Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [HL]

Baroness Garden of Frognal Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 26th November 2024 Grand Committee

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 28 and 29 in my name. Given my noble friend the Minister’s comprehensive and extremely thorough response to our debate on the first group, I will try not to fall into the trap of once again appealing to the Oscar Wilde agency that cannot speak its name. If we are to have a whole-system approach—the White Paper on getting people back to work, which was published today, mentions this—and we start with ensuring both that there is joined-up thinking in government and that that is translatable in terms of relationships with business, then we need to be reassured that we are clear on where decisions are being taken. Again, I mentioned this in our debate on the first group.

I declare an interest in this group because I have some interest in a major infrastructure project at the moment. The excellent contribution from the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, on the first group highlighted the issues around net zero and other environment-related issues, but there are major problems for us as a nation, as we know. HS2 has set us back. In this country we tend to look at what we are bad at rather than what we are good at, so we will obviously be affected by what has taken place with HS2 and by the massive mistakes that have been made, but there are other major infra- structure projects—some of which, in the nuclear industry, have been mentioned—where success has been substantial.

I had the privilege of going down to a college in Somerset to talk about Hinkley Point. I was deeply impressed with what has been done there but there seems to be a mismatch between the overall picture—the holistic picture, if you like—and the minutiae. I have written to my noble friend the Minister so I do not expect her to deal with this matter in detail this afternoon but, whatever we call boot camps in future and whatever immediate requirements on the ground are to be met by something such as one, if the decisions on funding them are to be devolved, how should an infrastructure project covering a substantial geographical area—as well as a sectoral one—deal with them?

I have another interest because, on Friday, I have the pleasure of initiating the new learning resource digital centre at the Northern College for Residential Adult Education. There are only two left in the country, and one is at Wentworth in Barnsley. That project has been funded because of the local schools improvement plan and the partnership that is arisen from it in terms of the digital needs of learners through lifelong learning. The reason why I am raising this and have touched on boot camps is that there is a real danger that, in our enthusiasm for devolution—I am an enthusiast for it—we start to create joins that did not exist. The Northern College has survived only because the elected Mayor of South Yorkshire has so far managed to find the resources but it was not possible to find resources joined up with West Yorkshire, which has students at the college because it is very much on the edge of South Yorkshire and West Yorkshire but does not fall within West Yorkshire—so it is not West Yorkshire’s concern any more.

With the best will in the world, the devolution that we are engaged in could disable unique things, where there is limited provision available and a holistic approach is difficult to achieve if people are not collaborating. With this Bill and the new executive agency, it would be possible to join things up if we knew where decisions were taken. It would be possible, if we accepted Amendment 29, to make sure that departments across government think and work together in order to ensure that the department responsible for housing, say—whatever it is called these days—understood what was needed to ensure that workers had a green card to get on site in the construction industry and be able to do the job.

Somehow, we have to put the bits back together while we are doing devolution where appropriate, either regionally or sectorally, and ensure that we do not by default end up with the department and Skills England, which will be part of the department, not being clear about who is doing what. In the example I gave in relation to infrastructure projects, it is not yet totally clear. I hope that, by raising the issue, we might be able to clarify it, but, at the moment, the embryo Skills England body will have to refer that to the department because nobody can give me an answer.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 30 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, partly because—I remind the Committee of this—I worked for City & Guilds for 20 years. I was working for it when national vocational qualifications were introduced—1990, I think—precisely to reduce the complexity in the qualification system. There are times when one feels that one has been around too long, but that was exactly it.

Those qualifications came in with levels 1 to 5 in order to be a simple way in which people could understand practical qualification levels. Levels 6 and 7, covering managerial and degree-level subjects, were then introduced as well. The qualifications were called “vocational” because we always wanted to include craft qualifications as well as technical ones. I worry now about what is happening to the encouragement of craft qualifications, which are vital to the economy of the country. I am not suggesting that we go back to NVQs again—they had their day and they went—but it worries me that memories are so short on this. It is a complex system because anything as complex as the myriad variations of employment inevitably will be so, but having a simple way in which one can measure levels of expertise seems to have some advantage to it.

This made me wonder how much discussion there has been with the awarding bodies. City & Guilds has been around for well over 100 years, as I say. Obviously, apprenticeships have been around since the Middle Ages, but I am not suggesting that we go back to then to find out what they did with them. The BTEC has been around for at least 50 or 60 years, I think. There is a mass of expertise there, yet they do not seem to be referenced or involved; I wonder why this is because they have some very useful skills to offer to this Bill.

I just felt that I needed to go down memory lane when I saw that the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, had referred in his amendment to reducing

“the complexity of the qualifications system”.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

My Lords, I added my name to the important amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare. I was fascinated to hear that he actually read the Labour manifesto; that is very impressive. I also support my noble friend Lord Addington’s amendment.

It is quite important that the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, and the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, mentioned mayoral combined authorities—the noble Lord called them pan-regional partnerships, which I had not heard before—and local skills improvement partnerships. Can the Minister tell us how those will feed into the department or how she will consult them?

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Moved by

[Baroness Garden of Frognal]

37: Clause 9, page 3, line 35, leave out subsection (2)
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment removes the power for consequential changes to be made by delegated legislation to Acts other than those specified in the provisions of the Act.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, Amendment 37 in my name, which is supported by the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare, would remove the Government’s power to introduce regulations that make consequential changes to Acts beyond the scope of this Bill. Like so much in the Bill, this represents a classic Henry VIII power. As we have highlighted elsewhere in our discussions on the Bill, it facilitates an Executive power grab and gives far too much power to the Secretary of State, who, as I have said before, may be someone with no interest or understanding of colleges and further education. We are lucky in our current Minister and I hope she lasts a long time, but Ministers can be moved without rhyme or reason.

The power in this clause would undermine parliamentary scrutiny and allow significant changes to be made without proper oversight. The amendment is a small safeguard in a potentially dangerous Bill. I also support Amendments 40 and 41 in this group in the name of my noble friend Lord Addington. I beg to move.

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[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

My Lords, I begin on this group of amendments by reassuring the Committee that the department recognises and takes very seriously the important role that Parliament has in scrutinising consequential amendments. For this reason, we have made every effort to identify all the consequential amendments to primary legislation that are necessary, and to include them as Schedules 1 and 3 to the Bill.

Despite those extensive efforts, there is a risk that in the future we may uncover Acts which need amending because of provisions in this Bill. I reassure the Committee that this is a very limited and narrow power and that any use would be subject to parliamentary scrutiny. We have carefully considered the power and believe that it is entirely justified in this case. In fact, the inclusion of similar powers as a safeguard is well precedented in legislation. Our delegated powers memorandum has been considered by the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee, which has confirmed that there is nothing in the Bill which it would wish to highlight to the House.

Therefore, the amendment, and Amendments 38 and 39 in the name of the noble Baronesses, Lady Barran and Lady Garden, would remove the delegated power to make consequential amendments to primary legislation. If this were accepted, it would be unnecessarily burdensome on Parliament and require greater amounts of parliamentary time should we uncover Acts that needed minor and genuinely consequential amendments to be made as a result of the Bill. It would, of course, require all those changes then to be made through primary legislation.

Depending on the nature of the issue, and to go back to the previous group of amendments, we might see an increased risk of disruption in the functioning of the skills system for learners and employers. I hope it might provide some reassurance to the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, although perhaps not to the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, that previous legislation, including legislation passed by the previous Government, has included a power such as this because it provides that important safety net should future amendments be identified.

The power is limited to consequential amendments to previous Acts and Acts passed later in the same parliamentary Session. It does not encompass all future legislation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Barran, seemed to suggest. The amendments would limit consequential amendments to those Acts specified in Schedules 1 and 3 to the Bill, but our approach in relation to amending Acts passed later in the same Session is not unusual, notwithstanding the challenge from the noble Baroness, Lady Barran. We have reviewed legislation and identified that including a power to amend primary legislation passed in the same parliamentary Session has been done in at least 20 other Acts since 2020. It may well be that the noble Baroness has now seen the light, but I suspect it is more likely that this is a sensible, narrow and reasonable provision to put into this legislation. That was why the previous Government decided to do it at least 20 times.

Amendments 40 and 41, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington, would require regulations making consequential provisions that are subject to the negative procedure by virtue of Clause 9(5) to instead be subject to the affirmative procedure for a period of six months. As is customary, any consequential amendments to legislation other than primary legislation, which would be subject to the affirmative procedure, will be subject to the negative procedure. The limited and uncontroversial nature of such changes means that this procedure provides sufficient parliamentary oversight while enabling changes to be made without unduly taking up parliamentary time.

Consequential amendments to secondary legislation are not included in the Bill as the power to make or amend such legislation is held by the Secretary of State by virtue of the passing of that legislation previously. We have already identified the amendments to secondary legislation that are needed; these are of a similar nature to those included in Schedules 1 and 3 to the Bill. There is a strong precedent for delegated legislation under the negative procedure to be used to make consequential amendments to delegated legislation. Therefore, the amendment seeking affirmative resolution is not necessary.

I have set out in a letter to the noble Baroness, Lady Drake, the chair of the Constitution Committee, how the clause is inherently narrow in scope as it is limited to making amendments that are genuinely consequential on the provisions in the Bill.

Therefore, for the reasons that I have outlined, I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is doing a mighty job in trying to convince us that this is a helpful Bill. Sadly, some of us still have concerns but, for now, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 37 withdrawn.