Enterprise Bill [ Lords ] (Fourth sitting)

Caroline Flint Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2016 Public Bill Committees

[Kevin Brennan]

My hon. Friend emphasises that point with great effect.

People with disabilities feature in both amendments in this group. Too few disabled people or those with learning difficulties become apprentices. In all further education and skills providers in 2013-14, more than 16% of learners disclosed a learning difficulty or disability compared with only 8% of apprentices. In an Ofsted survey, only one provider demonstrated that it had supported an apprentice with dyslexia to pass their functional skills test.

The figures indicate that the proportion of apprentices who have learning difficulties or a disability has actually decreased in recent years, falling from 11% in 2010-11 to 8% in 2012-13. The success rate of all apprentices completing their framework rose from 55% in 2005-06 to 73% in 2011-12. In the same period, the success rate for those with disabilities doing apprenticeships rose from 49.5% to 69.9%. In other words, the differential between the success rate of all apprentices and apprentices with a disability is not very great.

The increase in the completion rate has been broadly similar during that period—it is now up to 75%—and if anything slightly better for disabled people. We all welcome the progress that has been made and the successful completion rates of apprenticeships, which used to be a big problem many years ago. That is all good, but why is the proportion of disabled apprentices falling when there is clear evidence that they can succeed when given the opportunity?

In addition, the environment for people with disabilities to get advice on work, apprenticeships and training has been under pressure. Jobcentre Plus’s disability employment service has a ratio of one adviser providing support to 600 disabled people. That is a key cause for concern and was highlighted in the Work and Pensions Committee’s inquiry in December 2014. In answer to a written parliamentary question in October 2015, the Minister for Employment, the right hon. Member for Witham (Priti Patel), revealed that the number of jobcentres employing at least one full-time equivalent disability employment adviser had fallen from 226 in 2011-12 to just 90 by 2015-16. That is a real concern.

[Caroline Flint (Don Valley) (Lab)]

Obviously, employment and support allowance is there to recognise people who have disabilities and other health conditions but who may, with the right support, be able to find work. I know, having been the Minister for Employment and Welfare Reform, that whether it is the old incapacity benefit or employment and support allowance, the longer someone is on that allowance, the more the likelihood of them coming off it is reduced. Is it not important that we enable young people with disabilities to get training as soon as possible, so that despite what they have to deal with, they can contribute and give huge value to many employers in this country?

[Kevin Brennan]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right; it is crucial that that happens. Like her and, I am sure, other colleagues, I have seen wonderful examples of where the right sort of adjustments are made and taken into account for people with disabilities and learning difficulties, and those people go on to be highly successful in their jobs and careers. They just need extra support and attention to do that.

There is real concern among disabled people that their position is getting worse, not better, at the moment. That is not only a concern for Opposition Members. The Minister was present recently during Business, Innovation and Skills questions in the House when her colleague the hon. Member for Bedford (Richard Fuller) raised the issue of barriers to apprenticeships for disabled people. While quite rightly praising the Government’s commitment to apprenticeships, he said to the apprenticeships Minister that

“disabled people still face significant barriers. The Alliance for Inclusive Education has raised specific concerns about the requirements for maths and English. Will my hon. Friend the Minister review those concerns and write to the alliance and me to assure us that he is taking all steps to ensure that disabled people can take advantage of apprenticeship opportunities?”

In his reply, the Minister for Skills said:

“This is such an important issue that I hope that I can go one better and invite my hon. Friend to come and meet me, along with the people who have such concerns. I have had other such meetings, not least with my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes South (Iain Stewart), on similar issues. It is very important that we get this right.”—[Official Report, 2 February 2016; Vol. 605, c. 777-78 .]

--- Later in debate ---

[Kevin Brennan]

Opposition Members are proud of the work that was begun and done by the previous Labour Government, who, as I mentioned earlier, rescued apprenticeships from the scrapheap and revitalised the apprenticeship programme, boosting apprenticeship starts from 65,000 in academic year 1996-97 to 279,700 in 2009-10. It was a revolution, and we are pleased that it has been carried on by subsequent Governments. It was that Labour Government who set up the dedicated National Apprenticeship Service to promote and expand the apprenticeship scheme, and who launched the first National Apprenticeship Week in 2008 and introduced the right for a qualified person to an apprenticeship, which was unfortunately removed by the coalition Government.

Of course, as the shadow Secretary of State said on Second Reading, there is little explanation from the Government as to how local government and other public bodies, which have been subject to deep budget cuts, will easily be able to expand the number of high-quality apprenticeships that they can offer at a time when they are having to reduce their staffing because of central Government policy. Even the Prime Minister’s mother would understand that point.

[Caroline Flint]

And his auntie.

[Kevin Brennan]

As my right hon. Friend says from a sedentary position, his auntie would quite certainly understand, too.

The Government have had to set up the slush fund that we heard about this week to placate their own MPs, who are complaining about cuts to local government funding in their areas. The Government have set a target of 3 million apprenticeships by 2020. We want apprenticeships to continue to expand, but what we do not want—and I do not think the Government want this either—is for this to degenerate into a “never mind the quality, feel the width” philosophy. The quality of apprenticeships is of paramount importance, so I hope the Minister will give us her assurance that the Government will be vigilant on quality as numbers expand, and that she will explain how public bodies, including local authorities, are to meet the target when they are subject to such brutal financial pressures from central Government.

[Anna Soubry]

I will not respond to everything that has been said. Our local authorities are more than able to fulfil their target. On Second Reading I gave the example of my own borough council, which has gone from having three or four apprenticeships a year to an absolute target of well over 20 a year. As the council is often keen to remind me—I am delighted to see my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning here from the Department for Communities and Local Government—it does not have one of the best settlements among local authorities. Notwithstanding that, it has been able to more than exceed any target in its determination to provide apprenticeships.

We were concerned that low-quality courses that did not meet the requirements of a statutory apprenticeship would dilute the apprenticeship brand. We are fully aware of that, which is why we are so keen to create an offence for a person in the course of a business to provide or offer a course or training as an apprenticeship if it is not a statutory apprenticeship. That is how seriously we take the matter, and it is one way in which we are determined to ensure that apprenticeships are all the things that people would expect them to be.

Of course, we know that one of the most important groups of people when it comes to apprenticeships is parents. As parents, we care deeply about what our children choose to do, and I will be brutally honest with the Committee that there was a real problem under the last Labour Government, when there was a rush to go into higher education and university. If someone’s child did not go to university, they were seen in some way as a failure. That was palpable nonsense, and I say that as the mother of one daughter who went to university and another who did not. It is fantastic, brilliant and wonderful to go to university—it is a fabulous time of one’s life—but if someone does not go to university, they should not be regarded in some way as a second-class citizen.

I always use the example—my hon. Friend the Member for Derby North is here, and she will know what I am about to say—that if a youngster in my constituency gets an apprenticeship at Rolls-Royce, although it does not lie within my constituency, it is seen as being as good as any university course at the finest of our excellent and outstanding universities. They are remarkable opportunities for young people and, as we know, some of those apprenticeship courses have a duration of some seven years.

[Caroline Flint]

The Minister makes an interesting point about universities. I was the first in my family to go to university; my brother and sister both left school at 16 and went to work. Does she agree that it was perhaps a mistake under a Tory Government to get rid of polytechnics? Through polytechnics, there was much greater scope to raise the level of vocational education and of professions across all sorts of areas—people had a clear idea of what they were going into. In some ways, the merging of polytechnics and universities was to the detriment of vocational education.

[Anna Soubry]

That is very interesting, but I will not spend too long on it. The right hon. Lady and I are as one. We have a common background, because both my brothers left school at 16 and went into the world of work, and neither of my parents went to university, either. I was the only one who went to university, so I can say this, because it was a Conservative Government who got rid of polytechnics and a Labour Government who did not do anything about it. We are equal. I agree with her that there is a good argument that it was a mistake to get rid of the polytechnics. I always think of Trent Polytechnic in Nottingham, which was an outstanding polytechnic which offered exceptional courses with a vocational twist. Having said all that, I will look at Derby University, Lincoln University, Nottingham Trent University and Nottingham University—[Interruption.] Yes, I know I am straying off the point, Ms Buck.

All those universities are excellent, and we need to understand that almost any opportunity we can offer our children is wonderful, but we should not discriminate against those youngsters who do not go to university, which has happened, and I am delighted that we are addressing that imbalance.

We have made an absolute commitment to deliver 3 million apprentices. I am helpfully reminded by my excellent Parliamentary Private Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby that information in a House of Commons Library note shows that there were fewer than 300,000 apprenticeships at the end of 2010 but that—here’s a thing—in 2011-12, there were well over 0.5 million apprenticeships.