Small Businesses: Finance
Debate between Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean and Baroness Wilcox(12 years, 9 months ago)
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Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, will the Minister tell the House what is being done to help small businesses to export more? We know that many markets abroad would benefit from putting their small businesses together with ours. What action are the Government taking to concentrate on small businesses getting into these very important export markets?
Baroness Wilcox
The noble Lord, Lord Green, heads up our export division. I am absolutely sure that he has this well on his scanner. When he took up his office, he decided not to go abroad first but to go around Great Britain and look at small and medium-sized businesses to see what they needed and what help they could be given. I like to think that one day he will come here and described this himself.
Higher Education: Funding and Student Finance
Debate between Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean and Baroness Wilcox
Baroness Wilcox
I am afraid that I do not know. The devolved assemblies will carry on doing things in the way that they wish, and we will consult them. However, today I am speaking for universities in England. Of course, as time goes on and we go forward, we will debate and consult with all the devolved assemblies in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland to see how we can best work together and learn from best practice.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
My Lords, the noble Baroness has done her best to answer the questions, but it might be helpful if she gets a rather fuller briefing before dealing with a Statement of such enormous importance.
I return to the point raised by my noble friend Lord Triesman. I am sure that she heard her colleague, Michael Gove, on the radio this morning. He announced the main points in his interview on “Today”. The Front Bench opposite has said all sorts of things about election promises, but one thing that is certain is that Ministers must abide by the Ministerial Code. Has the noble Baroness read the code? If she has, she will remember that Section 9.1 states:
“When Parliament is in session, the most important announcements of Government policy should be made in the first instance, in Parliament”.
That is an unequivocal statement that all Ministers must abide by. Will she tell us what in that unequivocal statement the Government do not understand?
Baroness Wilcox
I do not know the circumstances of the interview and I do not know whether it was leaked. Michael Gove made a very good statement. It has been a very busy day, we have a lot to do and the noble Baroness has been, as she always is, very gracious. However, I have read the Ministerial Code, so I do not think that she can find me wanting on that point. She may feel that my knowledge of the breadth of the brief that I have is not as great as that of others. In this House—as the noble Baroness knows from the debate that we had last week—we have some wonderful minds and noble Lords who represent some of the finest universities not only in this country but in the world. I have tried my best today to do what I could—it is a very big brief—and, if I did not answer as well as the noble Baroness hoped, I am very sorry. However, if anyone wishes to write to me with other questions, I will happily answer them.
The Browne report, which was commissioned by the then Labour Government and which we have supported, is ground-breaking stuff. We are only too pleased that the previous Administration commissioned the noble Lord to do this work. We have taken on board the six principles that he outlines. This is a very exciting way to take our country forward. The report talks about building the greatness of our nation for tomorrow's world and I do not think that I could end on any better line than that. We as the Government of this country will do our best to achieve that.
Higher Education: Funding
Debate between Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean and Baroness Wilcox
Baroness Wilcox
I thank my noble friend Lord Phillips for that question about consultation taking as long as it should take and making sure that all universities and student unions are included in all the conversations. That will be the case. We will consult with all the facts before us. This has been a slow start for us as a Government, and I know that people are getting short-tempered with the lack of progress. We feel it. We would like to move ahead further than we have been able to do so far. The comprehensive spending review will allow us, at last, to see what the news is and to move forward from that. I am part of a coalition Government, and I can tell the House that over the past six months we have learnt to do consultation. We are doing better for it. I may not be able to produce the important answers to some of the very important questions that have been asked today, but I hope that the consultation process will bring about the thing that we all want: good education and good universities for our children, to give them the best.
Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean
Perhaps the noble Baroness will return to one of the questions raised by my noble friend Lord Triesman. He asked her whether the noble Lord, Lord Browne, had been given any indication of the Government’s evolving thinking on the CSR while drawing up his report. That is an important question. Was the noble Lord, Lord Browne, kept informed about government thinking on that point?
The noble Baroness, Lady Sharp, said that she and others in her party would have liked to have seen no raising of the cap. But it went a little further than that, did it not? Before the election, 57 Liberal Democrat MPs not only felt the same as the noble Baroness, but signed a specific pledge saying that they would oppose the raising of the cap. The Minister speaks for the coalition. Will she tell us her feelings about that and does she regret what those 57 Liberal Democrat MPs did?
Baroness Wilcox
On the first question, the noble Baroness will have to ask the noble Lord, Lord Browne. He is here today and it is lovely that he is. On the second question, all three parties here assembled have had to rethink this problem over time. Certainly, the Benches facing me have changed their mind more than once.