I’ve built businesses from nothing, and I’ll tell you a simple truth. Employers hire when it feels safe to hire. Right now, it doesn’t.

The government is making hiring a risk

A survey of 2,000 firms shows 37% plan to cut permanent recruitment because of the new workers’ rights reforms. That isn’t politics, it’s predictable economics. Add higher National Insurance, day-one sick pay and easier unfair dismissal claims, and taking on staff becomes a gamble, especially for small businesses operating on tight margins.

Politicians think they’re protecting workers. In reality, they’re protecting people from being hired in the first place.

If employing someone feels risky, employers don’t stop needing work done, they switch to temps, subcontractors or simply don’t expand. The permanent job disappears before it’s even advertised. And once businesses stop growing, the wider economy slows with them.

Youth unemployment is the warning light

Now look at the bigger picture. For the first time in 25 years, youth unemployment in the UK is higher than the EU. That should set off alarm bells across Westminster.

Young workers are always the first to be squeezed out when costs rise and flexibility falls. Raise wage floors quickly and increase legal risk, and employers stop taking chances on inexperienced people who need training.

We’ve created a labour market where it’s safer to hire experience than to create it. That’s how a country quietly loses opportunity, not with mass layoffs, but with missing first jobs.

We’re funding the wrong pathway

And here’s the madness. The state spends roughly £55,000 supporting the average university degree but only about £9,000 training an apprentice.

That means we could train five or six apprentices for the cost of one graduate. That’s people earning, paying tax and building skills immediately instead of accumulating debt and hoping the job market will absorb them later.

Instead, we steer teenagers toward university, restrict employers’ flexibility and then act surprised when businesses stop offering entry-level roles. You don’t fix unemployment with more regulation. You fix it by making it easier for businesses to take a chance on someone new.