National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts and Lord O'Shaughnessy

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 7th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord O’Shaughnessy (Con)]

My Lords, before I address the amendments in this group, I thank the Minister for his comments on the previous group. I did not say anything because I did not think anything more needed to be said, but the amendment is very welcome and a sensible compromise on the part of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett.

There are two definitions at play in this group of amendments. The first is around the intention of the trust, as it were, in its impact on the wider social action sector, as addressed in Amendments 2 and 4. The other is more about reporting the consequences of those actions, as addressed in Amendment 8. I have a great deal of sympathy with the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. I think we all want the NCS to be a spur rather than to crowd out wider social action. Like her, I am extremely committed to promoting the idea of a journey of service.

Whether these amendments are needed is in question. The evidence on the NCS so far is that it is acting as a spur through its commissioning work. It is not a direct delivery agent itself. I forget how many new and established agencies it commissions through its work, but it is clearly already providing income and capacity for the sector and it is difficult to imagine that it will not do more of that as it grows. If my noble friend the Minister were to give a commitment on a review, I hope that would satisfy the intent of Amendment 4.

Amendment 8, in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, is a bit more difficult because it is about what happens afterwards as a consequence of the action rather than the intention. It would certainly add to the reporting burden. I am also not sure whether it is the sort of thing on which the NCS Trust would have the capacity to report. It strikes me that the noble Baroness is asking for something that is more properly the work of the sponsoring department, rather than the delivery agent itself. Therefore, although I understand why she has tabled the measure and I understand the concern in all the amendments in this group to make sure that the impact is positive rather than one which crowds out other provision, I am not sure that the suggestion in Amendment 8 is proportionate in terms of the functions and purpose of the NCS Trust, nor would it be productive.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I shall detain the House for just one minute to say a few words in support of Amendment 4, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, spoke. Those Members of your Lordships’ House who were present in Committee will recall that I was concerned to try to involve international citizen service in the National Citizen Service as part of a seamless whole. My noble friend the Minister was having none of this, and has continued to do so, although he has continued to assure me and others that it is not intended that the two should be anything other than locked closely together, but that it would nevertheless be inappropriate for that to be stated in the Bill. That is partially, I think, for reasons of precedent—always the weakest argument in my view—but, more significantly in my view, because international citizen service has a slightly larger target audience. I have accepted this argument and have therefore not retabled the relevant amendment, but the concept of NCS being part of a journey of involvement in civil society and the voluntary movement is important. If I heard the noble Baroness aright, that is the philosophy behind Amendment 4. Since I think ICS would be part of that further journey, along with participation in a lot of other organisations before and after it, I consider the points she made on Amendment 4 worthy of consideration.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Debate between Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts and Lord O'Shaughnessy

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I have one amendment in the group, Amendment 47. It is the last in a group of 18. The prior 17 would impose various duties on the NCS Trust. Some of these seem to be entirely sensible. Measuring the impact of what is being achieved is good, so I very much support the thought behind Amendment 25 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, on how many individuals complete the programme, although an annual report that did not contain that would be a sad one. I am less enthused by Amendment 39 about the open-ended requirement to consult the voluntary sector. That seems to be a recipe for a talking shop and would not necessarily achieve very much.

I do not doubt the good intentions behind the amendments in the group, but as we know, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Amendment 47 attempts to go beyond hope, expectation or intention to the reality of what has happened. It would do so by requiring an independent review of the whole of the NCS Trust’s commissioning process. We would thus be able to examine its performance in areas a number of which are the subject of the other 17 amendments in the group.

Amendment 47 focuses widely but particularly on those issues that have been the subject of a good many discussions and comments at Second Reading: how easy is it for small providers to obtain contracts? What barriers have been identified that stop them? What additional benefits have been found for our society arising from the whole process? That last issue has been commented on in the last few minutes, so I will not repeat it, but the Committee needs to be aware of the level of risk aversion among commissioners. It is something we need to guard against for the NCS Trust.

A number of voluntary groups are invited to bid. The fact is that if you ask 12 to bid, there are 11 losers. Therefore, the amount of time wasted on that can be very great. My noble friend Lord Maude has had a valiant blast against the use of pre-qualification questionnaires, or PQQs. That is another hurdle for smaller groups to get over. His weed killer has worked pretty well in central government, but PQQs seem to be alive and well and living reasonably persistently at local government level. Perhaps we need to think about that. There are then lengthy tender documents that take a lot of compiling. Then there are the monitoring processes, which can be very lengthy and extensive, and can be changed in the middle. All those issues and features combine to deter, to put off, to disadvantage smaller voluntary groups.

The day before our meeting last Wednesday a small charity came to speak to me, because I have been involved with this process. It said that it had an example where the commissioner clearly believed it was unsuitable and that it should not be given the job. The charity was persistent, in a rather brave way. It went on to complete the process, against considerable odds and adversity. Then it was disqualified because, in the final contract, where it had to sign the document at the end, the words said, “Sign inside the box”. The signature had touched the side of the box. That was sufficient reason for the commission to say, “Sorry, you haven’t declared, you’re off”. One thinks that this is an extreme example, but these sorts of things come up again and again. We need to ensure this does not take root in the NCS commissioning process and that these non-tariff barriers, if you like to call them that, are identified and dealt with.

The purpose of the amendment is to make sure that we can find out what has actually been happening. It is supported by the NCVO. It provides this important independent overall review, with some special focuses to it. On reflection, I probably would not have chosen a review after 12 months—that is probably a bit too soon. So it might be a review after 24 months, to give more time to see how things settle down, but that is a detail. I hope my noble friend will accept that there is a principle here of something worth pursuing, which deals with some of the other concerns raised by noble Lords on both sides of the Committee, and we can explore how to build it into the Bill at the next stage.

[Lord O'Shaughnessy (Con)]

My Lords, I was pleased to put my name to the amendments tabled by my noble friend Lady Finn. I support everything she said about making sure that the bureaucratic workload is kept to a minimum so that the NCS Trust can focus on its primary role.

I have great sympathy with the idea of the annual reports and the business plan focusing on particular areas of interest, such as diversification of intake, performance, and so on. But there are a couple of reasons why I think it would be a mistake to put it in the Bill and why this more elegant solution from my noble friend is a better approach. First, we cannot possibly anticipate all the things that the NCS, as it succeeds and flourishes between now and whenever—into infinity—could need to focus on from year to year. Inevitably, those challenges will change and we cannot possibly anticipate every single reporting requirement that might be needed to focus on the issue or the challenge of the day. Today, it might be disability; in three years’ time, it could be ethnic minorities, or anything. To put in a small number of things that we can think of now might focus the attention of the board on reporting things that actually in future years might be less important than others. That would be a mistake.

Secondly, all the issues that have been brought up by noble Lords as important focuses for the business plan and the accounts are covered in the royal charter. In the interests of brevity, I will not read out all the relevant bits of the royal charter but pages 7 and 8 talk about the primary functions,

“enabling participants from different backgrounds to work together in local communities”.

The charter says:

“In exercising its primary functions, the objectives of the NCS Trust are … to promote social cohesion”,

and,

“to expand the number of participants”.

The trust is also to,

“have regard to the desirability of … promoting social mobility … personal and social development … ensuring value for money”,

and so on. I think that all the good points that have been made about the sorts of things that the NCS should be reporting on in its annual report and planning for in its annual business plan are covered—perhaps not completely and that is worth a look—in the royal charter.

Having the Bill say that the NCS should report and plan for the primary functions in relation to what is in the royal charter is the correct balance between making sure that the things that we care about are reported on and leaving flexibility with the board to focus on those things that are perhaps more important from one year to the next, rather than putting in the Bill things which might just narrow attention on to a small number of issues, which may not be the most important things in any given year. That is why I think inserting them as primary functions is helpful in clarifying what is important and what we should hold the NCS accountable for, but allowing some flexibility for the board to report on the things that are most pressing in any given year.