Life chances Two city areas among country's worst for less well-off kids

OPPORTUNITIES for working class young people are far more limited in two areas of Bristol than almost all the rest of the country, a new study has found.

- Tristan CORK

Young people who qualified for free school meals when they were children growing up in south Bristol and east Bristol go on to have among the lowest level of opportunities and prospects in the country, and end up more likely to be unemployed, in a low-paid job or without a degree qualification.

Meanwhile, young people who were on free school meals in London are far more likely to get to university and get good jobs, according to a huge new study by The Sutton Trust, which has revealed huge disparities in the way working class kids are disadvantaged by where they live as well as by their family's circumstances.

The Sutton Trust report, called The Opportunity Index, looked at 25 years of data from more than ten million young people, providing what its authors said is 'an unprecedented insight into the geography of opportunity and social mobility in England.' It crunched the numbers on what happens to kids on free school meals in every area of the country, what grades they get at GCSE and A-Level, whether they get a job or go to university, whether they are in 'sustained employment' at the age of 28, and how much they are earning then.