Inclusive Society

Lord Haskel Excerpts

Wednesday 14th April 2021 Grand Committee

[Lord Haskel (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, my noble friend introduces a broad topic: inclusion—religious, racial, social and economic. They are all important, but I will speak about economic inclusion. To me, economic inclusion means the ability to participate, to contribute and to share in the benefits of our economy.

Central to participating in the economy are skills, education, training, retraining and, yes, attitude. We have heard many fine words, particularly about further education, plus a White Paper pledging pioneering reforms to reshape the landscape. At the centre of this agenda are the colleges of further education. Many of them were in financial difficulties before Covid, and the decision by the Treasury to claw back funding from colleges which delivered less than 90% of planned courses—largely because of Covid—makes a mockery of the Government’s fine words. This action undermines the Government’s own policies and makes inclusion after Covid less likely.

When we had an industrial strategy council, it could have held the Government to account over this, but it was disbanded. An industrial strategy gives a sense of national purpose that we can all get behind, but this has been replaced with a plan for jobs, which some have described as mainly a list of existing policies with broad ambitions and few targets. This will do nothing for inclusion after the pandemic. Indeed, it will lead to a loss of skills, a continuing unproductive economy, and a resulting loss of competitiveness.

As far as participation in the rewards is concerned, we seem to be going backwards. Work is becoming more precarious, with some one in 10 workers facing losing their job and being rehired on worse terms. “Fire and rehire” is growing and will expand when the furlough period ends. This, along with bogus self-employment and employment through agencies after you have signed your rights away all make for a less inclusive society, which seems to be on the horizon, not a more inclusive society, especially regarding young people at work, where a special effort is needed. Fortunately, a growing number of companies believe that making employees feel they belong and are included makes for a stronger and better-performing business. There has been talk of an employment Bill in the Queen’s Speech next month. Inclusion should be central to it. The IMF and others forecast an economic recovery, but one with widening and enduring inequality. Surely inclusion must be a major part of our response.