European Political Community

Lord Aberdare Excerpts

Monday 31st October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

My Lords, the UK will always do what is in our interests, and our interests are closely aligned with those of our European neighbours. The fact that progress was made at the forum without that forum being owned exclusively by the EU, with the summit being open to other non-EU member countries on the continent—as I said, one-third of the attendees were not members of the European Union—and the fact that no new structures or institutions needed to be created mean that this is exactly the kind of forum that we need, to be able to talk honestly with our friends and to align our response to things such as Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine with one another in our mutual interest.

[Lord Aberdare (CB)]

My Lords, both the UK and the EU have said that they want musicians to be able to tour freely. The present situation is particularly damaging to young up-and-coming artists seeking to perform in the EU. Might the UK Government seek to give a lead in improving relationships through unilateral actions, such as setting up a music export office to help to promote UK musicians globally or providing extra funding through a transitional support package, similar to that for fishing, particularly to help younger artists?

[Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)]

Music has been one of the great exports of this country for many decades now. I know that the noble Lord’s comments will be heard loud and clear by colleagues in the appropriate departments.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Aberdare Excerpts

Tuesday 17th May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Aberdare (CB)]

My Lords, I too shall focus on education and skills, which are fundamental to the stated priorities of the gracious Speech and to the whole idea of levelling up. Education and skills should be a central part of any Government’s aims and aspirations, so it is encouraging that the Queen’s Speech includes both a Schools Bill and a higher education Bill. The Schools Bill focuses on funding, academisation and attendance, but the Bill on its own will not be enough to achieve the laudable goal of helping

“every child fulfil their potential wherever they live”.

I will briefly address some of the other activities that will be needed but which are not covered by this legislation.

The first is the long-standing challenge of improving the quality and status of technical education. I am encouraged by the Government’s commitment to T-levels, apprenticeships and other initiatives, such as those in the recent Skills and Post-16 Education Act, and the planned lifelong loan entitlement, the introduction of which will be enabled by the higher education Bill. Successful delivery of these will be crucial, but more work is needed both to ensure that all the pieces of the complex skills jigsaw fit together—that Kickstart, for example, leads to apprenticeships—and to convince not just students themselves but their schools, teachers and parents of the value of technical education, such that it finally achieves the long-sought parity of esteem with academic routes. There is also a need for effective provision to allow students to mix and match, combining both technical and academic elements in their studies. Languages, for example, are an important skill in many technical careers, and my own experience shows how valuable classics can be in developing computer programming skills.

Secondly, every young person needs to be aware of the range of jobs and careers available and the routes they need to take to further their own aspirations and abilities. This calls for continuing enhancement of careers information, advice and guidance in line with the Gatsby benchmarks, including contacts with a variety of different employers and workplaces, as well as work experience opportunities. The enhanced Baker clause in the skills Act, specifying the number of meaningful employer contacts students must have, should be embraced as an absolute minimum and enforced when necessary.

Thirdly, it is surely time for the Government to address the persistent concerns of employers and others about the apprenticeship levy, introducing greater flexibility to make it more fit for purpose so that more young people are able to become apprentices, including 16 to 19 year-old school leavers; more small and medium-sized firms are able to offer apprenticeships; and more of the skills that are most needed are eligible to receive funding from the levy.

Other issues include recognising digital skills as a functional skill of comparable importance to English and maths and, as other noble Lords have mentioned, restoring creative and arts education to its proper status as an essential part of the curriculum, as indeed it is in most independent schools. Again, that would clearly qualify as levelling up.

Education and skills are fundamental to the Government’s priorities as set out in the Queen’s Speech. I hope the Minister and her colleagues, as well as meeting their heavy legislative commitments, as described by the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, will find the time and energy to press ahead on the other issues I have highlighted. What matters most is not so much the quantity of legislation—we already have rather too much—but the quality of delivery.

China: Organ Harvesting

Lord Aberdare Excerpts

Thursday 25th July 2019 Lords Chamber

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon) (Con)]

My Lords, I note the time and energy that the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China has dedicated to this issue. Officials have reviewed the evidence thoroughly. While the evidence is not incomprehensible—

[Noble Lords]

Oh!

Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Lord Aberdare Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Northover, can be excused totally for being unable to be present. In fact, hundreds of us were not able to be present; the only people present were the Minister and my noble friend Lord Collins.

[A Noble Lord]

And someone in the Chair.

[Lord Foulkes of Cumnock]

There was someone in the Chair too, yes indeed. This is symptomatic of what is going on at the moment. I believe the noble Lord, Lord Collins, described it in Committee as an “SI stampede”. I have described it on occasion as a veritable tsunami of statutory instruments. I think we were told yesterday that 740 statutory instruments have been laid, but most have not yet gone to the committees, let alone to the Grand Committee and to the House. This is an astonishing situation. As my noble friend Lord Hain said—as did the noble Baroness, Lady Northover—this is a very important statutory instrument. We have important statutory instruments, Lord Speaker—sorry, I mean noble Lords, but maybe one day we will be able to address him properly; we have them simultaneously in Grand Committee and here. How can we possibly carry out our proper duty of scrutiny?

This is being pushed through because one woman is so adamant and determined to have her own way and treats both Houses of Parliament like rubber stamps. She appears more like an elected dictator than a Prime Minister in a Cabinet Government in a parliamentary democracy. It is getting totally out of hand.

Queen’s Speech

Lord Aberdare Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Aberdare (CB)]

My Lords, I shall focus on the commitment in the Queen’s Speech to,

“increase the total number of apprenticeship places to 2 million by the end of the Parliament”.

I welcome that. Good-quality, well designed apprenticeships that meet the needs of employers and apprentices across a wide range of business sectors are surely one of the most effective means of tackling the blight of youth unemployment while increasing the UK’s productivity and competitiveness in the global economy as a whole. In March, the Government published for consultation proposed new arrangements for delivering and funding apprenticeships, which are largely based on the recommendations of the Richard review of apprenticeships. I attended a conference yesterday morning at which both Doug Richard and the Skills Minister, Matthew Hancock, spoke, and was on the whole encouraged by what I heard.

However, there are some concerns, particularly about persuading more small and medium-sized businesses—the importance of which we have heard so much about today—to take on apprentices. Most of the initial trailblazer initiatives being used to pilot the new approach are in sectors dominated by larger businesses such as aerospace, automotive, energy and utilities, and financial services, while sectors such as construction and creative and media, which have a much higher proportion of smaller firms, are unrepresented.

I will enumerate some of the concerns which need to be addressed to ensure that the 2 million target is reached and that it does not exclude large numbers of younger apprentices or specific sectors such as construction. First, under the proposed new rules, employers will have to make a cash contribution of a third of the training cost of their apprentices, with the Government paying the other two-thirds. Apparently no allowance will be made for the extra, non-cash costs involved in taking on apprentices, such as additional supervision, on-site training, mentoring time and the costs of slower work rates and needed rework. Extra incentive payments will be available for businesses with fewer than 50 employees, but the overall cost of providing apprenticeships under the proposals seems likely to put off some, and perhaps many, SMEs.

Secondly, there will also be extra payments for taking on younger, 16 to 18 year-old apprentices, for whom until now the full costs of training have been paid. Assuming that those extra payments will fall short of the full cost, that could act as a further disincentive for firms to take on apprentices at those younger ages, as against using either older, more job-ready or more experienced apprentices, or just using the supply of cheap labour often available in sectors such as construction. Given that most of the increase in apprenticeships so far has been among over-25s, with under-19 apprenticeships hardly growing at all, that seems particularly ill advised. It certainly will not do much for those young people who fear they will never work, who were mentioned by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham in his fine maiden speech.

Thirdly, there are significant concerns among SMEs and others that the payment options being considered by the Government, which are based either on using existing PAYE mechanisms or on a new apprenticeship credit model, may prove far from simple for small firms to implement, and unpredictable in terms of the exact amounts and timing of payments. In addition, they are likely to result in serious cash-flow challenges, which are, of course, the absolute bane of all small businesses—as I can vouch from my own experience.

Fourthly, many SME apprenticeships are managed through apprenticeship training agencies—ATAs—whereby the ATA acts as the employer for a group of businesses and undertakes most of the administration and bureaucracy involved, to lift that burden from the small employers for whom the apprentices actually work. It is not clear how the proposed new funding arrangements will affect ATAs, but at least one of them, Building Lives, is concerned that its delivery and funding model may be put at risk by the proposed new arrangements. Building Lives is a community interest company which currently runs six academies across London which offer training and employment for up to 300 apprentices a year, who work mainly in small to medium-sized construction-sector firms. It featured as a case study in the cross-party report No More Lost Generations, which was mentioned earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald of Tradeston. It has set itself a target of expanding to 10 centres and offering up to 1,000 construction apprenticeships each year. However, despite the fact that its whole raison d’être is to make it possible for small contractors to take on apprentices, it seems that it may in future have to fund a third of the training costs for all those apprentices upfront, without even being eligible for the small employer incentive payment—a double whammy which may jeopardise its entire award-winning operation.

I applaud the intention to increase the number and quality of apprenticeships, but I urge the Government to ensure that there is sufficient flexibility in the funding and other arrangements to meet the specific needs of smaller employers, and of sectors such as construction, and of younger apprentices. The system must be genuinely simple, able to accommodate firms of all sizes in all sectors, and be thoroughly piloted before being rolled out.

Almost as important as providing more apprenticeship places is the other side of the coin: ensuring that there are enough candidates, especially 16 to 18 year-olds, coming forward to take up those places. Schools need to do a much better job of making their students aware of the apprenticeship opportunities available and encouraging those for whom they might be appropriate to pursue them. This seems unlikely to happen unless and until Ofsted inspections include formal assessment of the careers services offered by schools, often deficient at present, and of the range and quality of progression routes followed by their students, including into apprenticeships and other forms of employment, not just into further or higher education.

Finally, I hope that your Lordships will forgive me if I stray from the topics of today’s debate to add a brief welcome to the proposed social action, responsibility and heroism Bill, providing a degree of legal protection for good Samaritans and have-a-go heroes. I declare my interest as a trustee of St John Cymru Wales, which is dedicated to helping people save lives through first aid training and support, and pursues the vision of a first-aider on every street in Wales. It would be even better for the Government to provide more of these potential heroes with the tools to do the job, as it were, by making first aid training a mandatory part of the school curriculum, so that the UK could begin to match the life-saving outcomes of those other countries where that is the case.