"Sorry to disappoint you, but TOPS and YOPS courses preceded Thatcher by some years"

Don't worry Don - I was deeply involved with the Young Conservatives during this period and I saw the true face of Thatcherite politics up close and personal (I posted the story on the "Reasons for being a Conservative" thread so won't repeat it here). It's why I'm a Marxist now.

The YOPs (it became the YTS the year after I was on it) was not designed to give you real world work experience but to give tighfisted employers cheap labour and take as many young people off the jobless lists as possible. By the time I was forced onto it, the Tory government was using it for a dumping ground for jobless young people - I was due to go to college but due to (then unexplained to me) family events we moved away from the are I was brought up in and I was dumped right into a shite job regardless of my career aspirations.

This was designed to manipulate the employment figures - so I'm not disappointed Don, as I was actually going through the process at the time, so can speak from personal experience.

Reasons not to be a Tory part 674.