Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [HL]

Baroness Sheehan Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 15th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sheehan (LD)]

My Lords, I add my congratulations to the noble Baroness, Lady Black, on her excellent maiden speech.

I rise with some trepidation, as this is the first time that I have spoken in an education debate. My reason for doing so is to raise issues about what is not in the Bill. Although the Minister mentioned the green revolution in her opening remarks, she failed to note that there is not a whisper of reskilling to meet the challenge of climate change in the Bill itself.

Like others, I welcome the Bill. For far too long, lifelong learning has been seen as being a bit quirky. It must instead become an acknowledged norm. We must make it easier for people to upskill or reskill, so that they can redirect their efforts to where there are going to be opportunities in future developments as we reshape our economy to meet the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic, climate change and threats to our natural world.

This Bill should represent a pivotal moment for supporting UK efforts to move to a prosperous zero-carbon economy and society. It could help with building public understanding and confidence and the behaviour change needed to meet net zero and to protect our finite natural resources. It could offer impetus for green jobs and the competitiveness benefit that comes with them. However, it does none of those things. It is silent on the massive skills shortages in sectors that will be crucial to building a greener economy. There is no provision to embed climate and sustainability considerations into the post-16 framework, despite strong evidence from business, educators and learners on the need to do so.

Given that there is unlikely to be further legislation in this area for some time, this Bill is where these gaps must be addressed. The Government are well aware of this, which makes it rather puzzling that there is a lack of even a signalling of their intent to address how they will join up their strategy to achieve net zero with the planned reforms of the post-16 and skills system.

The Government have a 10-point plan for a green industrial revolution, which highlights the opportunity to unlock hundreds of thousands of jobs in the transition from a fossil-fuel-based economy to a more sustainable one—one that will support a just transition for workers. They have the Green Jobs Taskforce, set up jointly by BEIS and the Department for Education, whose remit is to support the UK to transition to a net-zero economy and deliver a green recovery by developing recommendations for an action plan for government, business, education institutions and trade unions to support 2 million good-quality green jobs and the skills that will be needed by 2030. The taskforce finished its work in April this year and has not yet reported. How do the Government plan to incorporate the task force’s findings?

Is it indeed the case that local skills improvement plans would be prepared without reference to strategic objectives such as the net-zero targets or the associated sector-specific strategies, such as the industrial decarbonisation strategy, the transport decarbonisation strategy, the energy White Paper, the nature strategy and the heating and building strategy? Can the Minister reassure me that these crucial underpinnings of how we build back better—in the Government’s own words—will be taken into account in LSIPs? If so, how will that happen?

It is unclear how the Bill will offer support to workers transitioning from industries such as oil and gas, or to fossil fuel heating engineers who will require retraining and reskilling. Current policy plans mean that workers transitioning out of high-carbon sectors who already possess level 3 qualifications would not be able to access the lifelong learning entitlement. Maybe the lifetime skills guarantee level 3 entitlement could be put on a statutory footing and extended to include subsequent qualifications where relevant.

The interrelated climate, biodiversity and Covid challenges have intensified questions from students, teachers and parents about the purpose of education. The learning approaches and analytics they need and want are those that are necessary to tackle global and local crises. This Bill is an opportunity to embed climate and sustainability aspects in both non-vocational and vocational 16 to 19 provision, as well for older adult learners. I hope that the Government, in later stages of the Bill’s passage through your Lordships’ House, will address the green gap within it.