Oral Answers to Questions
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Davey
I am very grateful for my hon. Friend’s question. She will be aware that her constituents in this village share their concerns about postcode issues with many other residents in many other constituencies across the UK. I have raised this matter in the past with Royal Mail, and it believes that the costs of changing its systems would be disproportionate. Of course I will raise her point, but I do not want to raise her expectations.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The responsibility to promote adult and community learning in Northern Ireland is a devolved matter. Has the Minister considered linking with Northern Ireland’s Department for Employment and Learning to provide a strategy for the mutual benefit of both the UK mainland and Northern Ireland?
Education Bill
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
In other regions of the United Kingdom, such as Northern Ireland, education, including further education, is devolved. In Northern Ireland it is possible to obtain gold-plated apprenticeships that can accompany the education and training that are also needed. Have the Government considered similar action to help apprentices to secure better final qualifications?
Mr Hayes
The hon. Gentleman has made a useful comment. The way in which apprenticeships are perceived, and the experience of the apprentices themselves, are critical to whether apprentices are likely to make progress. Those who have had a good experience of the early stages of apprenticeship may well progress to a higher level, perhaps in the companies that have taken them on, which will be good for both the business and the individual.
Paragraphs 30 and 31 of Lord Leitch’s report, which was commissioned by the last Government, state:
“Improving the skills of young people, while essential, cannot be the sole solution to achieving world class skills. Improvements in attainment of young people can only deliver a small part of what is necessary because they comprise a small proportion of the overall workforce. Demographic change means that there will be smaller numbers of young people flowing into the workforce towards 2020.
More than 70 per cent of the 2020 working age population are already over the age of 16.”
Lord Leitch concluded that unless we upskill and reskill the existing work force, we will never catch up with our competitors.
The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby is right to say that we should not think in terms of two alternatives. This is not about providing a valued and valuable route to practical learning through apprenticeships for younger people but not doing so for people in their 20s or 30s who want to upskill or reskill, such as the level 3 apprentices whom I met recently at Jaguar Land Rover in Halewood, near Liverpool, not a million miles from the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. Both those things can be achieved through an apprenticeship offer of the right kind.
Adoption
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Jessica Lee
I agree with my hon. Friend. Of course we need a common-sense approach. There are thousands of children in care who are waiting to be placed, and we must do all that we can to help them.
The issue of concurrent placements is important. Foster carers who are caring for children throughout the court process—the care proceedings—can also become the adoptive parents without having to be assessed all over again. The advantage is that children are in their prospective home and able to form those important attachments from an early stage. That is surely desirable and needs to be encouraged. Organisations such as Coram are skilled and successful in implementing such an approach, and authorities, including the London borough of Harrow, have championed it.
Of course there are consequences to such an approach. We are asking foster carers to make an emotional investment, and yet they are often left for months on end waiting for the outcome of the assessments of everyone else to see whether they can keep the child for the longer term, so it is not for the faint-hearted. None the less, there are many advantages to the concurrent placement approach. I hope that the Government will consider increasing the number of concurrent placements and also how they are undertaken across the country.
Another aspect of the adoption debate is the question of how important it is to secure a cultural and ethnic match between prospective parents and the child. In my experience, this is a debate in which feelings can run very high, and professionals and parents hold a variety of views. Of course there are many who have a greater knowledge and insight into this issue than I, but for what it is worth my view is that we have taken a step in the right direction with the recent change in the legislation that says that a culturally appropriate match is desirable but is by no means a prerequisite or a deal-breaker.
It is easy to be simplistic about this topic, but it is difficult to accept that it is better for a black and minority ethnic child to have to remain in care for all of their childhood instead of being placed in a loving home because there is not an ideal ethnic match.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing this debate to the Chamber today. Often foster parents and those who wish to adopt go overseas to adopt. Does that not illustrate the problem that we are trying to highlight today—that it is quicker to adopt overseas than at home? Surely there needs to be a quick change to the system for the very reasons that the hon. Lady has stated.
Jessica Lee
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. I have many anecdotal examples of this issue. I have met many adoptive parents who have spent years hoping to adopt children and who have, eventually, had to turn to agencies overseas. It has taken years and cost them a huge amount to parent a child. That is a tragedy and must come to an end. Society has moved on considerably on this issue and those not involved in any way with the court or adoption process are often amazed to hear that they may not be considered as parents for a child because there is not a good cultural match. I do not think it is fair on BME children who are in foster care to be disadvantaged in such way. We must make progress on this issue.
On the issue of sibling placements, there is evidence that the loss of contact with birth siblings is a real regret to adopted children. We need to do more to support successful sibling placements and to encourage contact and communication between siblings throughout their childhood. I have friends who went from having no children to having three overnight, aged three, two and one. It was a life-changing moment for them, but it ensured that the sibling group were able to stay together. I can now report that those children are flourishing and experiencing a very happy childhood.
It is easy to be over-simplistic about this issue and there will be many examples of situations where it is not in a child’s best interests to maintain such relationships. None the less, if such relationships can be sustained they should be, and this is where the care plans that are devised at court and the role of the independent reviewing officer come to the fore.
When the case completes in court, the judge will sign off and approve the final care plan. A section in that will include the contact—contact with birth parents and with birth family, which will include siblings as well. A real regret for judges is that they do not know what happens after that point; they have no judicial role once the case has concluded. The case then moves to the management of the local authority and the independent reviewing officers, who have a key and pivotal role to play in the whole adoption procedure. I hope the role of such officers is supported and perhaps even increased and improved over the years. They are charged with the responsibility of checking on that care plan and seeing how it is being implemented. The loss of birth parents can be difficult for children as they grow up, but the loss of siblings with whom they may have been very close can be something of real regret. More needs to be done to improve and encourage not just the placement of siblings together but sibling contact if children have to be separated.
The issue of Criminal Records Bureau checks also needs to be considered and changed across many Departments. A constituent of mine wanted to volunteer to work with the local Home-Start charity. Erewash is lucky to have such a good Home-Start team who do great outreach work, especially for young mums, and work very well with the local authority. The constituent put in for her CRB check and she was confused with another lady who did not even share the same name. The check came back saying that she had a number of convictions. That is simply not the case and it has taken months to resolve the matter. My concern is again with the system that we have. We are dealing with an individual who wants to help; she wants to volunteer in her community and help young mums, and the system has done everything it can to try to prevent her from doing that. We must not let such problems with bureaucracy get in the way. Such problems are also reflected in the adoption process, but I have already covered them in this debate.
Martin Narey, the former head of Barnardo’s, has been appointed by the Government to advise on adoption. He has worked extremely hard and been bold and direct in his conclusions about how we move forward. Both his work and the campaign that has been championed by The Times have done a huge amount to raise the issues across the country.
Philip Davies (in the Chair)
Two colleagues are seeking to catch my eye. Just to let them know, I intend to call the Front-Bench speakers at 10.40 am, so they can divide the time between them.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I want to make a few points to give the Northern Ireland perspective. I commend the hon. Member for Erewash (Jessica Lee)— I am sure that my pronunciation is totally wrong, but that is by the way. I hesitated to mention her constituency, because I was not sure it would come out right. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) on his heartfelt contribution. He has walked that road and knows it well.
I am a great believer, as I have said in other debates, in the importance of family life. Family is the core of society, and we build society around the family. I am fortunate enough to have come from a good family environment, from my point of view. I have three boys and am a grandfather to boot. I see the importance of family life in giving children stability and ensuring that they do well in life.
In my position as an MP, I have had the opportunity to meet many constituents who adopt and foster, and who give love and meaning to those who need help. Many wish to adopt, and I will make a couple of points relating to them. Some of those points have been mentioned, but I want to put on record the situation in Northern Ireland and the importance of family life to those who find themselves on their own.
I have seen many products of adoption and the good work done by foster parents. I know a family in my constituency who have adopted or fostered numerous children over a period of years. I remember one young boy; I mind well when he was adopted, and I have watched him grow all the way through the process. He started as a vulnerable young boy, and found parents who gave him an opportunity in life. Now he is a young man. I have watched his progress from a child seeking adoption to his present employment. He is stable, kind, well-mannered and a credit to both his parents and his foster parents.
Northern Ireland had 2,660 children in the care of the authorities in March last year, to give some statistics. Their needs included short-term care as well as long-term adoption and fostering. The breakdown is that 50% were boys, 17% were between the ages of one and four, 30% were between five and 11, 31% were between 12 and 15 and 19% were 16-plus. They all have their own unique needs.
Fostering and adoption are absolutely important, but in Northern Ireland, only 61 of those 2,660 young people found adoptive parents that year. That is a minuscule drop in the ocean. I have spoken to fostering authorities and organisations in Northern Ireland, and they have indicated some of the problems with the process. A better way is needed through the paperwork and bureaucracy that we have all mentioned and know about. I made a comment earlier about people going overseas to adopt children. It is not that children from across the water should not have the opportunity for adoption. It is not only celebrities who adopt them but people such as my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann, who wanted to give children a home, as do many people I know, who have looked at photographs in the paper and read stories on TV and in magazines about multi-millionaires who go overseas to adopt children. Such people give young people stability and opportunity.
The process worries me, because it takes so long. One key factor that other Members have mentioned is that the process can take anything from two to two and a half years. For those who are starting the process and are anxious to enable quick fostering or adoption, we must do something about that.
Claire Perry
I wonder what the hon. Gentleman would say about a case in my constituency involving an officer returning from Afghanistan. He and his wife had been trying for five years to have a child and decided to adopt. He was a smoker and was told that he had to give up, that he could not then restart the process for a year and that it would take another two years, by which time he is likely to be on deployment again. Surely we should do better and make the system more streamlined.
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Lady for that example. We are all frustrated by the process, which does not deliver when needed but adds anomalies, in this case in relation to smoking.
David Simpson
On that point, when we were going through the process, we were told that it would take a year or a year and a half to do the home study and so on, but if we were willing to pay for it, social services could do it in four months. That is exactly what we did. People who cannot afford that have to wait a year and a half or more, but those in a position to pay for a home study through social services can do it in four months, a bit like the health service. It is not right.
Jim Shannon
I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. There is something seriously wrong with a process where those who can pay get it and those who cannot pay have to wait.
Mr Andrew Smith
On that point, does the hon. Gentleman share the ambition that Martin Narey set out regarding the scale of change needed when he suggested that the number of adoptions ought to double and the time taken to complete them ought to halve? Is that not the scale of change that we must press for?
Jim Shannon
I welcome those constructive comments. I would say that the number should more than double. If only 61 people in Northern Ireland were adopted in a year when 2,660 were awaiting adoption—I am mindful that those figures are for both short-term and long-term care—I would like that figure to more than double. However, I accept that point.
Mr Smith
I mention that ambition because that is what Martin Narey said. He set it in context by saying that even people who are pro-adoption—incredibly, he comes across people who are anti-adoption—have a feeling that that is too ambitious and undeliverable, but like the hon. Gentleman, I think that we ought to be capable of doing better than that.
Jim Shannon
I think that we all agree that we have to set targets that meet the need. I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his comments.
Richard Graham
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way; he represents Strangford, my old hunting ground. On the difficulties for those who wish to adopt or who have adopted, does he agree with my constituents, Mr and Mrs James, who told me the other day that, as people who have adopted children, had they known what they would have to go through, they probably would not have done so? Moreover, Mr and Mrs Nash told me that they did not know about the difficulties that they would have in relation to education or about the hidden trauma of the children whom they adopted—it was waiting to come out, but they did not get the same support as children in care. Does the hon. Gentleman agree with them that, if we could overcome those difficulties, we would be able to raise the rates of those who are adopted—in Gloucestershire, only 27 out of 500 children in care are adopted—and that the problem would be much less grave?
Jim Shannon
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that contribution. I wholeheartedly agree with him and think that every other Member present does, too.
I am conscious of the time, so I will come to a conclusion. I welcome the fact that the Prime Minister has indicated that he is keen and anxious for a time scale of six months. If that is to happen, we will need more than a verbal commitment. I want action. It would be good to see that happen.
Finally, I am concerned that, in some, not all, cases, it is as though Christian families are interrogated about their ethics and morality, their homes, and their desire to adopt. In some cases, Christians, Christian families and Christian parents are being penalised because of their beliefs, but we cannot pass by what they have to offer. Those potential parents wish to adopt and we have a list of young children who seek adoptive parents. The answer is simple—let us put the two together and do it right.
Grammar Schools
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 2 months ago)
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Gareth Johnson
I am not saying that there are no examples of social mobility among non-selective schools, but in my experience it is common for children who go to grammar schools to benefit enormously from the social mobility that they offer.
What is unique about grammar schools is that they enable specialisation in academic work, which is not always available, not should it be, in other schools. In some areas with exclusively comprehensive schools, the catchment area around good non-selective schools experiences higher house prices than in areas around less-well-performing comprehensive schools, which leads to poorer families being unable to send their children to the best performing schools in the area.
To return to the point made by the Gentleman, social mobility may suffer in areas without selective education. Grammar schools provide an equal chance for children from poorer backgrounds. Common sense suggests that children will learn more when placed with children of similar academic ability.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Grammar schools clearly push academia, and push pupils to achieve above what they may think they can do. An example in my area is Regent House school in Newtownards, where one young fellow achieved six A-levels, four of which were 100% passes. That proves that if children are in the right school and are pushed hard, they do well.
Gareth Johnson
The hon. Gentleman makes an important point. I think I am right in saying that Northern Ireland has a completely selective school system. I have taken the liberty of obtaining some figures on exam success in Northern Ireland compared with England. I do not doubt that there are caveats attached, and I will give him the figures after the debate. According to the Library, in England, just under 70% of GCSE entries were awarded a grade C or higher, compared with just under 75% in Northern Ireland; and 76% of A-level entries in England were awarded a grade C or higher compared with 84% in Northern Ireland. That is the proof of the pudding. Northern Ireland has a completely selective process and, with caveats attached, it has improved exam success as a result.
Esther McVey (Wirral West) (Con)
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford (Gareth Johnson) on raising this issue. All of us are saying that grammar schools provide excellent education for all children from all backgrounds. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Laura Sandys) explained most powerfully, we would not necessarily know what schools people’s children go to when we are knocking on doors while out canvassing.
For me, the debate is about acknowledging grammar schools and the excellent work they do. It is also about acknowledging the part that they play in the educational system. There are a number of different kinds of schools, and grammar schools are just one, but we cannot run away from the fact that they do an excellent job. They need to be supported, and I am delighted that the Government are backing them, which will enable them to flourish.
Grammar schools produce consistent, successful results and well-rounded citizens and adults. I say that as a previous governor of Calday Grange grammar, which is 365 years old this year. I was most impressed by the way in which the parents there came together to support not only the school, but the pupils in it. I was also impressed by the community engagement there. If parents want grammar schools and support them—this one has been going for 365 years, and there are many more like it, not just in Wirral West, but right across Wirral—we must keep hold of them. Parents know what is right for their kids and they want these schools to keep going.
The successful results of grammar schools in Wirral West speak for themselves, so let me give just a couple of examples. On the average point score per student, Calday Grange grammar gets 34.5% above the average in the country, Upton Hall school for girls gets 37% above the average and West Kirby grammar gets nearly 40% above the average. On the five A to C grades at GCSE, Calday Grange grammar is 44.5% higher than the average, Upton Hall is 35.5% higher and West Kirby grammar school is 43.5% higher. That is outstanding, and it is part of the grammar school system. Why try to mend something that is not broken? Why take away something that is unbelievably successful?
Wirral grammar school for girls had a 100% pass rate for A-level students, with 43% of its pupils getting A* and A grades and 73% getting between A* and B grades. The school is unbelievably successful. It is ranked in the top 100 state schools in the country in The Sunday Times list.
My area desperately needs great schools—I can say that because I am from Merseyside. In fact, every area could say the same. That really is key when we look at the future generation we are creating and at social mobility. Grammar schools have to be the engines for social mobility in communities.
Grammar schools are academic schools, and our top universities look to them. More than 1,000 grammar school pupils went to Oxford and Cambridge after taking A-levels in 2008. In areas such as mine, grammar schools provide an outlet for academic potential.
We all watch BBC and ITV and select excellence in dancing, singing or some other kind of performance—nobody has a problem with that. We all vote on these things and say that someone can win because they are the best. Why do we have a problem with looking at academic excellence and selecting people in that way, when the whole country is quite happy to send in a text to vote in these shows?
Jim Shannon
Why do people vote for Russell Grant in “Strictly Come Dancing” if this is about excellence? I cannot understand that.
Esther McVey
To be fair, I think that man has got move and groove and slinky hips, and I will be voting for him. As an ex-dancer, I was taken by his dancing abilities.
I welcome what the Government are doing. I welcome free schools and academies, because I believe in choice. The grammar schools in Wirral West are moving to become academies and following the academy route. As they progress towards becoming academies, I hope they will remain true to their beliefs, aims, aspirations and founding principles. I hope they will remain the same when they become academies. I hope that our support for them will allow them to flourish, that we do not change a winning formula and that we ensure that these excellent schools remain in our community.
What the coalition Government are doing is a refreshing change. They are offering choice, pushing for discipline, looking to support and encourage all sorts of schools and looking for achievement in every area. Yes, there must be academic achievement, but there must be achievement and fulfilment for every child. What some might do in academia, others might do through practical skills, while others might provide for their community in a very different way. I support all those kids, because they all have a talent; we just have to find out what theirs is and nurture them.
University Technical Colleges
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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Robert Halfon
I agree with my hon. Friend, and I think that my remarks later will address some of his points.
Thanks largely to my hon. Friend the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning, and the Minister of State, Department for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb), the Government have increased the number of apprentices to a record level this year—up 50% to 442,700, with increases at all levels and age groups. However, we are starting from a low base. In 2009 there were about 11 apprentices for every 1,000 workers. In France that figure was 17, in Austria 33, in Australia 39, and in Germany 40. In 2009 our young people were four times worse off for apprenticeships than young people in Germany.
Considering that the Berlin wall fell only 20 years ago, that is deeply shocking and shows just how uncompetitive the UK economy has become. For years Germany reaped the benefits of its skills policy and a culture that valued apprentices and gave prestige to vocational learning. Germany built up its manufacturing and high-tech industry while we lost out, not only under the previous Government but, honestly, during the 1990s. I agree with the analysis of Lord Baker, who was one of our finest Education Secretaries and was, in many ways, the forefather of the UTC movement, along with the late Ron Dearing. Lord Baker wrote in the Yorkshire Post in 2008:
“One thing our country has missed out on is good vocational schools. Several attempts have been made since the 1870s, but they have generally fallen by the wayside. The 1944 Butler Education Act established three types of school—grammar, secondary modern and technical, but the first to disappear was the technical school as it had become”—
to quote the Latin—
“‘infra-dig’. Ironically, this English pattern was adopted by Germany in 1945 and became very successful: their youngsters who attend technical schools acquire skills in engineering, construction, manufacturing and design. Germany’s technical schools today have more applicants than their grammar schools and Germany produces several times the number of qualified technicians than the UK.”
We simply cannot afford to keep producing generation after generation of rootless university graduates with purely academic qualifications who lack the skills that industry needs.
What are UTCs, and why will they succeed where other attempts have failed? As Lords Baker and Adonis said when first proposing the UTC model, we need a vocational route that is rigorous, attractive and as prestigious as the best academic routes. That simply does not exist in our current schools system. As the Prime Minister put it recently, the expansion of UTCs will be
“the next great poverty-busting structural change we need…offering first-class technical skills to those turned off by purely academic study.”
However, the key reform is that major local employers, especially in manufacturing and industry, will help to write the curriculum, which has never been tried before. As the recent schools White Paper said:
“Pupils at the JCB Academy in…Staffordshire, will study a curriculum designed to produce the engineers and business leaders of the future…They will complete engineering tasks that have been set by JCB and other Academy partners including Rolls-Royce, Toyota and Network Rail.”
Early results are positive. They prove that UTCs are an instrument of social justice, as well as economic efficiency. At the JCB academy, for example, students wear business suits. There are reports that truancy has been reduced significantly and GCSE results, particularly in the core subjects of English and Maths, have massively improved.
As Lord Baker said a few weeks ago,
“10,000 students are now set to attend University Technical Colleges by 2015”.
That means 10,000 fewer youngsters on the dole, and 10,000 more students learning the high-tech skills of the future to support British industry, manufacturing, and growth.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
We are fortunate in Northern Ireland to have technical colleges—the South Eastern Regional college campus in Newtownards is an example—that give young people exactly what the hon. Gentleman is referring to: an opportunity to train, build their confidence and get a job outside, or be directed towards one. I encourage him to look up the South Eastern Regional college website to see exactly what he hopes to achieve in action.
Robert Halfon
I would be delighted to look at that website, and I would like to study it more, because it is good to see successful examples in action.
So far, 18 new UTCs have received support from the Education Secretary, with 13 announced last month, and 130 companies are supporting them, which I think is a record in industrial investment. For the past three years the Baker Dearing Educational Trust has worked with the Department for Education, the private sector, universities and further education colleges to build the network. The Chancellor has doubled the funding for UTCs and found money for at least 24. The Opposition always go on about cuts and the legacy of youth unemployment—left by the last Government, as I have mentioned—but we are talking about a concrete investment of at least £150 million, with more funds levered in from the private sector, to tackle that very issue. This is not small beer.
Sex and Relationship Education
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 3 months ago)
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Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the hon. Member for South Northamptonshire (Andrea Leadsom) for bringing this issue before us, and I totally support her point of view. We live in an age of high teenage pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections and multiple partners. No man is judge of how people live their lives as adults, but there must be safeguards in place to protect the innocence of children and to keep them as children for an appropriate time.
I questioned two mothers about their children’s education in primary school. One was a married mother of three, who also had a grandchild, and the other was a single mother of two, who had one child in primary school. Both told me the same thing: “Teach my daughter what is appropriate touching and what is not. Do not teach my daughter about sex when she is not even old enough to stay up past 9 o’clock.” No matter what their religious background, most parents agree that primary school is much too soon to be teaching these things.
When my three boys were young, they played with their G. I. Joes—I think that was the thing at the time—and little girls played with their Barbie dolls to encourage their imagination. Now children are told that that is babyish and that they should be playing on computers and hanging about with their friends. We now have six to seven-year-old girls wanting to wear padded underwear, wearing full faces of make-up to school and wearing high heels that harm their backs, all to look like their favourite TV stars.
As we know, Primark announced it was to stop selling padded bikini tops for children as young as seven, after criticism from the general public and politicians. The company, which was criticised for its £4 bikini sets, apologised to customers and said it would donate any profits to child welfare organisations. Penny Nicholls of the Children’s Society said:
“There is a big distinction between children dressing up for fun and retailers producing items of clothing that target children and encourage premature sexualisation.”
There is a clear difference, and I want to develop that point.
Last week, I attended a Prayer for Parliament and the Nation meeting in the House, as did other Members here. We were given a presentation about sex education at primary school level. It was very graphic, very physical and very technical. I am not a prude by any means, but I felt uneasy sitting watching it, and I suspect many others in the Room would probably feel uneasy, too. Thirty to 40 people were present at the meeting, and they gave examples of how their children had come home from school and told them that they could not get their heads round the sexual act; they were fearful. Let me just say, therefore, that it would be wrong to take sex education out of the hands of parents, schools’ boards of governors and teachers without the agreement of parents.
In Northern Ireland we have an organisation called Love for Life, which my hon. Friend the Member for Upper Bann (David Simpson) mentioned. It talks about not the technical details but emotional relationships; and that is what we must try to do. Love for Life in Northern Ireland has been able to affect 30,000 people in their school education. That is an example of what can happen. I urge hon. Members fully to support what the hon. Lady proposes.
Kevin Brennan
My view is that the hon. Lady should put it in the public domain. If she thinks that inappropriate practices are going on in our schools, wherever they are in the country—my or her constituency, or anywhere else—and that children are being exposed to materials that could damage them, that is an important matter, of public concern, which should be in the public record. I am sorry to disagree with her, but that is how it should be.
The hon. Lady also suggested that parents should be able to exercise an opt-in with respect to sex and relationship education. My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) has pointed out that there is an opt-out, which extends to the age of 18, which is an anomaly. My hon. Friend, who was an able and successful Minister in the Department for Children, Schools and Families, tried to address that anomaly, by reducing the age to 15—although she did not quite get the relevant measure passed at the end of that Parliament—so that children could have the opportunity of a year of sex and relationship education before reaching the age of consent and what was at that time the school-leaving age. That seemed to me to be an entirely sensible proposal, but it was lost in the wash-up, as my hon. Friend pointed out, along with the proposal to make sex and relationship education a compulsory part of the primary curriculum.
An opt-in system would be inappropriate. The opt-out is available, and it provides parents with the necessary protection if they are concerned about what their children are being taught. Some argue that there should be no opt-out, and I think that the hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay (Stephen Gilbert) was arguing that, but I do not agree.
My hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North said that we need to source the evidence if we are to make accusations about the material being used in schools. If there is an accusation of widespread use of inappropriate materials for sex and relationship education we should know about it. She also pointed out the danger that, if there is insufficient sex and relationship education, young women will not be taught sufficiently to be confident about themselves and their ability to take control of their relationships, whether sexual or other personal relationships. I would add—and I am sure that my hon. Friend would agree—that it is important for young men to be taught about appropriate behaviour. When I was a Minister in the Department for Children, Schools and Families, we heard a lot of evidence from charities about the effect of the more widespread availability, in the age of the internet, of hardcore pornography, and its influence on the practices of young men, and their expectations of young women in a sexual relationship. If young men see that material in their daily lives they need to be taught that that is not necessarily how a relationship should develop. That is where sex and relationship education in school can be important—in helping young people to develop healthy, good relationships.
Jim Shannon
Is the hon. Gentleman aware of the national opinion poll, which showed that six out of 10 parents are concerned about any sex education in primary school? Those 60% of the ladies and gentlemen who were questioned suggested that sex education should start at 13. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that they too have an opinion, which needs to be taken on board?
Kevin Brennan
I do accept that they have an opinion. I am glad that the hon. Gentleman clarified the statistic, because when he spoke earlier he did not mention that it related to primary education. I am afraid that it all depends, in such situations, on how the question is asked. I think most people would understand the appropriateness of teaching children about relationships, which is what we are talking about, at an appropriate level at primary school. I know that the Minister was not very keen when the previous Government introduced social and emotional aspects of learning, but it had a huge impact on improving relationships between children. When parents are given an explanation of what is in mind, and of the scare stories and unsubstantiated scaremongering about sex and relationship education, they will change their mind.
I pay tribute to other hon. Members on their speeches. The hon. Member for St Austell and Newquay made some important points and gave some important statistics about sexually transmitted diseases and the prevalence of sexual activity among young people. It was not necessarily wise of him to quote The Specials. I could tell him the whole lyric, which I know by heart, and it is not necessarily entirely helpful to his case, but I thank him. My hon. Friend the Member for Airdrie and Shotts (Pamela Nash) told us about her role as the chair of the all-party group on HIV and AIDS, and she too mentioned the importance of evidence in discussing the topic. She told us that the inspectorate has said that SRE is patchy and inadequate. That is not good enough, and we need to do something about it. There were also good contributions from the hon. Members for Congleton and for Strangford (Jim Shannon). The hon. Gentleman said that we should teach what is appropriate, and went on to talk about the sexualisation of young people. Sex and relationship education can help to counter such sexualisation of young people by teaching them what is or is not appropriate, and about the relevant issues. He should reconsider the issue and see the opportunity to counter the sexualisation of children.
The Opposition are disappointed that in the review of personal, social, health and economic education, the Government have made a U-turn. When we criticised the Conservatives in the wash-up for forcing the then Government and the Liberal Democrats, who supported them, to drop the sex and relationship education issue, they criticised the then Secretary of State for suggesting that they were not in favour of extending sex and relationship education. However, it turns out that they have ruled out in their review any change to the law on sex and relationship education. That is highly disappointing. There is plenty of evidence, certainly from the recent Brook study, of young people’s ignorance about sex and relationships. There is also plenty of evidence from the inspectorate about why we should do something about it.
I have praised the Minister, and I praise him again, for tackling head on homophobic bullying in schools, as we tried to do, and for being the second Minister from the Department, after me, to address the Schools Out conference. He should show the same kind of vision when it comes to sex and relationship education.
Careers Service (Young People)
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 4 months ago)
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Mrs Chapman
Fantastic! I am all for that. That is marvellous, but is it happening in every school in the country? Of course not. I have some brilliant engineering businesses which go into schools and inspire young people. They try to point young people in the right direction and show them that there are wonderful careers for them on their doorstep—international careers—but young people need more than a visit from such a company. They need proper face-to-face advice from people who will inspire them.
The businesses in Darlington to which I referred are recruiting senior engineers from Greece, Brazil and Turkey, because we are not producing the people to fill those senior roles. One reason for that is that people are not getting the right advice at the right age. I am not talking just about 16 and FE. I am talking about year 6 in primary school, before they take their options, so that they know that they have to take good science subjects and maths. I am glad to see the hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) agreeing with me. Such careers advice will not happen via Google. It needs to be face-to-face, inspiring advice.
I am fortunate to have in Darlington the Queen Elizabeth sixth-form college. I shall shamelessly plug the work of one woman, Stella Barnes, who provides first-class careers advice to young people there. I am sure that despite the pressures that it faces, the college will find the funding to keep Stella doing such fantastic work, but that is one woman and she can only do so much.
In the turbulent world that our young people are entering, job prospects are not certain, the costs of higher education are putting people off, and EMA no longer incentivises young people to stay on post-16. That applies not only to the at-risk, the vulnerable, the people who would not have a job if their mother had not organised something for them. It applies to all young people from all kinds of backgrounds. It is not just about the children of people on benefits. It is about people whose parents are in professional careers but who lack the wherewithal to open other doors—people like myself.
The biggest shame is that the Government have over-promised on what they will do. When they said that there would be an all-age careers service, people took them at their word. They thought that that meant the same for everybody and that it would be fair, but that is not what we will find. Adults can get face-to-face advice, because the Government rightly recognise that they need it, so why can young people not get it? They need it more than anyone else. They need someone to look them in the eye, work out their personal circumstances, listen to their hopes, dreams and aspirations, perhaps give them some if they do not have any, and work out the best thing for them. Otherwise, we are leaving young people stranded.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
There are good examples across the United Kingdom, and some of those will be in Northern Ireland. I suggest that that might be a way forward.
Mrs Chapman
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that inspiring contribution. I find myself now in a situation in which everything has been said, but probably not by everyone.
School Food
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 6 months ago)
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Andrew Gwynne
My hon. Friend is correct, which allows me to move neatly on to the next part of my contribution. As she has rightly said, showing and informing children about nutritious and healthy meals will clearly help in the battle against childhood obesity. Education and the health of our children are hugely important. It is estimated that obesity and associated conditions such as diabetes cost the NHS £3.5 billion a year, and that figure is set to rise. This is therefore a cost worth paying to save money in the long run. Even at a time when the deficit needs to be cut, we cannot forget the social implications of the Government’s decisions. If we want to reduce the attainment gap, as my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood) has said, we must ensure that all children at school are given an equal chance. We know that free school meals contribute enormously to reducing attainment gaps, because they help children from low-income backgrounds, who may not have good nutrition, to concentrate more in the classroom.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this subject to the Chamber. He has clearly outlined the issue for those in the poverty trap, which is part of the cycle. Another issue is those of perhaps a different build, who are eating the wrong foods. He has indicated that education can address that issue. How does he see that balance being achieved between those who need that square meal every day and those who are, perhaps, eating the wrong food?
Andrew Gwynne
The hon. Gentleman makes a good point. Education is the key here. People need to learn about nutrition, and what is right for one child is not necessarily right for another. I hope that one of the long-term benefits of a scheme such as Sure Start is that those families start to understand the nutritional value of different foods and the need to have a balanced diet, with the need for healthy eating as part of that balanced diet, alongside other factors such as physical education and physical activity. There is no magic wand. There is no answer to one aspect. I am really concerned about some of the cuts to Sure Start that we are starting to see, because some of those very early age healthy eating programmes are now being targeted by local authorities facing the squeeze on their budgets. Some of the work done with very early years, which would benefit through to school age and beyond, is starting to be scaled back, too.
One of the perks of this job, as I am sure that you are aware, Mr Dobbin, and as all hon. Members from both sides of the House will agree, is the chance to visit schools in our constituencies. I have spoken to not one head teacher or teacher in either the Tameside or Stockport part of my constituency who is not tremendously supportive of the free school meals programme, because they know just how much it benefits the children whom they teach.
Roberta Blackman-Woods
Indeed. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that point. I will say something about how parents have been involved with the process, because obviously it was important initially to get parents signed up, which is why schools had taster sessions. As the pilot progressed, what schools felt was really important. When they sorted out with children how to have a balanced and healthy diet by choosing different things on different days, and ensured that salad or vegetables and a balanced meal were always available, they decided to get the parents to sign up to whatever meals the children were choosing. That was important, because parents across the board—given that the take-up was 100%, that meant all parents—had to engage with what their children were going to eat in school, and to talk to them about the importance of a balanced meal. That required the schools to undertake work with parents.
That is what we mean about changing the culture. We know how to do it, and the evidence exists. My hon. Friend and I were able to see that before our eyes, and indeed the schools managed to develop, probably inadvertently, evangelism in the children, who were able to explain carefully to us how the food system worked in their school.
Jim Shannon
The United Kingdom is a multicultural society where ethnic groups introduce their own food ideas. In the pilot schemes, was the hon. Lady able to introduce some of the benefits of other foods to make food exciting?
Roberta Blackman-Woods
That is an important point. Schools in Durham managed to do that, but perhaps not as effectively as schools in Newham, and it was an important aspect of the pilots, as the evidence suggests. That is what I mean when I say that schools that embraced the scheme were able to add the subject to the curriculum and use it to talk about other cultures, and so on.
I hope that I have made the point that the pilot was really successful. It had started to change the way in which schools, parents and young people think about food and exercise. I saw with very great sadness that the Government’s priorities meant that the first thing they did on taking office was cancel that pilot programme. The Minister has some questions to answer about that. We know that the Liberal Democrats have form on such matters because when they took over Hull city council, the first thing they did was to cancel the free school meals programme. That showed an extraordinary set of priorities, which I simply do not understand.
If the Minister wishes to find allies in the coalition Government, she might like to ask her fellow Ministers why it is that private schools ensure that their children have a healthy, usually hot, school meal at lunchtime. The coalition Government are good at emulating the private sector across the public sector, so how come that aspect of the private sector, which could easily be transplanted to public sector schools, is not on their list of priorities? Instead of concentrating on the needs of children and families, the Government—really quite staggeringly—lifted the ring fence on the school lunch grant from April this year. That money now has to compete with all the other priorities currently facing hard-pressed schools.
Such concerns lead me to ponder the fact that the Labour party has to make a tough call; we have got to win the argument about the importance not only of healthy school meals, but of universal free school meals at primary school level. There is no point in having healthy school meals if no one takes them up or if they are too expensive for most parents to afford, but unfortunately, that is the route down which the Government are taking us.
Young Runaways (Sexual Exploitation)
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Ann Coffey
I absolutely agree with the hon. Gentleman. He has brought home to us the sort of exploitation that we are talking about in his description of what happens to children. It is truly horrible, and he is right to say that we must take all available action to prevent it.
West Mercia police say that 266 children in care went missing for more than 24 hours in 2010, and Kent police figures for 2010 reveal that 826 children were recorded missing for more than 24 hours. However, an answer to a parliamentary question stated that in Stockport only 45 young people were missing from care for longer than 24 hours in the three years from 2008 to 2010. The Department for Education figures that I mentioned earlier are staggering, given that Stockport police has told me that there were 2,014 missing incidents between July 2009 and June 2010, of which 41% were from care homes.
The police have provided me with their most up-to-date figures for Stockport, which cover the first five months of this year up to Friday 17 June. They reveal that the police received 1,070 missing-from-home reports, generated by 284 children in Stockport under the age of 18; of those, 77 were reported missing from care, and they generated a massive 711 reports. Forty-six of the youngsters were missing for more than 24 hours, and of those 25 were from care.
That shows a clear pattern of repeated missing episodes and a consequent vulnerability to abuse, as well as further evidence of gross under-reporting by local authorities. In addition, two thirds of missing incidents from home are not reported by parents. As I have said, there is good evidence that repeated missing episodes are correlated to children being exposed to sexual grooming. If accurate data are not held by the Department for Education and the Home Office, it becomes more difficult to estimate the risk of sexual exploitation to which these children are exposed. It is important that we get it right.
On that point, ACPO pilots are looking at ways of achieving the collection of meaningful data on missing episodes, so as to determine when a child is missing. It is concerned that children’s homes are reporting children missing when a telephone call could establish where the child was.
All the evidence shows that sexual grooming starts by encouraging children to stay away from home, or persuading them to go home late, in order to create parental disputes and thus drive a wedge between child and home. Removing the protection of families and carers is the beginning of the grooming process, and the eventual outcome is the sexual exploitation of the child. The significance of that should not be lost in any redefinition of “missing”.
The “Puppet on a string” report states that the entrapment of children and young people in sexual exploitation does not occur overnight. If a child goes missing for a few hours, there is a danger that professionals will become complacent. However, that is when the child may be at risk from the gradual grooming process that I have described, and these early missing episodes may be the warning signs.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Experience in my constituency, and I suspect in many others, is that the homes may not be able to control the children and keep them in all the time, and the children will always indicate that they have human rights that must be respected. However, is there not a better and more definite way, with the homes and the local police co-ordinating on those who habitually stay out late or who may not return until the early hours of the morning? Could more not be done by the police, the local homes and the local authorities?
Ann Coffey
Of course the hon. Gentleman is right. We must have proper arrangements between children’s homes and the local police. If they do not work together, we will be unable to prevent children from going missing; and we will not know where those children who are that do go missing. He has made an important point.
Barnardo’s says that those who exploit children are all too aware of how the system works:
“These heartless men and women understand the police procedure on runaway children and know if a child goes missing on a regular basis, for a short period of time and then returns home safely, the case is unlikely to attract much attention.”
Turning to statutory guidance, another concern is the mixed picture that not all local authorities are adhering to the statutory guidance on children who run away from home or care, which was published in 2009. The guidance states that local authorities should have procedures in place for recording and sharing information between police, children’s services and the voluntary sector, and that the local authority should have a named person responsible for children and young people who go missing or who run away and that there should be return interviews.
I cannot emphasise enough the importance of the independent return interview. As the Children’s Society has demonstrated, children are more willing to disclose what has happened to them to adults whom they do not perceive to be in authority. A 16-year-old at Manchester’s Safe in the City project said:
“It was horrible. I felt I could not talk to anyone—friends, family, police, teachers—no-one.”
Eventually, however, the child did talk to the Children’s Society.
I have asked a number of parliamentary questions about implementation of the guidance, but I have been repeatedly told that the information is not held centrally. Implementing statutory guidance should be a high priority for local authorities. Local safeguarding children’s boards have a responsibility to protect children in their areas. The young runaways action plan 2008 asked safeguarding boards to evaluate the risk of children running away and to put action plans in place. The Children’s Society’s “Stepping Up” report found that half of the local authorities surveyed had no protocol for managing cases of children and young people who are missing from home.
According to recent research by the international centre for the study of sexually exploited and trafficked young people at the university of Bedfordshire, there are protocols for responding to sexual exploitation in less than a quarter of local safeguarding children’s boards. Ten years on from the introduction of the dual strategy of protecting young people and proactively investigating their abusers, a third of the country has no plans for the delivery of such a strategy.
Apprenticeships (Small Businesses)
Jim Shannon Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
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Richard Graham
I am grateful for that intervention, and I am sure that the Minister will have noted that point and will come back on it in due course.
Developing the themes of our debate today, we now have to consider the obstacles that small businesses face in taking on apprentices. I have touched on the two key areas of bureaucracy and cost. On bureaucracy, the challenge for those of us who want to promote apprenticeships is that there are so many different ways of taking on apprentices. For example, it is generally the case that the training costs for 16 to 18-year-olds are entirely funded by the Government and those for 19 to 24-year-olds are half-funded by the Government. Members will find in their own constituencies that we have training providers who will provide certain training courses for 19 to 24-year-olds entirely free of charge. On the one hand, that gives the 19 to 24-year-olds a competitive advantage, and on the other, it offers to small businesses the opportunity to take on a slightly more experienced individual at a lower cost than might be the case normally.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The hon. Gentleman mentioned two schemes—I think that one of them was for 16 to 24-year-olds and that the other was for 24 to 27-year-olds—but some people lose their jobs and have to retrain. Does he not think that opportunities should be given to those who want to diversify into other jobs? Should they not be given apprenticeships as well, even if they are past those ages?
Richard Graham
The hon. Gentleman raises an interesting point about the ways in which we can get people back into work. The Work programme is starting this week. I am sure that he is already in touch with both the contractors and sub-contractors in his own constituency. Working closely with those who are rolling out the Work programme offers the best chances of getting older people back into the workplace. What we are really talking about today is apprenticeships that are focused specifically on the 16-to-24 age group. I acknowledge the hon. Gentleman’s general point, but I think that it ranges wider than today’s debate, although the Minister might want to comment on that.
I will return to the obstacles for small businesses and quote from the NAS in Gloucestershire, which works with hundreds of SMEs on a daily basis. We know that the definition of an SME can include businesses that, on a constituency basis, are really quite large. Companies employing 250 employees are big employers as far as I am concerned, but they are categorised as SMEs. One of the challenges for the NAS, which is resourced by one representative per county, is to engage with the small businesses that we are discussing today, which would technically be called micro-businesses. I do not use the term “micro” because I do not think that companies enjoy being called “micro”—they do not relate to that word. We are talking today predominantly about companies with fewer than 12 employees.
The NAS in Gloucestershire has spoken to more than 15,000 small businesses in the past five months. That is an astonishing achievement, and I pay tribute to its hard work in spreading its tentacles so widely among small businesses in our county. Its experience has shown that it has been able to spread the word about apprenticeships and their role.
As hon. Members have said, the role of the media and further education colleges has also been critical in spreading the word, but it can be very difficult to reach businesses of the size that we are discussing today. Many people
“simply don’t have the time to come out of their businesses”
to attend events. Such companies—often one man, one woman or a family working together—do not have the sort of people who typically sit on the committees of their local Federation of Small Businesses. We are fortunate if we can persuade them to come to an event, a lunch or a supper to discuss topical issues.
There are some breakfast clubs for very small businesses—I have certainly been to them, as have other hon. Members. They are quite good at doing business-to-business with each other, but the process of filling in forms, searching on websites, discussing with training providers and working out whether to go to the further education college or a more specialist training provider is quite time-consuming for people who are dealing with customers minute by minute in their shops.
To try to ensure that very small businesses get the opportunities to incorporate apprenticeships into their companies, the Department and the NAS are therefore supporting projects among group training associations and apprenticeship training agencies. In response to a letter that I wrote him, the Minister highlighted that
“recently, Group Training Association and Apprenticeship Training Agency models have been proving successful in making it easier for small business to take on apprentices.”
I hope that the Minister will share some examples of those successes with us, whether they are geographical or sectoral, and share with us how we can help him to promote GTA and ATA models in our own constituencies, as a way of helping small businesses to overcome the apparent obstacle of administration.
It is true, for example, that the South West Apprenticeship Company in my own constituency is able to provide the legal ownership of apprentices taken on by small businesses should there be future employment law concerns with an apprentice who has not worked out. Many of us will know that the business of finding the right apprentice is the single most important thing and often a very hard thing for a small company to do. As far as employment law is concerned, ownership of the apprenticeship is with the training provider, which can be enormously helpful to small businesses.
The next stage covers what sort of carrots might be offered to very small businesses as part of the incentive to take on an apprentice. I start from the presumption that if we were all able to persuade half the small companies in our constituencies to take on one apprentice each, we would have solved the youth unemployment problem in this country by that step alone. The opportunity, if we were able to seize it, would be enormous. The goal would be considerable, so how can we get closer to achieving it? We could consider two or three things, the first of which is to provide a financial incentive. In March 2010, there was an apprenticeship grant for employer scheme—AGE—which gave a straightforward cash amount of £2,500 to employers taking on their first apprentice. As a result of that incentive, which was offered for a limited period of three months, 5,000 unemployed 16 to 17-year-olds were taken on during that time.
It is right to ask ourselves whether that incentive was entirely motivated by a long-term solution for youth unemployment or by a short-term concern to keep teenagers off the unemployment statistics in the run-up to a general election. It is also right to ask whether cash incentives for taking on a first apprentice, without necessarily a time commitment on how long that apprentice will work, will always generate good long-term results, or whether that is a very short-term way to enhance small business profitability without necessarily leading on to career opportunities for 16 to 17-year-olds, but it is something on which perhaps the Minister might comment today.
A slightly different thought offered to me by the chairman of the FSB in Gloucester was to look at ways to subsidise apprentices over a three-year period. For example, when a company takes on an apprentice for the first time, a percentage of the amount paid by the employer could be reimbursed by the Government at the end of the first year. A smaller amount would be reimbursed in the second year, and in the third year all the cost would be absorbed by the company. That is a slightly different and more interesting model to look at, were the Government able to offer financial compensation for some of the employment costs of taking on new apprentices for small businesses.
Other ways to help small businesses to take on apprentices could be considered. One of them could be to rationalise the training costs for 18 to 24-year-olds as well as 16 to 18-year-olds. The Government have previously differentiated between the two age groups on the basis that getting people started is the most important thing and that, by the time people are 19 to 24, they should have more experience and more maturity to offer employers. But we know that that is not always the case. Some 19-year-olds and older people might still need considerable investment of time and effort by very small businesses to bring them to a stage where they can contribute to the growth of that company. The cost of that investment in time is as important to the smallest companies as the financial cost of paying apprentices for however many hours a week they are employed.
Gordon Birtwistle
I agree. That was to be my next point. A company in Burnley called Aircelle makes thrust reversers for the Trent jet engine. Three years ago the company employed 350 people; it now employs 800 people and has work for 15 years. Aircelle has been offered work from Boeing and other aircraft manufacturers, but has to turn it away because it does not have the skills.
I used to work for the company when it was called Lucas Aerospace, which was a long, long while ago. I walked around the place, and I said to the managing director, “I look at some of the people here and I remember them working here when I did, and I’ve been retired for three years. Some of these guys must be coming up for retirement.” He replied, “The age profile is a big concern because more than 80% of the work force is 40-plus.”
Another big problem for the company is that young people coming into the industry want to be designers and technicians, working on computers on the other side, and the guys who put the aircraft engine parts together are in short supply. It is a problem getting skilled fitters and process workers to come and do the job. The company is now a world leader in composites, but it is very difficult to get people to come and work on composite design and manufacture. Fortunately, it is using a lot of young ladies to do that now; because of the dexterity of their fingers, they are able to mould things in carbon fibre. I agree entirely that this is an issue that the Government must pick up. We must ensure not only that we train people to do the real top jobs but that we train young people to come in and do the jobs that involve physically making things.
As I said, at Burnley college we are having a manufacturing summit on 20 June. The council there has worked with the college. We spent £100,000 from the working neighbourhoods fund, and three years ago the college put in a further £100,000 to buy three Mazak advanced machine tools. The hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker) will know of Mazak because the company is based in his constituency. The college ran an engineering course but could not get anyone to go on it, but as soon as we put in the Mazak machine tools the course was overwhelmed, because young people see that they can work in an office and a workshop and design a product, go on a computer and feed the design into the machine, and then make the product on the new CNC—computer numerical control—machine. They can see that it is a great job for the future. The days of what I call the garage on “Coronation Street” with engineers in blue overalls with oily rags in their pockets have long gone.
Gordon Birtwistle
Are they? They are very fortunate to be on three days. In some of the big companies that make advanced products, food could be eaten off the floor because it is so clean, and young people see that.
An apprentice is an investment. Companies think nothing of spending thousands of pounds on a machine but will then worry about spending a few thousand on training someone to run it. It is important that companies think of apprentices as an investment for the future, because without them they will not have any staff for the future to make their product of the future, and the profits of the future will disappear.
The Government need to carry on with what they are doing. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester, I am extremely disappointed that we have not seen anyone from the Opposition here today. That is a big disappointment because this is a big issue. They often go on about it in the House, yet when we have a debate like this they cannot be bothered to turn up. Having said that, I hope that the coalition Government will get on with it and complete the course.