Whilst it may be easy for politicians to rail against unpaid internships, the debate over this issue is far more complex and simply cannot be explained with a populist sound bite. The reality is that the 10,000s of mostly students and recent graduates who "work" as unpaid interns all come from varied backgrounds, education levels, ages and work in completely different industries, companies, roles which leave a one size fits all solution to be very unsuitable.
I have been lucky enough to have completed three internships in different areas of politics, one in an MPs constituency office, one at a "think tank" and one at a campaigning group. All unpaid, except one which offered up to £5.00 a day travel expenses. There seems to be a prevailing view that the vast majority of people who manage to obtain one of these coveted internships did so simply by Daddy making a quick phone call to an old Oxbridge classmate.
During my time interning in Westminster I've spoken to seemingly countless dozens of other interns. A few have relative horror stories to tell of their internships but the vast majority gained a considerable amount of experience and are now on their second of third internship. One thing most of the organisations had in common was the fact interns outnumbered the paid staff, sometimes 2-1. In one think tank I interned there would often be days when us interns would be the only ones in the office.
One might ask how can these interns afford this? Surely the only ones who can have rich parents funding them? Many have worked very hard in menial jobs, bar-tending and the like, earning minimum wage before starting interning. One particular intern I worked with travelled in to work from his home outside of London, which cost over £10 a day, had to buy his own lunch and was funding his internship from money he had earned from bar-tending. He couldn't afford it. He was considering taking a week or two off from interning to work anywhere that would take him. All in order to keep interning for no money and long hours.
This shows that unpaid interns who don't have the financial backing from rich parents are able to intern, even if that means taking on a weekend job or spending some of your summer working. Obviously this is not the perfect scenario for the intern but banning unpaid internships outright would not fix this. It would, in a large number of cases, mean there being no internship available at all, as the organisation could not afford it. The solution may be worse than the problem itself.
Banning unpaid internships would cause an immense decline in young people with practical experience which would increase their employability. Before I started my first internship in Westminster, I had never met a Lord, let alone had tea with one in the House of Commons. These invaluable experiences would be the preserve of the truly connected if such internships were made illegal.
These think tanks and other political organisations are not as flush with money as they are believed to be. The internship programs they currently run would be either completely shut down or limited to only a select few people. Youth engagement with politics should be encouraged; the banning of these internships would stop many able and enthusiastic individuals from playing a part in an area that severely lacks youth representation.
Whilst many worthwhile unpaid internship programs are offered, there are unfortunately a substantial number of internships that are largely a waste of time. Even if all internships were paid that is no guarantee that poor quality internships would disappear overnight.
As I said at the beginning of this feature, it is hard to asses the quality of each internship which is unpaid, as different people will value different internships in different ways. What may be a thoroughly worthwhile internship to one person could be an absolute bore for another. Therein lies the problem. Outlawing unpaid internships would have both many positive and negatives but in my experience unpaid internships enhance social mobility more than they restrict it.