Young people ‘need nepotism’ to exit NEET ‘rejection loop’, says Chicken Shop Date star

Young people “need nepotism” these days in order to get out of unemployment, YouTube star Amelia Dimoldenberg has said as she warned about the “rejection loop” faced by the NEET generation.

Ms Dimoldenberg, famous for her Chicken Shop Date series on YouTube, declared that “young people deserve better” as she reflected on the one in eight young people in England classed as a NEET (not in education, employment or training).

“My big issue is that young people deserve better,” she told The Big Issue. “The vast majority have everything they need to get employment but they are in a rejection loop. They just need someone to open a door for them. They need someone who knows someone to send their CV to someone.

“They need nepotism, basically. So I encourage people who can open their network, who can create opportunities and put people forward for work experience placements, to do so because that’s definitely a way we can help.”

Ms Dimoldenberg’s Chicken Shop Date series, which has featured the likes of Sir Paul McCartney, Billie Eilish and Idris Elba, was born out of a column she wrote when she was 17 years old for a magazine called The Cut, run by a youth clib in north-west London.

She said that this youth club “now doesn’t exist due to austerity cuts by the Conservative government.”

The YouTube Star launched her own programme, Dimz Inc. Academy, in 2023 which offers young people hands-on media training, industry mentorship and paid work placements over the summer.

Reflecting on Alan Milburn’s report on the NEET generation, she said: “It is far too easy for critics to label young people disengaged.

“[Alan Milburn’s] report proves the reality is structural – mental health struggles, regional inequalities, and stripped-back youth services have systematically shut doors in their faces.”

This wouldn’t be the first time Ms Dimoldenberg has spoken about the challenges facing young people after she told the BBC last month that while prime minister Andy Burnham wasn’t her type to go on Chicken Shop Date, she’d “100 per cent love to have a conversation with him about what he is doing to support the Neet young people.”

“I know that he does have more plans around creating training schemes,” she said, reflecting on how the education system focused on exams and creating pathways to university.

“There isn’t a clear pathway of what you do next other than university and maybe that’s not for you,” she said. “So I think having more apprenticeships, training schemes, is really vital.”

Mr Burnham said last month he was “on a mission” to halt the number of 16-24-year-olds not in education, employment or training, unveiling plans to open up new technical education routes to 14-year-olds, which will be put on an equal footing with traditional academic pathways.