal Democrats.
