Unions have called for action to tackle a “growing crisis” in young people’s participation in the labour market.

The TUC said there should be an “ambitious” national jobs guarantee for young people not in education, employment or training – so-called Neets.

The UK faces a growing crisis in young people’s labour market participation which “spiralled” under the Conservatives, the TUC warned.

The Government had laid the foundations to tackle the problem, starting with a youth guarantee programme to ensure every young person aged 18-21 has access to learning, an apprenticeship or support to find a job, which is being trialled in regions up and down the country, said the TUC.

The union organisation said this should be built on with a national jobs guarantee, which prioritises young people aged 18-24 who have been not in employment, education or training for six months or longer and young people aged 18-24 who are at high risk of becoming long-term Neet.

TUC general secretary Paul Nowak said: “Under the Conservatives, young people were failed with many let down by the education system and stuck out of work, education and training.

“This toxic Tory legacy has hugely damaged young people’s prospects and for the country as a whole too.

“We know that real experience of paid work is the best way to turn the tide on rising rates of worklessness and that over time this investment will more than pay for itself.”

Infosys, India’s second largest IT services firm, is gearing up to recruit employees through campus hiring. Infosys has asked its senior staff members to participate in panel interviews at universities for recruitment purposes, marking a revival in campus hiring after two years.Major IT companies, including Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys and Wipro, had reduced both campus and lateral recruitment since Covid due to business deceleration. Infosys reported a significant reduction in fresher recruitment, hiring only 11,900 in FY24, down from 50,000 in the previous year.In FY25, the figure increased to 15,000, with the Bengaluru-based IT firm maintaining its fresher recruitment target of 15,000-20,000 through combined off and on-campus initiatives for the fiscal year ending March 2026.

Infosys campus hiring

These staff members will travel to educational institutions nationwide to recruit digital specialist engineers (DSE), sources familiar with the matter informed ET.For the first time, Infosys has sent a mass email communication to employees at managerial levels and above. According to the email quoted in the report, the Infosys representatives will evaluate candidates’ fundamental programming abilities and problem-solving capabilities required for entry-level DSE positions.Employees at job-level five (JL5) or higher positions who have served the company for at least one year and achieved a minimum performance rating of ‘met expectations’ are eligible to volunteer for these interview panels. The selected panellists will conduct face-to-face interviews at various campuses for positions across the company’s development centres in India.

Freshers hiring in IT sector

According to a source, the emails to senior staff indicated Infosys’s commitment to interviewing numerous students during the upcoming campus recruitment period, scheduled between October and November end. The organisation had previously conducted virtual interviews during the Covid pandemic.The fresh graduate recruitment follows Infosys’s decision to terminate approximately 800 trainees from the 2022 cohort since February, due to their inability to pass internal evaluations.As a component of the current campus recruitment strategy, Infosys plans to organise on-site evaluation processes including aptitude assessment, group interaction, technical interview, managerial discussion and HR consultation. The initial four stages will be conducted at various tier-2 and -3 engineering institutions. Students from diverse disciplines including electrical, electronics, telecom, computer science, information technology, civil and mechanical will participate in this process.“In reputed colleges, we will get up to 1,000 students from all branches. We interview students in the seventh semester as those found fit will have to head for training at the global education centre at Mysuru campus after the eighth semester,” a person familiar with the process was quoted as saying.These positions are designated for freshers who join as trainees. Their permanent employment status depends on successfully finishing the training programme at Mysuru.In June, Infosys implemented an incentive scheme for senior staff members, providing monetary benefits for conducting lateral recruitment interviews.

TCS has campus hiring plans too

Despite TCS announcing layoffs of over 2% (approximately 12,000) at senior and mid-level positions, the Tata Group enterprise and three other leading IT companies collectively aim to recruit more than 70,000 graduates in FY26, suggesting improved employment prospects for new graduates, the ET report said.Campus recruitment continues whilst the $283 billion IT outsourcing sector experiences AI-driven transformation. Organisations are prioritising AI-native and specialised competencies for new appointments whilst focusing on reskilling and upskilling their current workforce.