Young People not in Work, Education or Training

Lord Laming Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

I always enjoy my visits to UTCs and of course my conversations with the noble Lord as well. UTCs are doing a very good job in providing technical education which then leads on to apprenticeships, and so are other schools as well. At the heart of our post-16 White Paper was that we provide the pathways, through the new V-levels, T-levels and apprenticeships, for young people to get the skills they need to make a success of their lives.

[Lord Laming (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister will agree that, after the 1948 Education Act was introduced, there was an unspoken contract between the state and parents that the state would provide education for every child and that parents, on the other hand, had an obligation to get their child to school every day, unless there was good reason for it not to happen. The difficulty about the young people not in education, work or training today is that this behaviour starts very early in a child’s career. Does the Minister have any thoughts about how we can restore the contract between the state and parents to get their children to school?

[Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)]

The noble Lord makes an important point. It is absolutely the case that children who are absent for periods of time, or who are in alternative provision by virtue of behavioural needs, are more likely not to be in education, employment or training. That is why, as part of this plan, we will have a particular focus on those children, to identify much earlier who is likely not to be able to find a college place or job, and to intervene at that point to prevent them becoming NEET in the first place.