An employer in Bolton is hoping to participate in the Government's Kickstart Scheme to help get young people back in to work - and aims to provide long term jobs for the people it takes on.

Earlier this month the Kickstart Scheme was launched, it aims to get those aged people aged 16-24 on Universal Credit back into employment.

The £2bn initiative will see young people being offered six month work placements, with wages of up to 25 hours a week being fully paid by the Government.

Employers will be able to top up this wage themselves and they will also be paid £1,500 to set up support and training for those on the scheme.

Bright Direction Training are a growing company offering training courses in areas such as customer service and management.

The company has taken on more staff in the past year and has opened offices in Birmingham, West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester.

Bright Direction Training are hoping to take on several young people as part of the scheme, and the priority for the business is to ensure that those young people stay with the company once the six months is over.

Managing Director Jamie MacGregor said: "We're currently in our 10th year and we have grown a lot recently, this growth requires more people.

"At the moment we don't work with a lot of younger people so it would be great to work with that age group and to give those people an opportunity.

"The goal is to take on two or three people, get them trained and keep them on our team.

"It's very important for us that these people can grow with us.

"We're a very ethically driven company and one of our big concerns is to make sure that workers are not exploited.

"We don't want to just take on someone for six months and then get rid of them, we want them to be a part of our team for the long run.

"Often schemes like this in the past have led to businesses taking advantage of people, but that's not what we want to do.

"I think it's essential for businesses in Bolton to get involved with the scheme. The town centre is struggling in particular and we have got to help young people before it's too late.

"We're really looking forward to it and it will be fascinating to see what kind of candidate we will get."