Education, Skills and Training

Alex Chalk Excerpts

Wednesday 25th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan) and my hon. Friend the Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell), who made passionate speeches about the importance of our young people.

It is difficult to discuss skills and education and the Queen’s Speech, given what is going to happen on 23 June —which is not so much the elephant as the circus in the room—and the effect it will have on the choices we make, but I am going to give it a go. It is remarkable to hear this Government now saying that increasing the life chances of the most disadvantaged is a priority for them. Given the choices they have made over the past five years, that is like a dentist offering someone anaesthetic after he has taken out their wisdom teeth for no reason.

“Life chances” is one of those phrases that we often use but seldom define, but definition and detail matter, as does determination—the determination to do what it takes to ensure that every person from every background has every opportunity to achieve their potential. I want to set out my fears about how, in today’s ever-changing world, we are running out of time to acknowledge that that means doing things completely differently.

Everyone in this House is proud of the young people we represent. We see their ability and the factors that make the difference between them realising it and wasting it. I do this job because I think that somewhere in my community is a kid who could cure cancer, if only they had the right opportunities to unlock their talents. Imagine how we would all benefit if that happened. That is where we come in: our job is to make sure that they have those pathways to be the kinds of people they can be and change all our lives.

That is where this Queen’s Speech misses the mark. We act as if opportunity is the ladder we have all known and that, to improve life chances for all, we simply need to get more of the next generation to repeat the same steps we took—go to school, go to university and settle into a career. If we are honest, we will admit that it was not that simple or open for us. Most of us can point to the points in our lives when we had a helping hand up that ladder, including good parents, good teachers and good networks. They all opened doors closed to others, by which I mean not just schools and universities, but internships and job interviews, too. The world is changing so quickly that if we are really to change the life chances of today’s 15-year-olds, we need to do more than open up the old boys’ or old girls’ network. We need to see opportunity as less a ladder than a maze, with many different doors, directions and routes to take.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

Is it not the case that to give young people opportunity we really need more good and outstanding schools, producing fantastic standards, so that they can go on and fulfil their dreams? That is what we need, and that is what the Government are delivering, is it not?

[Stella Creasy]

If the hon. Gentleman will let me continue, I hope I will convince him to think bigger. When I was involved in the scouts, we always said that the key to understanding youth work was to recognise that although everybody has been a 15-year-old, not everybody has been a 15-year-old in today’s world. If we really want to improve the life chances of today’s young people, they do not just need our help to get them a job. They do not seek an industry or a profession. They live in a world in which, it is predicted, they will hold seven different careers, two of which are yet to be invented.

Each generation has faced change, but this generation will see it not just in their lifetime, but within a decade. The real challenge to their future prospects is not Romanian immigrants, but robots. Just as Friends Reunited was overtaken by Facebook, so technology is replacing not just manual labour but skilled labour—prescriptions filled, legal forms checked, cars driven and retail services replaced. It is a time of peril and potential: adapt or fall behind. There is little certainty to be had and little time to catch our breath. But the fact that the world moves so quickly means that people can keep learning new skills or reapplying those that they have to the new opportunities that arise. There are more second chances than ever before.

Not only are we failing the next generation by not acting to help them to navigate the world that is to come, but I fear that the measures in the Queen’s Speech could reinforce the inequalities that already define life chances for so many. The Institute for Fiscal Studies has demonstrated that graduates from richer family backgrounds earn significantly more than their less wealthy counterparts, even when they take similar degrees from similar universities.

That is not just happening at university. Research by the Institute for Public Policy Research shows that even at good and outstanding schools, there are large attainment gaps between rich and poor students. The OECD states that of all the countries it surveyed, the UK has the biggest gap in literacy and problem-solving skills between 16 to 19-year-olds who are not in education or employment and young employed people. Our failure to teach skills that can be transferred and that are relevant in the modern world means that too many of our young people are struggling not just in their home territory but against their European, Chinese and south American counterparts. That is not because we are members of the European Union, but because of their very British education.

As many of my colleagues have pointed out, we face the biggest skill shortage for 30 years. We have growing inequality and an outdated idea of what would fix these issues. The choices made in this Queen’s Speech about what to offer our young people give them little to prepare them for the world to come. At best, those choices will work for only a minority of young people unless they are independently wealthy—beneficiaries of the bank of mum and dad.

The education Bill is a case in point, with its obsession with turning every school into an academy, rather than turning every young person into an achiever. It works against partnership, isolating schools rather than linking them with local businesses and local communities. The Higher Education and Research Bill will put more resource into the “ladders” approach just when young people need more access—to apprenticeships, to further education and to paid internships—to open other doors. The Bill comes at the same time as the area-based review of further education seeks to close down those institutions.

Although the Government’s restatement of their commitment to sharia-compliant loans is welcome, if we fail to deal with the inequalities in resource that affect the poorest in our society in the early years, those people will continue to get a worse deal than their more affluent counterparts even if they make it to the same schools and universities.