Exit Margate’s train station, and your gaze soon turns to a towering sign for the iconic Dreamland amusement park. Newly restored with neon lettering, it is hard to miss and elicits the nostalgia-induced rush often associated with seaside towns like this.
Yet much of the young adult population here and across this stretch of coastal Kent are struggling to make ends meet, let alone follow their own “dreams”.
In Thanet, the local authority area which counts the likes of Margate, Ramsgate and Broadstairs among its constituent towns, new research has revealed that almost one in three people in their 20s are receiving Universal Credit (UC), a benefit paid to help with living costs for those on a low income, out of work or unable to work.
That is one of the highest rates of UC claimants among working age young people in the country, a “scary” situation campaigners have warned risks a “forgotten generation” being “dumped on benefits, written off and condemned to a life of dependency”.
Jobseekers, meanwhile, spoke of their frustration at struggling to find work as well as feelings of “shame” they associated with attending their local Job Centre.
The country-wide picture
Thanet was second only to Blackpool – which The i Paper visited earlier this month – among all councils in England and Wales when it came to the proportion of 20 to 29-year-olds claiming UC, according to analysis by the TaxPayers’ Alliance (TPA).
31.6 per cent of people in that age bracket in Thanet were receiving the benefit as of May 2026, the TPA found.
The research also revealed that a fifth (20.3 per cent) of all working age adults – 7.3 million people aged 20 to 64 – were claiming UC as of May, including 17 per cent of people in their 20s.
That last statistic highlights the severity of the situation in Thanet for young people in particular – the council area is close to double the country’s average rate for people in their 20s, and the rate stays high for those in their 30s (35.4 per cent) and 40s (33.1 per cent).
While the councils with higher proportions of older people on benefits were concentrated around London, areas with a higher percentage of younger people on UC tended to be around coastal towns like Blackpool, Thanet, Hartlepool and Great Yarmouth.
And while UC can be claimed by people who are working but on a low income, data updated in April showed that 12,151 of the 19,155 individuals receiving the benefit in East Thanet were not in employment, representing 19.3 per cent of the working age population.
The TPA’s chief executive, John O’Connell, said that “in some places, dependency on Universal Credit has become endemic”.
“Generations are being dumped on benefits; written off and condemned to a life of dependency as ministers make it harder for them to find a job,” O’Connell added.
“If Andy Burnham was serious about growth in every postcode, he would be making it more affordable to hire young people.”
Thanet is among the areas that has experienced an influx of Londoners in recent years, with its seaside towns like Margate developing a reputation as trendy and comparatively affordable alternatives to the capital that offer a slower-paced lifestyle without losing direct transport links to the city.
Possible effects of – or attractions to – that migration are observed in some of the chic clothes stores and quaint coffee shops dotted near the seafront.
What may be lacking, though, are opportunities for local young people to take their first steps onto the career ladder.
‘You apply for jobs and they never get back to you – not even a rejection’
Outside the local Job Centre in Margate, 18-year-old Lara told The i Paper about her first appointment as she sought to begin receiving UC while out of work on health grounds.
“Because of issues with sleeping and my heart, I just want to get a bit of money whilst I’m waiting for all my tests to be done, then I can get medication and try to find work again,” she said.
The teenager previously worked at McDonald’s – “the only place that was hiring here at the time” – for nine months, as well as attending college, before her health issues meant she was unable to continue either pursuit until she could receive treatment.
“The frustrating thing about it is that I do want to work, I just physically can’t right now,” Lara continued.
“Once they figure out what’s going on and say I can get on medication, then I’ll be fine; then I can start with something like barista work. When I go back to college, I want to do something to do with forensics.”
Lara, 18, hopes to temporarily receive benefits whilst unable to work due to ill health (Photo: Tony Kershaw)Lara said she knows of just one friend from college who is working, “and that’s because they had connections”. “Otherwise, all of my other friends are trying to find jobs and they say it’s really difficult,” she added.
“You apply for jobs and then they never get back to you, it’s not even a rejection. Jobs ask you to have work experience, and it’s like, well, you can’t really get a job without work experience; so, how are you going to get your first job?
“You can’t even go in and put your CV in places anymore either, because they want you to do it all online – and then you’ll do it online, and they won’t get back to you!”
Multiple others of a similar age told The i Paper they were unwilling to talk about their own situation due to feeling “shame” from attending the Job Centre seeking benefits or employment.
However, several agreed with Lara’s experience that jobs were hard to come by, and even harder to receive responses to applications for.
Young adults wait outside the Job Centre in Margate (Photo: Tony Kershaw)One woman in her 30s said she and her partner had recently moved in with her parents in Margate in an attempt to save on living costs; she was then laid off from her job days later.
Liz, a 65-year-old betting shop manager, was made redundant at the end of August.
“At the moment, I would do anything,” she said when asked what type of employment she was pursuing through the Job Centre, adding that she “would rather use my redundancy money than go on benefits”.
“I don’t like being held to somebody,” she added.
‘A forgotten generation’
Helen, an employment advisor at Social Enterprise Kent Margate, told The i Paper that the number of young people on benefits in Thanet was “absolutely” around what she expected it to be from her experience working with jobseekers aged 18 through to retirement – “and it is rising, which is a bit scary”.
She added that the impact of the Covid pandemic, in her view, has been underestimated in its creation of a “forgotten generation”.
“A couple of years ago, we had a specific programme, funded by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which was just for people under 25,” Helen said.
“That’s where we realised that the pandemic had such a massive impact on everything from young people’s mental health and confidence to their lack of qualifications and ability to apply for jobs.
“All of that had a really huge impact – it has created a sort of forgotten generation – which few people seem to have picked up on.”
Helen, an employment advisor at Social Enterprise Kent, said the Covid pandemic had helped to create a ‘forgotten generation’ of young people (Photo: Tony Kershaw)That, she said, is likely to be part of the reason behind Thanet’s high percentage of young UC claimants, with the nature of seasonal work in the seaside town another possible factor.
“It does surprise me that right into their 30s and 40s, the percentage [of people in Thanet claiming UC] is still really high,” Helen said, adding that frequency of redundancies even at “well-established companies” was “quite shocking”.
‘Break down the barriers to employment’, government told
On the subject of benefits reform, Helen said any changes needed to involve being “more supportive of people in work”.
“I think there is a lot of scaremongering in the news, you know, attacking young people, saying they shouldn’t have this and they shouldn’t take benefits away from older generations,” she said.
“I don’t know what the answer is, otherwise, I’d be in government! But I do think we do need some kind of reform, and we need to be a bit more supportive of people in work.”
She continued: “There’s a whole group of people which I like to call the working poor – they’re too poor to survive properly, and they’re too ‘well off’ to claim benefits. They are just stuck in the middle.”
Andrew Connell, policy manager for The Salvation Army, told The i Paper that “to reduce the welfare bill, the focus should be on breaking down the barriers to secure employment with decent pay and making the benefit system the safety net it is intended to be”.
Connell added: “It’s wrong to see these figures as a measure of how many people don’t work because millions of people receiving Universal Credit have jobs. What we should be looking at is why so many people are in poverty despite Universal Credit and why so many jobs don’t pay enough to live on.
“Our foodbanks, homelessness services and debt and employment advice centres across the UK are full of people struggling to survive.”
That rings true for many of the Thanet residents The i Paper spoke to near the town’s Job Centre. One woman, who declined to share her name, said the Government “is getting it wrong” with regards to the current benefits system, adding that her experience looking for work at the Job Centre often felt like “a catch-22” situation.
Thanet District Council declined to comment on the TPA’s research, highlighting that the DWP manages Universal Credit while Kent County Council “takes the lead locally for post-16 education, skills and unemployment”.
A spokesperson for the DWP said: “Three-quarters of the increase in Universal Credit cases since July 2024 is driven by people moving from legacy benefits – a transition started by the previous government.
“Many people receiving Universal Credit are already in employment and our reforms will go further to tackle the perverse incentives that discourage work, and we’re investing £3.5bn in employment support for disabled people and people with long term conditions.
“We’re putting work and opportunity at the heart of the system, and the final recommendations from the Timms and Milburn Reviews will lay the foundation for sustainable reform.”
Kent County Council did not respond to a request for comment.
Hence then, the article about the trendy kent seaside town where a third of young adults are on benefits was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( The trendy Kent seaside town where a third of young adults are on benefits )
Also on site :