Young People: Skills (Youth Unemployment Committee Report)

Lord Harlech Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

My Lords, first, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, on being the brilliant chair of this committee. We heard a huge volume of evidence, and for him to marshal it and for us to hear and discuss it was quite remarkable.

This is a radical report, and I do not expect the Government to welcome it at all. I cannot anticipate what the Minister is going to say, but the attitude of the Department for Education to all change is now totally negative. In the last year, there have been six major reports, of which this is one. The first was from the High Mistress of St Paul’s School a year ago. It was a huge survey of 800 people, including from the public sector. She came to the conclusion that the curriculum was not fit for purpose, and nor were GCSEs. She was told—not by a Minister but by the Permanent Secretary at the department—“Forget it, we’re not going to change anything”.

A fortnight ago, we had a debate on the report from the Times Education Commission. The Minister made it quite clear that the Government were going to bin that as well. Again, the report recommended substantial changes in our curriculum. So I do not expect that the Minister tonight will accept any of the 88 recommendations that we have made—and certainly not the most important ones.

Some of the most important ones centre on the curriculum. The evidence we heard from industrialists, big and small, was that it is not suited for purpose because too many youngsters at 18 leave with no employability skills at all—none whatever. By “employability skills” they mean an experience of working on teams. That does not happen in the present curriculum. Experience of collaborative problem-solving does not happen in the present curriculum. Having really good communication skills—“oratory”, as it is called—is not taught in our present system, either. This was the absolutely overwhelming weight of evidence and, quite frankly, the Department for Education does not listen at all.

Nissan, one of the largest car manufacturers in our country, said that design technology should be a compulsory subject—but no chance at all. The Government over the last 12 years have presided over a decline in design technology of 80%—it is absolutely unbelievable. What is more, over the past 12 years they have cut technical education by 20%. They are not interested in it at all. The Department for Education is preoccupied solely with academic subjects.

We took a lot of evidence on data skills. The actual curriculum the Government are following is word for word what was published in 1904 in the Edwardian age: exactly the same subjects as 150 years ago. Well, the Minister might recall that 150 years ago, a man with a red flag would have to walk in front of a car. We have moved on from that now and, quite frankly, the Government should recognise that artificial intelligence is the gold rush of this century—and artificial intelligence is embedded in data skills. So will the Minister accept our recommendation that all primary schools should have coding clubs—all, not some? Every student should have the right to a computer—not just some but every single one.

When it comes to secondary education, does the Minister realise that, compared with 2016, 40% less computing is being taught in our schools? It really is extraordinary. We recommended that computing, which means not just coding but virtual reality, cybersecurity and artificial intelligence, should be taught from 11, as soon as possible. I do not expect she is going to accept that tonight, but it is in fact what we ought to do. This is the age in which we are living, and the department is digging in again and again.

The actual problem we have had is that, since 2010, we have been subjected to the theory of an American educator called Hirsch, who says that if you just give to those disadvantaged children academic subjects, they will flourish and expand and all the rest of it. Well, that has failed: we have been the test bed. There is no other country that has followed Hirsch and no state in America that has followed Hirsch, but we have been the test bed and the programme has failed. Today, there are as many disadvantaged students—300,000—as there were in 2010. There has been no real improvement whatever. So what is the result? We have job vacancies. Which department is responsible for job vacancies? It is the Department for Education, because it has not provided what industry and commerce need in the youngsters they are going to employ.

Therefore, we are on the edge of a major change, because the volume of opinion is now building up. The membership of our committee was not a group of eccentric amateurs; it included two ex-Secretaries of State, a former Director-General of the BBC, and the noble Lord, Lord Woolley, who is the greatest advocate in this country of improving the education of black, Asian and minority interest students.

Again, we had recommendations on this—we had recommendations on work experience, but the Government want to phase out work experience. They passed legislation in 2016 to try to restrict the number of people going on work experience from ages 14 to 16. This is so much against what is needed in our country.

This report is radical, and I was proud to be a member of the committee that produced it, but this is not just a single matter. A volume of opinion is now growing. I am very glad to see that the Labour Party is seriously going to consider fundamental educational reform. I can see noble Lords nodding. I hope that my party will also embrace that, and I will do everything I can to support it. We have to bring skills back into education, where they have not been for a very long time.

Are there grounds for hope? Yes, I think there are. The new Secretary of State for Education is the first since 1870 to have been an apprentice. I therefore think that she will be sympathetic to many of the proposals in this report. The Prime Minister, in a briefing from No. 10 to the Times newspaper, said that education was a silver bullet. I hope we might have some indication of the silver bullet tonight. I doubt that we will, but there we are.

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords—

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

I ask the noble Lord please not to worry about the time I am taking. He should just listen to what I am saying—he will learn something.

I hope that in addition, we will tonight have some evidence of what the silver bullet is—or will it just be a defence of the status quo? The status quo has failed on an absolutely massive scale. Youth unemployment is at 9%. By the way, when we, a committee looking into youth unemployment, asked the Minister and the senior civil servant who appeared before us what was the level of youth unemployment, neither of them knew. It is at 9% but in the depressed areas of our country, such as in Walsall, Stoke-on-Trent and Blyth, it is as high as 20%. I therefore hope that we will see a considerable change.

I conclude by saying that I was very interested to see that the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his speech last week has appointed an assistant, who I know very well, to be his adviser on education. That is clearly an indication that he will not expect very original ideas to emerge from the Department for Education. I wanted to end on a note of optimism, and that is as optimistic as I can be.

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[Viscount Waverley (CB)]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Baker, called for bringing skills back into education, and I shall attempt to present a bridge to that end. Before doing so, I fully sympathise with the frustration of the noble Lord, Lord Knight, with silos—a culture that needs urgent dismantling. Being holistic is the key word for going forward, generally through everything in life and particularly in relation to the UK’s management of itself.

I have happily slept-walked into a sector of critical importance to the United Kingdom—namely, the future of the UK’s freight and logistics, for which I serve as co-chair to the parliamentary group. This is to be a strategic evaluation by region, then analysed nationally by modal, by non-conflicted persons in an evaluation for decades to come. Skills and training are crucial, so I welcome this opportunity to draw attention to the opportunity that the sector presents as a career path for the youth of today.

As background, logistics is a large and growing industry across the UK, employing 2.56 million people, either directly or indirectly, accounting for 8% of the workforce. Top employers, of which 11 are pure logistics companies, include world-class players such as DHL Express, Wincanton and CEVA Logistics. Employment has nearly doubled since 2012, outpacing the rest of the UK economy and accounting for 8% of the workforce, contributing £139 billion gross value to the UK economy. A helpful independent report by Frontier Economics, supported by Logistics UK, has looked at the economic, social and environmental impact of the logistics industry, with findings based on a combination of quantitative and qualitative analysis.

A recent school career leaders presentation has challenged current perceptions about logistics roles as presenting an open career structure with the least number of managers with degrees. Some 30% of all roles advertised in the south-east Midlands are for logistics roles, of which one-third are above £30,000, well above the national average. A range of growth forecasts shows that we could be looking at creating 25,000 new jobs over the next 15 to 20 years in the warehousing sector alone.

All this brings me full circle to the report before us this afternoon. Logistics provides opportunities for people who may not otherwise be in work. An independent survey indicates that 20% of people currently in logistics were previously unemployed, of whom one in four was long-term unemployed. Almost two-thirds—62%—of logistics managers do not have a university degree.

There is, however, a call for reform of the apprenticeship levy so that funds can be spent on alternative training and qualifications. Issues raised as barriers to using apprenticeships typically include the 12-month minimum duration and the 20% off-the-job training requirement—in other words, one day per week spent training. It is suggested that they do not get as much out of the levy as they put in, which is supported by the fact that, during the financial year 2019-20, only 15% of apprenticeship levy-paying employers fully utilised the funds available to them. A skills levy, as opposed to an apprenticeship levy, would help to bridge the gap between shortages and skill acquisition. The apprenticeship levy—although originally hailed as a mechanism to link young people wanting a solid start to their career with businesses that needed next-generation knowledge, skills, and behaviours—has not reached the desired target audience.

It should be underlined that truck drivers and other vehicle operators currently struggle with the rigidity of the apprenticeship framework and could recruit and train more people more quickly if it were reformed into a skills levy. As an example, there is a heavy goods vehicle apprenticeship standard; it takes 14 months to complete, but the drivers have their licences in six months. Most employers continue to train their own drivers to their specific standards and work practices long after they have passed their tests, meaning that the continued requirement for individuals to attend college once a week is rather redundant.

While advanced and higher-level apprenticeships are important in professional development planning and for retention, with young people having an appetite to learn and businesses having a need for talent, the pipeline that joins them seems at present not to be sufficiently accessible for logistics and transport. Simplifying offerings and making more of portable modules would go some way to rectify those challenges. Thinking creatively, outside of formal qualifications, could lead to accredited modular learning that could then, if desired, lead to a qualification later. This is particularly important when considering the lean margins of the sector. If qualifications are to be company funded outside the levy for smaller organisations, a lack of return on investment could cause setbacks to future investment.

The propensity to put qualifications on a pedestal over on-the-job learning needs to be revisited to prevent the alienation of those looking to progress. Accredited training is a viable option as an alternative to more traditional qualifications for immediate return on investment to support those who want to pursue a career in the transport sector with businesses that desperately need those skills in their workforce. The Assured Skills Academies in Northern Ireland provide an interesting blueprint.

Generation Logistics is initially a 12-month programme of engagement and promotional activities that aims to bring the industry together, shift perceptions and encourage the next generation of logistics workers to engage with available opportunities. Generation Logistics’ campaigns are centred around increasing the diversity of the sector, ensuring that, when people across all demographics view Generation Logistics material, they see themselves reflected.

Addressing the aspiration gap is also key, profiling the managerial jobs that many will be unaware exist in the sector and so dismiss a career in logistics as not being one that matches their ambitions. Promoting the diversity of opportunities should support inclusion, noting the range of opportunities that are available that focus on certain knowledge, skills and behaviours, not on background, race or gender.

There is a danger, when considering the promotion of the profession, that only the more attractive side is shown to target audiences: robotics, driverless technology and more. However, it is critical to strike a balance to ensure that the sector not only recruits, but retains, new talent. Demystifying the sector, in addition to commonly held myth, is perhaps an attraction strategy better rooted in the everyday roles the sector is crying out to fill. Re-education, such as promoting the benefits of shift work as flexible, rather than undesirable, makes for interesting campaigns for both young people and career changers alike.

To change this perception, those working in logistics, transport and supply chain operations must be positioned as practitioners and professionals against benchmarked standards. Young people cannot be what they cannot see, and logistics is the very definition of a hidden industry, operating behind closed doors and yet keeping the United Kingdom moving. A national campaign to promote the logistics profession to underrepresented groups is being spearheaded by Generation Logistics, supported by the Department for Transport, and is aiming to address the negative perceptions of the sector and promote the availability of attractive, fulfilling jobs at all levels.

[Lord Harlech (Con)]

My Lords, before we continue, I remind your Lordships that the advisory Back-Bench speaking time is seven minutes. It says “advisory” but it is actually mandated.