We don’t get a lot of stories where the nice guy gets the girl, the car and all the money. If he’s nice to start with then he has to get mad first, which defeats the object. Even Peter Parker has a dark side. Bruce Wayne, well enough said.

OK, There is one thing I DON”T like and that bullies! It’s a red rag to a bull. So Game On!!!

So over the last few months I have noticed people in business who should know better treating young people (who are trying to enter the work place through work placements, graduate schemes for the first time) in a way that someone who has been in industry for some years would have sat them down and provided them with a few treats of colour and wisdom.

Many FE colleges require their student learners to gain experience and these students try calling, writing and emailing local businesses to gain this experience. The response they get is just shocking.

So we all have to start somewhere and in those first steps into employment we will (hopefully) make a few mistakes and learn to be better people. Young people need the support to grow, its obvious, but our small businesses need to engage to make this happen. Small businesses are afraid of young people, they are not sure of their skills, ability, work ethic or how they will fit in with existing staff. So there are major risks in employing young people. Thus, apprentices. They see them are needing lots of support (and a minority do) which will drain their business

UK SMEs employed 14.1 million people and had a combined turnover of £1,500 billion. Youth employment would not wiped out if the 4.6 million SME businesses employed just one more person each.

We should have a national “Take on a Work Experience Day” whereby small companies with less than 10 people (which is 95% of all businesses) should take just one person on for two months.

After all there are just three ways to deal with bullies, (1)get everyone in the room and get them to find common ground, (2)take the bully over the playing field with all your mates, their friends and some tools and sort it out once and for all, or (3)ban the bullies. So lets try the first option!!!