‘I’ve applied for 4,000 jobs’

Tina Chummun is one of over 870,000 50- to 64-year-olds up against a job market they feel they no longer belong in

- HARRIETTE BOUCHER

Tina Chummun has applied for jobs every day for the past two years. Some 4,000 applications later, and the 50-year-old finds herself unemployed, thousands of pounds in debt to her mortgage lender, and facing the possibility of having to move in with her mother.

With relentless rejections in her inbox, she says frustration doesn’t even begin to describe the struggle, which has completely consumed her life.

Ms Chummun, who holds an undergraduate degree, two master's qualifications in marketing and psychotherapy, and is in her third year of a health and social care doctorate, feels it is her age that is causing the rejections. She says the government must step in to help older people who, like her, are up against a job market they feel they no longer belong in.

After losing her job in April 2024, Ms Chummun has been in part-time work selling her counselling and marketing services, but has been unable to earn enough to cover her bills.

She hopes to work full-time in digital marketing, but has been applying for any role she can. In the last two years, she says she has only received one interview for a marketing job.

After she struggled to pay her bills, her mortgage lender eventually took her to court. ‐It’s just one nightmare after another,‐ Ms Chummun told The Independent.