Adult Literacy and Numeracy
Debate between David Rutley and Nigel Evans(10 years, 9 months ago)
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Mr Nigel Evans (Ribble Valley) (Ind)
It is a delight for me to make my first speech in the Chamber for three years on this subject. I thank the hon. Member for Gosport (Caroline Dinenage) for giving me the opportunity to do so by securing the debate. I also thank the hon. Member for Huddersfield (Mr Sheerman) for remarking that he was my lecturer at Swansea university—he has a lot to be blamed for in many ways. I always said that he taught me all I know about politics, and he reminds me that I came into Swansea university as a little Tory and came out a bigger Tory. That is a fact.
This is a good debate. We need to do more about literacy and numeracy, and I was delighted to hear what the Leader of the House said about it in business questions. The hon. Member for Huddersfield is absolutely right that it is not a party political matter. It has dogged this country for decades under different Governments, and we have to look harder for the solution. It is about making people better not simply so that they can get better jobs but so that they can fulfil their ambitions and lead better lives for themselves. It is a quality of life thing, and that is vital. Millions of people are affected in this country alone. The OECD report has been mentioned, and it is shocking that we are so low down the table—almost at the bottom. All Members should hang their heads in shame that that is the case, and we need to do more.
Dyslexia has not yet been mentioned. We need to do a lot more to understand people who suffer from it—they are not stupid people, but they need better help and earlier diagnosis. If that does not happen early on, we can find that they lack interest in what is going on in school because they feel that they are not up to it, which is not the case. Some 10% of people in this country suffer from dyslexia, and apparently 4% severely so, so we need to do a lot more.
We have heard about the shocking number of people who are innumerate and illiterate, and the same goes for people in prison. There are 84,000 people in prison at the moment, and we need to do a lot more for them to ensure that they get the education they need while they are in prison.
The hon. Member for Gosport mentioned libraries in prisons and the good they do. When local authorities up and down the country are looking for savings, it is shocking that one of the first and easiest targets they choose are libraries. “Let’s close the library”—well no; let us ensure that the libraries stay open, encourage more people into them, and use them for adult education classes so that people can become more literate and see the wealth of books available. That is one of the reasons people should want to learn to read, write and be numerate.
About 3 million pupils who leave school after GCSEs are ill-equipped for life, and, as I said, about 40,000 of people in prison are illiterate, and 55,000 are innumerate. We must do more to make education in schools more relevant to pupils so that they see why they need to read and write. Nothing surprises me more than when I go into a pub and see youngsters playing darts. They are able to add up what they have just scored and deduct it from, I think, 360. I am there with chalk and a board trying to do that, but they do it in their heads. They are so much better at it because it is relevant to them and that is why they are able to do it. On literacy it is the same with texting, and people substitute certain words for letters and so on. That may be okay, but life is not Twitter and we do not lead our lives in 140 characters. It is much richer than that, and we must ensure that people get the full wealth of knowledge and culture that is denied to them if they are not able to read and write.
I do not believe that teachers want demotivated classes with youngsters who lack ambition or hope, and where the only thing they look forward to is the “X Factor” on television. There are 25 letters in the alphabet apart from X, and if we combine them there is more wealth out there than there is on “X Factor”.
I was on the Council of Europe for five years, and nothing shamed me more than the fact that there were people from other countries who seemed to speak English better than we do. They came from Denmark, Sweden—a number of countries—and their ability to speak English as well as their own language, and probably Italian, Spanish and French while they are at it, was amazing. In this country, however, we have statistics showing that people cannot even speak our country’s national language. We must do more.
The hon. Lady mentioned stigma, and we must stop all that. People have not failed; we have failed them because they are unable to read and write. It is not their stigma but ours, and we—rather than those people—should have that stigma. We must correct that and give people opportunities to be able to read and write. Lifelong learning is important because education does not finish when people are 18 or 19, or when they leave school or university. It goes on for ever, and we must make opportunities for people to have lifelong learning.
The number of immigrants who have come to the country over the years is phenomenal and many simply do not have the skills to speak English. That should be a priority for us. I know we say that people should not come to the country and settle down unless they are able to speak English, but we must recognise that millions of people have come in who cannot do that. What are we going to do about that? Let us not deny to immigrants who have settled in this country, rightfully and legally, the opportunity to play a full role. Let us do more for immigrants who have settled in the country but who are not able to speak English.
When schools finish and the doors and gates are locked at night, it is a crying shame that they are not thrown open for all the people who want to do night classes. Community centres have been mentioned, but lots of schools up and down the country are closed and should not be. The lights should be on at 7 o’clock in the evening so that people can go there, and there are lots of resources, including teachers who would be willing to be mentors and teach those who want to read and write.
If we want people to have fuller lives, and if we want people to be better citizens and have better opportunities for employment, we must ensure they can read, write and be numerate. We must work harder. We cannot let people down as we have for decades.
David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)
My hon. Friend, as well as other hon. Members today, makes a powerful speech. Given the importance of the internet and the digital economy in helping people to access information and to learn, does he agree that it is vital that IT skills are linked to helping people to learn literacy and numeracy skills, including older people who have difficulty accessing public services? Does he recognise the important role that organisations such as Age UK play in that important task?
Mr Evans
I agree with my hon. Friend—that is exactly what should happen. When I am learning French or Russian, I use the internet. There is an amazing amount of stuff in different languages to read on the internet. It is the same for those who want to learn English, but they need the IT skills to do that. Those things can be combined—lifelong learning clearly involves IT.
Business and the Economy
Debate between David Rutley and Nigel Evans(12 years, 2 months ago)
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David Rutley (Macclesfield) (Con)
Contrary to what the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie) said, the economy is central to the Government’s agenda. They have already taken much-needed action to ensure lower-cost Government borrowing by working to create the most cost-effective business tax system in the G7 and by pushing forward supply-side reforms that are needed to tackle the burden of bureaucracy facing British businesses, much of which was put in place by Labour when it was in power. Real progress is being made, and I support the Government in their efforts to show that Britain is open for business once again.
The Queen’s Speech sets out proposals that will build on those achievements. The enterprise and regulatory reform Bill will promote enterprise and fair markets through a new competition and markets authority, the creation of the green investment bank, and much-needed reform of employment tribunals. The Queen’s Speech also contained the Groceries Code Adjudicator Bill, which has been welcomed by farmers in Macclesfield, the National Farmers Union, and small food producers more widely. By establishing an independent adjudicator that will enforce the groceries supply code of practice, the Government will ensure that supermarkets deal more fairly with their suppliers and that we have a much more effective supply chain for the food industry.
The Queen’s Speech includes important measures on financial services. The banking reform Bill will create a ring fence around vital banking services and introduce depositor preference, in line with the recommendations of the Vickers Independent Commission on Banking. After the Northern Rock experience, with the first run on the banks in over a century, it was clear that much needed to be done to protect the pensioners, families and small businesses who rely on our banks and financial services and that the failed framework of the previous Government had to be replaced. After the general election, the Government rightly focused on putting back in place a financially stable mechanism to ensure that we had a solid foundation, and they commissioned Vickers to take forward a bold approach to financial regulation and propose the ring fence for retail banks. That must be put in place to make certain that we do not see further failures such as Northern Rock and the Royal Bank of Scotland. This highlights the importance of going beyond Basel III and the minimum capital requirements that it proposes to ensure that there is real stability for the UK financial services system. I am pleased that the recommendations of the Vickers commission are now being taken forward by the Government in the banking reform Bill.
The Financial Services Bill, which I was involved in scrutinising in Committee, was the next step in the process. It puts accountability back with the Bank of England, where it needs to be, by creating a new systemic regulator—the Financial Policy Committee. The Bill is one of the carry-over Bills that will continue its progress in this parliamentary Session, and it is vital that it does so.
It is a concern that the aims of these reforms, whether banking reform or the Financial Services Bill, might be undermined by plans being suggested by Brussels. There are worrying signs that a significant number of EU regulations in the pipeline could have a major effect on the Government’s new financial regulations and undermine our freedom to take the necessary steps to get our banking system into a safer, more secure position.
A huge amount is at stake for the UK economy, and it should not be forgotten that the financial services sector still accounts for 10% of UK gross domestic product. In 2010, the sector employed 1 million people, and it contributed £53 billion in taxes in the 2009-10 financial year alone.
The Chancellor is right to work hard to ensure that the single European rule book does not bind the UK to a maximum level of EU capital requirements, which the Vickers report believes is inadequate. Capital requirements directive IV threatens to tie the hands of the Financial Policy Committee. Given the importance of this decision to the British economy, our negotiators are right to use every tool in their arsenal to protect our ability to regulate UK financial services. The Treasury is right to push back on Brussels to ensure that the box-ticking culture that was all too prevalent under the previous system is not replaced by further box ticking from Brussels.
Domestic regulators require discretion to utilise the new judgment-led approach, which is welcomed by many, to cater for the changing needs of the financial services sector here at home. However, without the effective safeguards from EU regulations, the UK risks being tied into a system more suited to Germany’s regional Landesbank or Spain’s caja savings banks than one regulating the globally important City of London.
The Government are right to continue to press for the safeguards that the Prime Minister sought at the EU Council meeting, where he made his decisive veto. Tomorrow’s ECOFIN meeting offers Finance Ministers from across the EU the chance to address the eurozone’s crisis and I hope that they take note of what this Government are doing in their efforts to tackle the deficit and push forward constructive reforms in the financial—