PRIME Initiative

The manifest season is upon us. And the last few weeks seems to have been alive with enterprise manifestos. None of them from a political party - but all of them about enterprise.

Here are some examples.

The Genesis Senate - Britain’s Economic Revival through micro, small and and medium-sized businesses

SFEDI (The Small Firms Enterprise Development Initiative) - Making self employment and micro enterprise a viable income opportunity for all

NFEA (National Federation of Enterprise Agencies) - Enterprise, the Economy and Society

And there are more.

What they all have in common is a view that enterprise will be critical to coming out of the recession, and start-up support, advice and mentoring should be available to a far wider range of people than is currently the case. They all want to see enterprise as an equal and integral part of Welfare to Work and better advertising of enterprise opportunities in Jobcentre Plus. And they all want to see finance to start a business available to a wider range of people.

Well, PRIME has been pre-empting the enterprise manifestos.

We now have a PRIME 50+ self-employment flyer in every Jobcentre Plus in England and Scotland, and now over one third of our enquiries are from people reading about PRIME and self-employment in Jobcentre Plus.

We have a sub-contract or agreement with a major contractor in every Flexible New Deal area in England and Scotland under the first phase and we have been working hard to ensure we are in every area in the second phase. We are currently awaiting the announcement on the second phase major contractors. This means for the over 50s, self-employment and enterprise will be a key option in Welfare the Work.

We recently launched our mentoring scheme for people just starting out on their enterprise journey in Bristol, Newcastle and Belfast. We have worked closely with Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to train volunteer mentors and they are available now. We will be adding new areas as we roll out the scheme across the country.

And yes, we have the PRIME-Zopa olderpreneur loan scheme.

All the parties are busy telling us how they will get people back into employment and off the dole queue. They have to realise that creating the jobs comes first, and that means putting enterprise first. Without a growth in new businesses, and therefore in new jobs, the best laid welfare to work plans are doomed to failure. So the issues raised in the enterprise manifestos need to be given pride of place in each political party manifesto.

I wonder if they will.