Employers in Scotland can get Government grants of around £4,000 for hiring young, inexperienced and vulnerable new workers.
The new employer recruitment initiative, backed by £10million of Scottish Government money, is designed to incentivise employers to take on young staff who have struggled to find or hold down a job.
The new programme replaces a previous scheme which created up to 10,000 job opportunities across Scotland.
The incentive offers employers around £4,000 to offset the additional costs of recruiting and employing a young person, including equipment and staff time for training and induction.
Colin Borland, head of external affairs at the Federation of Small Businesses, said: “By connecting Scotland’s enthusiastic but inexperienced young people with the country’s army of small firms, we can boost businesses and develop skills for life.
“These helpful incentives mitigate some costs associated with the very smallest businesses expanding their headcount.
“We’ve made the case to the Scottish Government and to local authorities about the need to simplify existing programmes. We welcome this new employer recruitment Incentive which should make it easier for small firms to access the help they need.”
Skills Secretary Roseanna Cunningham said: “We are seeing improvements in the number of young people in employment.
“Only five European countries have lower youth unemployment rates than Scotland and the lowest ever numbers of 16 to 19-year-olds not in education, employment or training.
“But we want to match the best in Europe and have committed to aim to reduce youth unemployment by 40% by 2021.
“This new initiative will specifically target young people who face the biggest barriers to employment and also responds to the demands of employers by delivering a consistent and simple recruitment incentive to ensure that employing a young person remains an attractive proposition.”
Meanwhile, new figures show that there are 267 more modern apprentices across the north of Scotland compared to last year.
Figures from Skills Development Scotland (SDS) show there were 6,936 apprentices in training as at March 2015 compared to 6,669 across the north-east, Moray, the Highlands and Islands.
The figures show that there have been 101,000 new Modern Apprenticeship places in Scotland during the past four years, surpassing the Scottish Government target of 25,000 each year.
SDS Head of Region for Aberdeen, Gordon MacDougall, said:
“It’s a great testament to employers that they have continued to invest in Modern Apprenticeship opportunities right through the economic downturn.
“The enduring appeal of Modern Apprenticeships is that they are driven by employer demand and for the individual they allow the apprentices to get a job and learn while they earn.”