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Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Hanson of Flint
Main Page: Lord Hanson of Flint (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Hanson of Flint's debates with the Department for International Development
(12 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberI am happy to agree with my hon. Friend about that. We found funding for an extra 50,000 apprenticeships last year and achieved almost double that because of the enthusiasm that there is among the business community and among young people. We are now running at about 360,000 a year and hope to achieve about 250,000 more apprentices than were planned under the previous Government. It is an important development in our country. We want to make sure that apprenticeship schemes are aimed at young people who need work and also aimed at the higher level—people going on to get degree-equivalent qualifications, so it is not seen as a second best. For many people it is the right career path, and there are companies in Britain such as Rolls-Royce where many of the people on the board started with an apprenticeship.
Q9. On reflection, is now the right time for the Prime Minister to scrap Labour’s indeterminate sentences for public protection, as the Justice Secretary wants to do? They were introduced to save dangerous violent criminals from harming the British public. Will the Prime Minister accept from me that the decision should not be about prison places, but about the protection of the British public?
My right hon. and learned Friend the Justice Secretary will make an announcement about this shortly. What the right hon. Gentleman will find is that we will be replacing a failed system that does not work and which the public do not understand with tough determinate sentences. People have always wanted to know that when someone is sent to prison for a serious offence, they do not, as currently, get let out halfway through. We will be putting an end to that scandal and I expect it to have widespread support.