Education Bill

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Will the Minister give way on that point?

[Mr Hayes]

On the point of ugly ubiquity, I happily give way to my hon. Friend.

[Bob Stewart]

In my constituency we have Bromley college, and I have been speaking to people there. Will these changes allow Bromley college to control more properly the fees that it has to charge? At the moment, it is affiliated to Greenwich university and is being forced to charge fees that it does not want to charge, which is very much against the spirit of what we are trying to do. Can it have the freedom to seek other partnerships in the way that we have been discussing—for ordinary degrees, for example? There must be some way in which colleges, which we all want to charge the minimum fees, can actually charge those minimum fees rather than be forced to raise them.

[Mr Hayes]

My hon. Friend is the very antithesis of both ugliness and ubiquity; indeed, he is known for his integrity and truthfulness. As Keats understood, and Shaftesbury in the other place later, truth and beauty are intrinsically linked, and so my hon. Friend’s truthfulness has an aesthetic all of its own. On the specific point that he raises, the way in which colleges have, over time, been dictated to and controlled from the centre has largely been about funding mechanisms. Colleges have danced to a tune set around funding. He is absolutely right to say that greater freedom means being more flexible about funding. It means allowing colleges to devise the kind of offer that is right for their locality in the kinds of partnerships that my hon. Friend the Member for Brigg and Goole (Andrew Percy) described, and funding needs to reflect that.

We are on a journey, and not all of it can be done overnight. When I came into the job, I was able to put in place a number of important changes that stripped away some of the central control. Since that time, we have done more, and these amendments go a step further. But this is not the end of the journey. The destination we seek is what I began to describe a moment ago—a more eclectic, more responsive and more dynamic system. I am not, as you know, Madam Deputy Speaker, one to overstate my virtues, but I would go so far as to say that what we are doing in further education is a model of public service reform: a deregulated system that is free to respond to local circumstances; dynamic and innovative; flexible and, in my judgment, imaginative—I make no apology for using that word—about exactly what it does and how it does it; and uses funding to feed that kind of new beginning. As I said, though, I do not want to overstate the case.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hayes]

Another bit of good news when we saw the figures from the statistical release was the substantial growth in manufacturing and engineering apprenticeships; the number of starts was 47,000, which was an increase of 20% on the 2009-10 figure. So we had very strong growth in the very apprenticeships that my hon. Friend rightly identifies as crucial to our future prospects. Interestingly, the figures clearly show that there is growth across the system. Again rather counter-intuitively from the perspective of the critics, there has been growth in sectors where employment more generally has either slowed or declined. So apprenticeships seem to be bucking the trend in areas such as manufacturing and engineering. Even in construction, where there has been a very sharp decline in employment, apprenticeship numbers have held up. That suggests that businesses are investing in training and in their future, and that apprenticeships are succeeding. This is a flagship policy, devised in opposition and delivered in government.

[Bob Stewart]

Has the Minister considered—I am sure that he has—the thought that a great number of high-quality individuals have had considerable technical training in the armed forces? Could they come in at level 2, with this possibly leading on to level 3? Is that part of the system he envisages?

[Mr Hayes]

This weekend, I was looking at a submission that suggested that we might ask the National Apprenticeship Service to look specifically at people who have left the armed forces. I am particularly concerned about those who have left the armed forces with a disability. One of the challenges that the previous Government faced and that we face too is in ensuring that the apprenticeship system is accessible to as many people as possible, and I do not think we do well enough by disabled potential apprentices. I asked, at the very early stages of my distinguished ministerial career, for the NAS to examine that area closely, but I want it to re-examine it. I particularly want the NAS to examine what we can do for disabled ex-servicemen.

[Bob Stewart]

rose—

[Mr Hayes]

I happily give way to my hon. Friend, who is a great expert on these things.

[Bob Stewart]

I hope that the Minister will forgive me, because he has almost made the point I was going to make, which is that we could involve disabled ex-servicemen as part of this system. That would be a superb way of helping them to get into decent employment in civilian life.

[Mr Hayes]

I am glad that I anticipated my hon. Friend’s point. Foresight is not essential for a Minister, but it is a great advantage, particularly when it can be displayed on the Floor of the House of Commons.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael) mentioned growth and others have talked about progression, so in dealing with the remark made by the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby about happiness, I wish to draw his attention to Yeats. I know that the hon. Member for Cardiff West (Kevin Brennan), the shadow Minister sitting next to him, is a fan of Yeats. Lord Layard did such good work on this particular amendment, so I shall cite the following from Yeats:

“Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that but simply growth, We are happy when we are growing.”

When apprenticeships are growing, I am particularly happy because it is testament to the success of our policies.