Best welfare is helping to secure and hold a job

12 OCTOBER 2016: The best form of welfare government can provide is to fund initiatives that help people to find and keep a job. The Liberal National Government’s focus on ensuring young Australians are job-ready has been strengthened with the launch of grant guidelines for the second round of the Empowering YOUth Initiatives.I am inviting not-for-profit community organisations to put forward innovative ways to help young people at risk of welfare dependency move into work. We are unwavering in our pursuit of effective policies and programs to ensure young Australians do not enter a cycle of long term unemployment.The Federal Government’s $50 million investment in Empowering YOUth Initiatives is a reflection of our steadfast commitment to getting our young people work-ready. Local community knowledge can be crucial to identifying ideas and initiatives that will assist young people in the community obtain gainful employment.Applicants in round two of Empowering YOUth Initiatives will be able to apply for grant funding of up to $5 million. The eligibility status of applicants has also been expanded. The program aims to test organisations’ innovative ideas to increase youth employment rates and build an evidence base. The Department of Employment will partner with successful organisations to help develop, support and evaluate their projects.The Australian Government will adopt a more targeted approach to sourcing provider initiatives in round two of Empowering YOUth Initiatives. It will:

• Favourably look upon initiatives that focus on young Indigenous people and young people in regions of high unemployment;
• Expand an organisation’s eligibility status to allow for all not-for-profit or non-government service providers to apply for funding. Successful initiatives will be identified through an expression of interest process;
• Favourably look at initiatives that support the required participant numbers;
• Remove funding categories to allow applicants to advise of the cost of their project, up to $5 million; and
• Limit applications to one application per organisation. This will encourage applicants to submit their best proposal and simplifies the assessment process.For more information on round two of Empowering YOUth Initiatives, please visit: http://www.employment.gov.au/employment-services-procurement-information
• Successful applicants for round two of Empowering YOUth Initiatives will be announced in February 2017. All initiatives are expected to commence by 30 June 2017.