The Government's Jobs PaTH scheme is falling short of its target of getting 120,000 young people into paid employment, with just under 40,000 finding jobs in the first 2.5 years of the program.

Under the Jobs PaTH program, businesses are paid $1,000 upfront for taking on an intern for placements lasting between four and 12 weeks. Businesses are eligible for up to $10,000 from the Government if they put that intern into permanent work.

The interns themselves receive $200 a week on top of their Newstart or Youth Allowance benefits.

The Coalition announced the program in the 2016 federal budget, but it didn't begin operating properly until April 2017. The $752 million program aimed to put 120,000 young people in jobs over four years; a target of 30,000 a year.

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Senate estimates on Thursday night heard that as of the end of October this year, 53,721 young people had completed an internship. Of those, 65 per cent got a job straight away, and another nine per cent got a job in the three months after completing the internship.

The Department of Employment was unable to answer how many of those job placements were with businesses that offered the internships, and how many were with other companies.

Derek Stiller from the department told estimates that while there was no limit to how many internships companies could request, they had to be able to prove they needed them.

"They [the companies] need to be able to demonstrate a reasonable prospect of employment post the end of that internship, and that's for each and every internship," Mr Stiller said.

'Exploitative and inefficient'

Estimates heard that just shy of 5,000 companies signed up to take on interns, and nearly 93 per cent of them took on between one and five placements.

However, the more interns a company took on, the lower the rate of employment. Companies that took on more than 10 interns only employed three out of five of them.

The top five companies to take on interns include Coles, Woolworths and Hog's Breath Cafe.

The employment rate for the top five companies to take on interns is around 54 per cent - much lower than the average.

Companies that take on an intern can be paid even if the intern doesn't complete their placement.

"We do not recoup the $1,000 if the intern does not last the four weeks," Mr Stiller said.

"Can the employer get an intern for a day and get $1,000?" Shadow Assistant Employment Minister, Louise Pratt, asked.

"My understanding is it's based on five days as a minimum," Mr Stiller responded.

Labor, who had promised to scrap Jobs PaTH if it won the federal election in May, said the program was "exploitative and inefficient".

"It is clear for the Liberals' signature PaTH internship program is failing," Senator Pratt and Shadow Employment Minister Brendan O'Connor said in a written statement.

They said the program was making it harder for young jobseekers to get paid work, because they were competing with interns for entry-level positions.

It is replete with rorts and rip offs, including the displacement of existing jobs and has failed in its first two years of operation.

Research published in October found there are at least 19 applications for every entry-level job.

"At a time when youth unemployment is more than double the national unemployment average, it is unacceptable that Morrison Government simply has a failed program and no strategy to address the issue," they wrote.

"The failed PaTH program is not making a dent in addressing the persistently high youth unemployment rate."

The seasonally-adjusted youth unemployment rate is at an 18-month high, rising from 11.8 percent last month to 12.4 per cent.