16:28 - The House divided: - Ayes: 218 / Noes: 294 - Question accordingly negatived.
The Minister for Skills and Equalities (Nick Boles)
It came as a bit of a surprise to learn that the Opposition were proposing a debate on apprenticeships, because as we have heard during this excellent debate, the Government can point to a remarkable record of success in their apprenticeship programme. We heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) that the number of apprenticeships in his constituency was 80% higher in the past year than in the last year of the previous Government, and my hon. Friend the Member for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry) told the House that, through his efforts to create jobs fairs and no fewer than three apprenticeship fairs, unemployment in his constituency was now 50% lower than it was when he was elected to Parliament. We heard from my right hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Maria Miller) that her local college, Basingstoke college, was keen to invest more money every year to create more apprenticeships, and I will of course be delighted to meet her and the college principal to discuss ways in which the college can bid more effectively for money in-year when it can identify ways to grow its programme.
I was particularly pleased to hear from the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Steve Rotheram), who brought to the debate the enormous advantage of having completed an apprenticeship himself. I have no idea why he chose to give up that honourable trade for the one that he is now pursuing, but I am nevertheless full of admiration for him. He made an important contribution —compared with the woolly and glib thinking of those on his Front Bench—in pointing out the crucial importance of level 2 apprenticeships, particularly in construction. It would simply be wrong to tell the young men and women who are doing a level 2 apprenticeship in bricklaying that it was no longer going to be called an apprenticeship, even though they were employed, working hard, going to college and training, and even though they were securing valuable qualifications, of which many more are needed.
We also heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael), who made the particularly important point that there was a key link between apprenticeships and the industrial strategies that the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills has brought in. He also said that we needed to work with local economic partnerships to create apprenticeships that support the local growing sectors in his constituency and elsewhere. I am sorry that I have not yet been invited to his festival of manufacturing and engineering, but I look forward to receiving an invitation to the next one when he is re-elected in May.
We have heard from my right hon. and hon. Friends about the good record of this Government. We have our record to be proud of, but Conservative Members also have a clear plan for the future. Unlike the Opposition’s proposals in the motion, our plan is fully costed and fully resourced.
Nick Boles
We will continue to improve the quality of apprenticeships through our Trailblazers programme by getting groups of employers to develop apprenticeship standards that deliver the skills that they need. We will also offer young people a clear choice: to earn or learn—to get a job or to go to university—or to combine earning and learning through an apprenticeship. It does young people no favours to let them start their lives in subsidised inactivity, neither earning nor learning, so we will restrict the benefits that young people receive and use the money saved from that and from the proceeds of a reduction in the benefits cap from £26,000 to £23,000 to fund 3 million high-quality apprenticeships between 2015 and 2020.
By contrast, what we have heard from the Opposition has been hopelessly vague. After the comprehensive demolition of the shadow Secretary of State’s policy on tuition fees by university vice-chancellors, he has clearly decided to try his luck with apprenticeships, but yet again we see that the right hon. Gentleman is better with atmospherics than with policy detail.
Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)
Order. The Minister is not giving way, and neither did the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Hodge Hill (Mr Byrne) when he was at the Dispatch Box. I must point out that the Front-Bench speakers in this debate have spoken for well over an hour, which is why Back Benchers have had very little time to speak. The right hon. Gentleman has had his chance. I call the Minister.
Nick Boles
Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. The Opposition motion refers to an aspiration that there should be as many people starting apprenticeships as there are going to university. Treasury officials—not Ministers—have costed this policy and advised that it would cost £710 million in 2015-16. But when challenged about how they would pay for this, what tax they would put up, what other spending programme they would cut, answer came there none.
The Opposition motion also promotes the fantastically deluded idea that all apprenticeships should be level 3 and should last a minimum of two years. Treasury officials—again, not Ministers—costed this policy too. They advise that it would cost £680 million in 2015-16. Can the shadow Front-Bench team explain how they would pay for that, who would pay more tax, whose services would be cut? Of course not.
It is especially disappointing to see this policy soufflé survive the exacting inquiries of the Opposition’s very own Masterchef, the shadow Minister. He has a razor-sharp mind and a real zeal for reform, but I am afraid it is clear that he has been relegated to the sidelines, allowed out only on high days and holidays and, as we have just heard, forced to read from the Leader of the Opposition’s lazily profligate script. The flimsiness of the Labour party’s proposals for apprenticeships might be harmless enough in the early years of opposition. That, of course, is where the shadow Secretary of State has learned his trade. But in government, it would create chaos.
Employers, training providers and young people are making big decisions when they decide to invest in creating apprenticeships and in creating the training programmes to support apprenticeships and, as young people, deciding to commit to an apprenticeship. They need certainty and clarity if they are to have the confidence to make a long-term commitment to apprenticeships. They need a competent Government with a clear plan and a clear understanding of how much their plan will cost and how they will pay for it.
If there is a Conservative Government after 7 May, we will invest in apprenticeships, which will be jobs and will last more than 12 months. Every apprentice will have an employer. There will be 3 million of them between 2015 and 2020 and we will pay for them by reducing other areas of Government spending so that, as we have in this Parliament, we can increase our investment in the apprenticeships programme. I urge Members to support those parties that really understand how to grow apprenticeships, and to oppose the motion.
Question put.