Barry Sheerman
Main Page: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)Department Debates - View all Barry Sheerman's debates with the Department for Education
(1 year, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Watch Debate Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Robert Halfon
My hon. Friend is an FE champion; I welcome his question. He will be pleased to know that we are investing in resources, increasing skills funding by £3.8 billion over the Parliament, investing in quality qualifications such as T-levels, higher technical qualifications, free level 3 courses, bootcamps and apprenticeships. We are also investing in infrastructure, rolling out 21 institutes of technology, spending £290 million.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Come on, my old friend—the Minister can do better than that. The fact of the matter is that further education is still a Cinderella service. When will he wake up to the fact that we desperately need more skilled people in our country and that the FE sector is the one area where we could do real investment that would pay back quickly? I like the Minister a lot—we are old friends—and urge him to get his act together and put some real heft into further education.
Robert Halfon
The hon. Gentleman describes FE as a Cinderella service, but I remind him that Cinderella became a member of the royal family and it is this Government who are banishing the two ugly sisters of under-resourcing and snobbery about further education and skills. As I said in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), we are investing £3.8 billion extra in skills in this Parliament and £1.6 billion extra for FE, increasing the number of hours of learning for students. I am proud of the Government’s approach to further education and skills.