LES Travers is a man with a mission . . . to overcome ageism in the job market.

Aged 53, Les says he has a lot to give to society but no-one seems to want his experience.

That is a feeling many older workers have had over the past few years as the cult of youth has taken over.

Les, of Wigan Road, Deane, is convinced that many of his job applications never stood a chance. But he cannot prove it and says he has had about 12 rejections for classroom assistant's jobs.

He said: "As soon as I mention my age, they go quiet on the other end of the line while at the same time maintaining there is no ageism in their company. What can I do to overcome this?"

Les has worked in a variety of jobs over the past few years. He has tried telesales, worked as a shop assistant, in factories and for Littlewoods.

He has taken several courses to improve his skills and had a thorough police check into his bacpkground when he taught a drama class at the Bolton YMCA.

Now, to pay the bills, Les has two part-time cleaning jobs but wants to fulfil a dream of working with younger people.

He said: "I left school with no qualifications and I worked in all sorts of jobs but I always wanted to work with children.

"Now I realise I could actually work as a learning support assistant and with my varied life experience I feel I could help them a lot if only someone will give me a job."

Les has taken a Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) course and could get work abroad in an instant.

But he wants to stay in this country to be near his family.

"I have a lot to give I could help those young children," he said.

"I have had a variety of jobs over the years and I could use that experience in communicating to the children."

Most people accept that ageism affects those over 50 but a new survey suggests workers aged just 35 may also be suffering age discrimination.

At 35, many workers feel they are making some progress up the career ladder; that they have won the respect of their managers; and their best working years lie ahead.

But some veiw them as being past it, according to a survey by recruitment firm Maturity Works.

One-in-10 of the workers who told researchers they had been victims of ageism were aged 35 to 40. And three per cent of those who felt their employers were discriminating against them for being too old had yet to reach their 35th birthdays.

Some sectors may be especially prone to ageism, particularly areas such as information technology.

"My boss looks for specifically younger people because they're cheaper," one IT worker told the Employers Forum on Age.

Open University ageism expert Dr Kerry Platman said the media is another area dominated by young people where age prejudice may kick in for workers barely in their 30s.

Dr Platman said British workers have to rely on voluntary codes of conduct to protect them from ageism, which has proved a "patchy and sporadic" affair.

The Association of Retired and Persons Over 50 was critical of government policy towards preventing ageism among employers.

The government's voluntary code of practice for employers, introduced in 2000, had been a failure because of a lack of awareness, it said.

"Nobody knows about the code and it has no teeth," said Don Steele, the association's social policy director.

"The firms that behaved properly complied, the others carried on as before."

But the pressure group admitted that job adverts had lost ageist overtones.

Ageist hiring and firing policies are estimated by Age Concern to cost the UK economy £31 billion a year.

"By getting rid of older workers firms are losing their history, experience and culture," Mr Steele said.

To combat ageism in the workplace, a European Union law guaranteeing older workers basic rights is to come into force in the UK sometime this year.