Apprenticeships: Rural Economy

Lord Smith of Hindhead Excerpts

Thursday 14th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

The noble Baroness makes a very good point about difficulties with travel. We are seeing examples in local areas of action on this. For instance, in rural Norfolk and Suffolk, the local job centres have used funding from the flexible support fund to help young people with the costs of leasing a moped, with the required safety equipment, clothing and training. So there are initiatives that other parts of the country can learn from in order to make sure that young people can access the apprenticeships that they want.

[Lord Smith of Hindhead (Con)]

My Lords, we know from ONS figures published last week that 11.4% of all children in the UK are in long-term workless households, and that a significant proportion of those children are between the ages of 11 and 15. This is an impressionable time in a young person’s education. Can my noble friend say what is being done to raise awareness of apprenticeships in this specific group as a real alternative to university and, importantly, as a route out of the culture of benefit dependency?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

My noble friend will be aware that we have taken steps to ensure that schools offer high-quality careers advice which indeed means that young people hear about not only university but apprenticeships and jobs. We will bring forward legislation to ensure that other organisations can come into schools so that young people get the range of careers advice that they deserve and need.