Wasting Places

What applies to interns applies to training counsellors. Read the LSE's Politics and Policy blog.

‘Internships are accessible only to some, whereas they should be open to all who have the aptitude. Currently employers are missing out on talented people – and talented people are missing opportunities to progress. There are negative consequences for social mobility and for fair access to the professions’. So concluded Alan Milburn’s 2009 report into social mobility in the UK (see Unleashing Aspiration: The Final Report of the Panel on Fair Access to the Professions pp99-112). Elsewhere it notes the UK’s professions are becoming more socially exclusive and class background is still a powerful determinant of life chances. Career paths opened up to many on an informal basis – premised upon personal contacts or an ability to sustain oneself through a period of unpaid work – thus excluding many otherwise worthy and talented candidates.