Warnings scrapping furlough could end hundreds of Dorset jobs
There's calls for the scheme to be kept permanently.
There's warnings today that allowing the furlough scheme to come to an end could mean hundreds of people lose their jobs in Dorset.
The South West TUC want to government to cement the scheme into policy instead to help carry the economy through any future crises.
The scheme officially comes to an end on Friday 1st October.
Latest figures show there were 6,600 people still on the scheme in Dorset at the end of July.
Nigel Costley is secretary of the South West Trade Unions Congress. He said:
"We think there may be thousands, hundreds certainly across Dorset, many employers who still want to keep valuable workers in sectors where they haven't yet recovered fully from the pandemic.
"We think that it's wrong to close the scheme at this time. Despite a busy summer, there are still some sectors not fully reopened; the events industry, the airline industry, arts and entertainment.
"These are people with valuable skills but their jobs haven't quite yet got back to full operation, and what's the option? Well, it'll be redundancy."
He says the cost of not renewing the scheme could be heavier for the government as workplaces are forced to let go of staff, many of whom will inevitably start claiming benefits.
"they're still going to be looking to get back to the jobs that they occupied and the employers will still want to retain them. If you're an airline pilot you can't suddenly start to retrain to be a lorry driver, and at some point when the industry recovers you're going to want to go back to doing the vocation you've been trained for, and the economy needs them to go back."
Nigel is calling on the government to instead look at making the scheme permanent to help keep skills in one place and cushion the cost of industry shifts on the public purse.