Youth Unemployment
Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone Excerpts(2 days, 2 hours ago)
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Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
The right reverend Prelate makes a very important point. The Government have done quite a bit of work in different sectors. As I have said at the Dispatch Box before, we have done quite a bit of work in social care, looking at how we develop schemes, skills and sector-based work programmes to make sure young people can both be given the skills and also encouraged to go into the sector. This can be a really rich and rewarding career, as his wife has found out, and as I know from people who work in the sector. Initially, people may not immediately see it as an opportunity. Once they get in there, if it is a good fit and if it is right for them, it is astonishingly rewarding. They transform lives. To be given the opportunity not just to change their own life, but in doing so, to change the lives of other people, is wonderful. I therefore assure him that the Government will carry on supporting that.
Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone (Con)
The right reverend Prelate’s wife will definitely know that being without education, employment or training has a devastating effect on young people. The consequences for social stability and the fabric of society are incredibly important, and I know the Minister is aware of that. To get a job, individuals need skills, confidence and motivation, and we expect young people to use AI and social media tools to get jobs, apprenticeships and training. But I would like the Minister to look at today’s report from Policy Exchange, which talks about “sickfluencers”: those on social media coaching people on how to make successful claims for disability benefits, mental health, neurodiversity and PIP. A quarter of the population is now classified as disabled, and there is three times the increase in those claiming disability benefits, as the Minister will know. The time has come to work with the health department to make it more stringent to assess whether people really have ADHD, autism and all the other manifold diagnoses people are taking on. There are times when a more bracing message encouraging young people into education, training or employment would be much more constructive —and I do not wish that to sound harsh.
Baroness Sherlock (Lab)
I have never regarded the noble Baroness as being harsh in the way she mentions. She has hit on the underlying question, which is a really important one. The question sometimes, when somebody encounters the state for the first time, is to look at what are the benefits to which they are entitled. That may be very important, but a much more important question is: what would it take to help change your life? What kind of support do you need to change your life? What that will be will depend on the young person’s circumstances. That is really hard, because it is a broader question, but it is a question we have to answer, and my department is on a journey towards looking at what it means to help young people. Of course, if they struggle, anyone who genuinely cannot work needs to get help. I am aware of the “sickfluencers”. This is not new; there have been different ways of doing this for some time. The department is very much focused on that and on making sure our assessment processes are robust.
We also need to get the incentives in the right place. This Government changed the incentives so that, in future, people coming on to the universal credit health journey will not get extra money for that, because we do not want to put people in a position where they have an incentive to persuade us that they can never work. It is why we are making sure that the Timms review looks carefully at PIP to see what has happened, because it has not really been reviewed since it was introduced. We have to get the incentives right and support people who need them, while also making sure that we give people a vision of what life could be in all its fullness.
Curriculum and Assessment Review
Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone Excerpts(4 months, 2 weeks ago)
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The Lord Bishop of London
My Lords, we are living in an increasingly complex world, and the study of religious education is critical in helping young people to navigate it. The need for understanding and dialogue across different faith groups and worldviews is increasingly obvious. The Church of England has welcomed the scrapping of the EBacc, because it has positive implications for religious education. At present, schools with a religious character provide the most comprehensive RE in the country. Will the Government commit to ensuring that these new proposals do not undermine this or the historic role that churches have in providing education in England?
Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)
My Lords, I think it is the turn of the Conservative Benches, but we should have enough time for everybody to get in.
Baroness Bottomley of Nettlestone (Con)
I am really grateful for the noble Lord’s protection and championing. It is always an honour to give way to the future Archbishop of Canterbury.
Can the Minister say more about the new oracy framework? Of course, young people need to be able to speak as well as read and write. Can she give us an assurance that, in preparing the framework, her department will work closely with the experts in this field, the English Speaking Union, whose work this has been for the last 107 years?
Secondly, I welcome the focus on building media literacy. The number of young people who do not read a newspaper and do not listen to the broadcast media is alarming. Their information comes through social media, with its adjusted algorithms. Within that, can the Minister give an unequivocal assurance that the benchmark for independent, impartial broadcasting in this country—and, I would say, around the world—is the BBC? Whatever the short-term squall, the BBC is a huge jewel in Britain’s crown.
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
I can give the noble Baroness the assurance she asks for on the development of the oracy framework. As she has identified, being able to speak and listen is an enormously important skill that employers say they need young people to have. On the point about media literacy, as she says, in a world in which young people need to distinguish misinformation and disinformation, it is enormously important that they are supported with media literacy. That is why media literacy will be embedded in English, in history and in citizenship. I share her view about the importance of the BBC, both at home and abroad.