The number of young people (aged 16 to 24 years) who are not in education, employment or training (NEET) stood at a total of 770,000 in the period from January to March 2023, down from the 788,000 in the period from October to December 2022 according to figures from the UK Office for National Statistics (ONS).

ONS data also found that the percentage of all young people who were NEET in January to March 2023 was estimated at 11.3%, down 0.3% on the quarter (October to December 2022), but up 0.2% compared with pre-pandemic levels (October to December 2019).

The decrease in the number of young people who were NEET was driven by young men, who saw a decrease of 26,000 on the quarter (from October to December 2022).

Barry Fletcher, chief executive of the Youth Futures Foundation, said, "It's alarming to see that NEET rates remain higher than pre-pandemic levels. Without immediate action, this will continue to have devastating effects on hundreds of thousands of young people across the country and, ultimately, our labour market.”

In January to March 2023, there were an estimated 475,000 economically inactive young people aged 16 to 24 years who were NEET. This was down 15,000 on the quarter from October to December 2022 and up 15,000 compared with January to March 2022. The number of young men who were NEET and economically inactive was 208,000 and the number of young women was 267,000.

ONS defines economically inactive as people not in the labour force. These are people who are not in employment, but do not meet the internationally accepted definition of unemployment because they have not been seeking work within the last four weeks and/or they are unable to start work in the next two weeks.