Fair Taxation of Schools and Education Standards Committee

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Wednesday 11th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

When I was on the Education Committee in 2019—just for the information of the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis), conversations about future work tend to happen confidentially within a Select Committee—we produced a report on special educational needs and disabilities, which one of our best pieces of work. In that report we highlighted the need to train teachers and people working in schools on SEND as a key priority. The money that my hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State is talking about could be used to provide that training, the need for which was identified back in 2019, but which is yet to take place because schools do not have the funding they need and the Government are prioritising tax breaks for private schools instead.

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will set out in more detail exactly what difference that money could make to delivering a brilliant education for all our children.

On money, the case could hardly be stronger. After more than a decade of Conservative Governments, what do we have to show for it? We have childcare in crisis, a recovery programme in chaos, staff leaving our schools in their droves, school buildings collapsing, attainment gaps widening, apprenticeship numbers in freefall, colleges being pushed to the brink, and universities treated as a political battleground, not as a public good.

Once again, it will be the task of the next Labour Government to repair our schools system and equip it for the future. But we know that takes money. As the cost of living crisis spirals, the Government have imposed the greatest tax burden for 70 years, reaching again and again into the pockets of working people to fix their mess. Labour will put our children, their futures and the future of our country first by asking those with the broadest shoulders to contribute their fair share; by requiring private schools to pay business rates, as state schools already do, and to pay VAT, as our colleges already do.

At this time of economic uncertainty, asking the public to subsidise a tax break for private schools is inexcusable. We are not talking about small sums. Putting VAT on independent school fees would raise “about £1.7 billion”—those are the Chancellor’s words, not mine.

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[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

As I mentioned in my intervention on the shadow Secretary of State, I served on the Education Committee in the last Parliament. I had a very positive relationship with the then Chair, the right hon. Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon), who I see has now made it to Minister. With respect, I have to say that it is disappointing that the current Chair—the hon. Member for Worcester (Mr Walker), who I endorsed for the position—gave such a partisan speech. I would have thought that one of the main bonuses of being a Select Committee Chair rather than a Minister was having the opportunity to hold the Government to account and question them, rather than blindly following and endorsing everything they say.

[Mr Robin Walker]

I am absolutely delighted to hold the Government to account and indeed to criticise them, as I have been known to do in the past. However, I gently say to the hon. Lady that what we are debating today has nothing to do with Government policy; it is about a proposed Opposition policy with which they want to sideline the Education Committee. That makes me angry, and I think it should make the whole Committee angry.

[Emma Hardy]

I do hope that the hon. Gentleman will exercise his new-found freedoms as Chair and make the full transition from parliamentary supporter of the Government to parliamentary ambassador holding them to account.

Some incredibly impressive straw men have been conjured up in this debate, including the faintly ludicrous idea that if we prevent independent schools from being charities and from being funded partly by the taxpayer, they will suddenly all close, everyone will suddenly come to the state schools and it will be a tragedy that costs our state sector so much money. What utter nonsense! The average cost of an independent school over a child’s education is £270,000, so I hardly think that parents will be running for the local comp if those schools suddenly stop having charitable status.

This year, private school fees are set to rise by 7%. If the Government’s ideas were logical, we would therefore expect a reduction in the numbers attending private schools, but what is happening? At exactly the same time that fees are rising by 7%, we are seeing no suppression of enrolment; in fact, the numbers who wish to enrol are increasing. This idea that numbers will suddenly decline if we make private schools stop being charitable institutions and start paying a fair amount just does not stand up.

I thank all the schools, teachers and school staff in my constituency. Schools do so much more than just educating children. I will briefly mention one school: Chiltern Primary School. If the Secretary of State ever visits, I hope that she will have a look at the work that Chiltern is doing. Every Thursday, it does something called Chat and Choose: parents line up and pay £1 for six items of food, which they can collect from the school, and a professional is there at the same time to advise and support them. That is an absolutely excellent example of a school doing so much to support the wider community. I put on record my thanks to Chiltern for its work.

Politics is always about priorities. Given the state of the economy, thanks to 13 years of Conservative Government, I am slightly surprised that the hon. Member for Bassetlaw (Brendan Clarke-Smith) chose to cite the last Prime Minister, who did not do particularly well with our economy, as someone whose recommendations we should follow. We have a choice. What will we choose and who should we choose to invest in?

In my earlier intervention I mentioned SEND, which is a real passion of mine and of the right hon. Member for Harlow. One priority that our Committee identified was the need to give teachers more training in SEND support. I was a teacher for 11 years: when I first started, I was not adequately trained to fully support all pupils with SEND. One possible use of the £1.7 billion is supporting teachers in that way. I would hope that that was a priority for whichever party was in government.

I want to mention oracy: speaking and listening, which the Schools Minister—the right hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Nick Gibb), who has returned to his place after a short break—has heard me mention before. Spoken language is one of the strongest predictors of a child’s future life chances, but it is often overlooked and undervalued. I chose to prioritise it when I was a teacher by giving children opportunities to talk. I even set up a little debate club for year 6 pupils in my primary school. At the time, a parent said, “Why are you doing that in a comprehensive? That’s for the private schools.” No: debate, discussion and holding your own in a conversation should not be a skill learned just in private schools; it should be taught in all schools.

Oracy is not just about making everybody an Oxford-standard debater. It is more than that; it is about helping people with communication difficulties, supporting people to become more active citizens, and giving people social support and confidence. The Education Endowment Foundation has found evidence that oral language approaches in schools have a very high impact on pupils’ outcomes and a very low cost. In fact, six months’ additional progress can be made over a year when pupils are supported with oracy.

[Margaret Greenwood (Wirral West) (Lab)]

I do not want to take up too much of my hon. Friend’s time, but she is making an excellent point: oracy is really important. Before Christmas, I met Wirral primary school headteachers and their representatives, who stressed the financial challenges that their schools face. The things they are finding it difficult to pay for include speech therapists and mental health support for children. Does my hon. Friend agree that we cannot afford not to give schools that support, because it is essential for our young people?

[Emma Hardy]

I absolutely support my hon. Friend, who is a tireless champion for schools and educators.

I also want to mention social confidence. Oracy helps students to get along with others. It gives them support with so much more than just academia. It helps them to engage with democratic society and the democratic processes. I hope we will remember that when we look at our priorities, at what we value and at where money can best be spent to support the majority of people.

I do not think private schools are going to close overnight if their charitable tax status is suddenly removed. What I do think is that the money could be invested to support more pupils, and I hope that by doing that we could help every single child in the country, not just those whose parents can pay £270,000 for an elite private education.

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[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Nick Gibb)]

To be frank, this debate has not been a triumph for the Opposition Front Bench. As my hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) pointed out, no Labour MP actually spoke in favour of, or even mentioned, Labour’s motion today.

I think it is fair to say that every Member of the House wants to see high academic standards in our schools and to make sure that every child reaches their full potential. What divides us is how to achieve that, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (David Johnston) powerfully exposed in his brilliant speech.

On the Government side, we believe that promoting an evidence-based approach to the teaching of reading and arithmetic in primary schools is key, and that empowering teachers to maintain good and improving pupil behaviour is essential if children are to be able to concentrate and work in a safe and calm environment. We believe that, notwithstanding the existence of Google, the curriculum should be rich in knowledge and give young people the cultural capital and cognitive skills to navigate and succeed in a modern society and economy.

[Emma Hardy]

I thank the Minister for giving way; he is always generous. On the issue of quality and knowledge-based teaching, will he respond to my point that the Education Endowment Foundation found that teaching explicit oracy skills in schools increased children’s progress by more than six months for pupils from the most disadvantaged backgrounds? Is that evidence being considered by his Department?

[Nick Gibb]

I agree with the hon. Lady on the importance of debating, speaking and discussing issues in class. That is terribly important.

We introduced the phonics screening check in 2012, ensuring that every six-year-old is on track with their reading. In 2012, just 58% achieved the expected standard; by 2019, just before the pandemic, that figure had reached 82%. We have risen from joint 10th to joint eighth in the PIRLS—progress in international reading literacy study—survey of the reading ability of nine-year-olds, scoring our highest ever results. That success is attributed to the focus on phonics and has been driven by improvements among the least able pupils.

We changed the primary school national curriculum, improving rigour in English and driving the habit of reading for pleasure, and adopting an approach to mathematics based on the highly regarded Singapore maths curriculum. That came into force in 2014 and the new, more demanding SATs at the end of primary school, based on that new curriculum, came in in 2016. Between 2016 and 2019, before the pandemic, the proportion of 11-year-olds reaching the expected standard in maths rose from 70% to 79%, and in the TIMSS—trends in international mathematics and science study—survey of the maths ability of pupils around the world, our year 5 pupils significantly improved between 2015 and 2019.

We introduced a multiplication tables check, ensuring that every nine-year-old knows their times tables. This June, 27% achieved full marks in the test and the overall average score was 20 correct answers out of 25. The approach of the Government over the last 12 years has been about standards—raising standards in our schools. That is why the proportion of schools graded good or outstanding has risen from 68% in 2010 to 88% now.

We reformed the GCSE qualifications to make sure that we are on a par with the best-performing countries in the world. We removed the controlled assessments from most GCSEs, as Ofqual said they were less reliable than written examinations. Our reformed GCSEs are now the gold standard, the curriculum is more knowledge-rich and the assessment process is fairer and more rigorous.

When I read Labour’s key education policy document—not on the website, but report of the council of skills advisers, chaired by Lord Blunkett—I cannot see the same commitment to standards. One of Labour’s key recommendations is:

“Introducing multimodal assessments so that young people’s progress is no longer measured solely through written exams.”

Exams are key to maintaining standards and in ensuring that our qualifications are rigorous and fair. David Blunkett’s report was endorsed by the Leader of the Opposition. Will the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) take this opportunity to disown from the Front Bench that pledge in that document?

Exams are fundamental to maintaining standards and ensuring that our qualifications are rigorous and fairly awarded. Why is Labour so committed to abolishing exams? What is its policy on reading and phonics, and the phonics screening checks? Is that another test they want to replace with a multimodal assessment? What about key stage 2 SATs or the multiplication tables check? What about GCSEs and A-levels, and all the important markers of standards and checks of pupil progress? Are they all to be replaced by Labour’s multimodal assessment?

My hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr Walker), the Chair of the Select Committee, made the important point that charitable status for education has been in place for over a century and that every Labour Government in that period supported that charitable status. He pointed out that Labour policy would make independent education more elite and more expensive, confined to the very rich and to overseas pupils. He also asked the key question of whether the £1.7 billion Labour claimed the policy would yield excluded the VAT that Labour has conceded will not be applied under this policy to the independent special schools catering for children with complex needs.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Jonathan Gullis) made the point that the maths of the proposed policies does not add up, with no account taken of potential independent school closures. In a powerful contribution, he cited a statistic not mentioned so far: that before the pandemic, the attainment gap had closed by 13% in primary schools and 9% in secondary schools.

BTEC Qualifications

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Monday 18th July 2022 Westminster Hall

[Marsha De Cordova]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on making that point; she has clearly read my speech, because I am going to come on to that. She is absolutely spot on. That is why I was proud to join over 100 parliamentarians calling on the Government to reconsider their plan.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is right: one thing that we want to promote, of course, is choice. I agree that scrapping BTECs will hinder social mobility, and hinder progress into skilled labour markets and higher education. As Paul Britton, the principal of Wyke Sixth Form College, pointed out—I am a bit biased as I went there myself as a student—scrapping BTECs will also have an impact on the local economy. Not only is it bad for social mobility, but it is bad for choice and for the local economy. I support BTECs so much that even my daughter is going to do one next year.

[Marsha De Cordova]

Fantastic—I could not say it better myself. My hon. Friend makes a fantastic contribution and she is absolutely right: it is not just about social mobility; it is about the local economy too.

The introduction of T-levels does have value in terms of technical education; however, there is no rationale for why BTEC qualifications must make way for them. It makes sense to have A-levels, T-levels and BTECs in all future qualification landscapes. It is clear that the Government are forcing through these changes so they can drive up T-level take-up. The Sixth Form Colleges Association has described T-levels as a

“minority, untested product that the Government is pushing as a mass product.”

It is still too early to analyse the effectiveness of T-levels. The Government should not be pulling away from BTECs without evidence about the success of T-levels. That is grossly unfair to young people, removing their choice and opportunity.

The notion that we can divide people into “academic” or “technical” is wrong. BTECs provide a different type of educational experience—one that combines the development of skills with academic learning. I believe that the Minister studied a BTEC and said that it had a transformative impact on her life. Perhaps she agrees with me that, after last week, we need a new BTEC course on public anger management.

Leaders from various education institutions have said that, for some students, BTECs will continue to be a more effective route to higher education or skilled employment than studying A-levels or T-levels.

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[Rebecca Pow (Taunton Deane) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to be here now that I am back on the Back Benches, as one of the 56 who were driven to resign. This is the first debate that I have spoken in since then, which demonstrates how important I feel it is. There are a number of reasons for that.

BTEC qualifications are important nationally and for my constituency, which has several excellent further education colleges that I will mention. I am pleased to follow the hon. Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova), who opened the debate. There were 669 signatories to the petition in my constituency—the eighth highest by number of constituents. Normally, when so many people sign a petition, it demonstrates that lots of others support the subject. That is why I am here.

To cut to the chase, I understand the need to equip students between 16 and 18, or indeed those studying in later life, with the best skills and tools to get into jobs and to work with the businesses that need them. That is really important for growing our economy. In that respect, I supported the Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022.

I have real concerns, however, about the proposal to axe BTEC qualifications, which, in a large proportion of cases, function perfectly well. I completely understand that it would be worth looking at the multifarious range of courses, because clearly some are repetitive and some do not quite align with the jobs and skills we need, but a great many of them certainly do. I do not believe that they should just be removed so that people are left with only T-levels and A-levels. I perfectly understand their place as well, but it seems like throwing the baby out with the bathwater to get rid of something that is already performing well.

[Emma Hardy]

The hon. Member is making an excellent speech. I hope that the Minister will recognise that T-levels are not universally available throughout the country, because of the work placement requirement that comes with them. Getting rid of BTECs and replacing them with T-levels actually limits choice for people, because the availability of T-levels is variable and depends on the jobs in the local economy.

[Rebecca Pow]

That is a really good point. It was not raised by people in my area—it may not be the case there—but the case certainly has been made that T-levels are basically the equivalent of three A-levels rolled together, and not every student is quite ready to do that. Students also have to get the same qualifications at GCSE to do a T-level, so already, one might be alienating a certain number of students who might find the BTEC really good and go on to do some of these other things. There are many things that I urge the Minister—I welcome her to her place—to look at and listen to, now that we have this reprieve.

Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 13th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Matt Western]

The hon. Member is right. A pattern is clearly emerging, which I will describe and examine in due course.

Having an Orwellian director for freedom of speech sounds like a contradiction in terms, but the appointee will certainly have sweeping powers. They alone will be responsible for making sure that universities and student unions are upholding their freedom of speech duties. They will act as judge, jury and executioner in free speech complaints and will potentially monitor overseas funding of universities and student unions. As job descriptions go, it is unprecedented. Incredibly, the job description is already out there, for anyone who is interested, with a £100,000 salary and a four-year term—I am not sure, Madam Deputy Speaker, but it could be on your horizon.

New clause 4 should not be necessary, but in the context of this Government’s record on appointees, it most definitely is. Let us start at the very top of the tree. In February last year, Lord Wharton, a Conservative peer, was appointed as chair of the Office for Students. His appointment was something of a surprise to many; he himself admitted that he had no experience in the higher education sector. It seems that the only criterion for his appointment by this Government was that he had run the Prime Minister’s leadership campaign.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

The standardisation provided by allowing a body such as a Select Committee to interview a person before appointing them to a role such as chair of Ofsted is common. The Minister knows that, because she was on the Education Committee with me when we did pre-appointment hearings, so it seems a little unusual that scrutiny is not seen as being as important in this aspect of education as in other areas.

[Matt Western]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We need more process, more transparency and an honest approach if we are to clean up our politics. I absolutely believe that that is what I would want any organisation to have. We must move away from what appears to be an increasingly transactional approach to these appointments.

In return for his being appointed, Lord Wharton’s company GBMW Ltd made what is now referred to as a golden thank you for being handed the job by the Prime Minister: a donation to the Conservative party of £8,000. That is small change for him, given that he gets paid £60,000 for just two days’ work per week.

Last month, we discovered that Lord Wharton had chosen to speak at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Hungary. It was a sell-out. In his speech, he endorsed Viktor Orbán’s far-right, autocratic regime—the regime that had forced George Soros’s Central European University to leave Budapest in 2019. So much for our champions of academic freedom! He also shared a platform with Zsolt Bayer, a television talk show host in Hungary who has been widely denounced for his aggressive racism; his grotesque comments do not bear repeating in this place.

Despite widespread condemnation from student groups here such as the Union for Jewish Students, and cross-party calls for the Government to take action against the chair, it is telling that Ministers have so far refused to do so. That is important, because independence, propriety and accountability in public life absolutely matter. That is the point of new clause 4.

It seems that the politicisation of the Office for Students has not stopped there. Three months ago, the Secretary of State appointed Rachel Houchen, the wife of the Tory Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen, as a non-executive director on the board of the Office for Students, despite her having no direct experience in the higher education sector.

In that context, the comments made in Committee by one of the Government’s own witnesses, Professor Nigel Biggar, especially alarmed the Opposition. He agreed that

“the Government…given the legislation…wants a director who has a certain partiality of that kind.”—[Official Report, Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Public Bill Committee, 7 September 2021; c. 22, Q40.]

Even the Government’s own witnesses fear that the appointment will not be impartial: Dr Arif Ahmed and others made the point that the person “has to be impartial”.

In Committee, the Minister responded to a series of Opposition amendments by stating:

“There is no need to set up the bureaucracy of a non-statutory advisory body, as suggested by the amendment. The OfS is independent of the Government, so to do so would simply duplicate its role as set out in the statute.”––[Official Report, Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Public Bill Committee, 22 September 2021; c. 343.]

Well, clearly not. If the appointments to the OfS are meant to reassure us that the director will be impartial, they have lost all credibility. I dare say that the Minister will repeat the same line today, as she has done—blind to any suggestion of improvement, not least because this morning her Department advertised for the position even though the Bill has not even had its Third Reading.

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[Matt Western]

I do not want to suggest that all people come from a position of partiality, but some are more partial—and overtly partial—than others. That was the whole point of what I tried to illustrate in the case of the chair of the Office for Students, who was clearly appointed according to the preference of the Government at the very highest level and the Prime Minister. I think that that surprise appointment, along with the appointment of the board member with no previous experience, is a further illustration of just how rabid this has become in our politics.

[Emma Hardy]

The issue of impartiality in the appointment process was debated in detail in Committee. We had a long debate about the job specification, the requirements, the importance of previous experience and the need to appoint someone with previous understanding of legislation and law, and the fact that the process needs to be impartial. When we appoint the new chair of Ofsted, we do so not on the basis of whom the Prime Minister of the day particularly likes, but on the basis of whether that person has the competencies that the job requires, and that is the point of our amendment. If such a person is to be appointed, we need the best person for the job, not the person who is most popular with the current Prime Minister.

[Matt Western]

My hon. Friend made some telling and constructive contributions in Committee, and I entirely agree with her. If we want the best from any system of higher education and its regulation, competencies must be at the heart of that.

Have a look through the job description for the director for freedom of speech, Madam Deputy Speaker. Four or five specified qualities are sought. It is worth a read, and indeed I am thinking of possibly putting in for the job. What is most surprising of all—this arose both in the Bill Committee and during our witness sessions, as my hon. Friend and others will doubtless recall—is that despite the overriding impression that, given the sensitivity and importance involved and given how delicate some of these cases will become, legal experience would be a necessity, there is no requirement for that legal expertise. We must make the process involved in any public appointment much more robust, but that applies particularly to the appointment to a position as sensitive and delicate as overseeing freedom of speech on our campuses.

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[Sir John Hayes]

Benjamin Disraeli said:

“Upon the education of the people…the fate of this country depends.”

That greatest of Conservative Prime Ministers went on to say:

“A university should be a place of life, of liberty and of learning.”

However, if the flame of liberty is to burn brightly, and if the university sector is to be a beacon of learning, we must face up to the fact that, in many of our universities, freedom of speech is in jeopardy, censorship is happening as we speak tonight, and academics and students feel intimidated by that censorship.

We know that from the evidence that the Bill Committee heard from academics on the frontline of that struggle. The shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western), quoted Professor Arif Ahmed, who was clear that there is a series of means by which universities restrict and limit freedom of speech. He said:

“what I mean is universities placing formal obstacles in the way of people saying things that are perfectly legal.”––[Official Report, Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Public Bill Committee, 7 September 2021; c. 13, Q22.]

He went on to say, quoting the Universities and Colleges Union survey of 2017, that

“35% of academics self-censor”––[Official Report, Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Public Bill Committee, 7 September 2021; c. 16, Q27.]

because they are nervous about saying what they truly believe; the number of students doing so is probably even greater. The truth is that there is a tyrannical minority in universities, among the academic staff and in the student body, who do not believe that universities are places of light, liberty and learning; instead, they think that universities should limit free speech.

I find it hard to understand why Opposition Members such as the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy), whom I respect greatly, and the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington, with whom I have—I was going to say “collaborated”, but that makes me sound rather like a fifth columnist—co-operated in this place on many subjects, oppose a Bill designed to reinforce precisely the freedoms that are essential to an open society. I thought about that and cogitated on how it could be that such decent and honourable people—I include the hon. Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner) as well—could do this.

In doing so, I should draw the attention of the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests in respect of higher education, as I did perpetually and—some people felt—relentlessly during the previous stages of our consideration of the Bill. By the way, I stimulated a number of others to do the same, and I have no doubt that they will want to chip in on a similar basis this evening.

The conclusion I drew, having thought about it, was that those decent people on the Labour Benches who certainly believe in free speech and the exchange of honestly held opinion find that hard to reconcile with a zeitgeist that is preoccupied with a fear of causing offence. We are perpetually told now that because we must not make people feel uncomfortable, we must not offend them. We in this House know, do we not, that the ability to alarm is closely associated with the ability to inspire, that the ability to disturb is intrinsically linked with the ability to enthral, and that even the capacity to shock is necessary in the development and exposure of new ideas and fresh thinking?

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Sir John Hayes]

Having said such nice things about the hon. Lady, it would be extremely impolite of me not to give way.

[Emma Hardy]

I say to the right hon. Member that, as Bill Committees go, it was a very enjoyable one. I thank him for being one of the few Conservative Members who listens to the contributions. On the point he is making, it is not about disagreeing with this idea of shocking people or of having different opinions; the fundamental problem, as I have said repeatedly, is how this piece of legislation interacts with existing legislation already in place. How does this interact with equality legislation? How does this interact with other existing pieces of legislation? My concern is further developed when I see the person who is making the decision on how these different pieces of legislation interact with each other. It is, as has been mentioned—and this is the reason for new clause 4—somebody appointed by the Prime Minister of the day, which then leads to all those issues around impartiality of process. We have a situation here where we have a piece of legislation that almost buts up against existing equality legislation, but it is not quite clear how their processes will rub together, yet there is no specification that the person making the decisions has to have legal experience or knowledge; they are instead a political appointment. That is where we have the difficulty—it is not with freedom of speech, but with the legislation itself.

[Sir John Hayes]

At the risk of putting our professional association in jeopardy, I say to the hon. Lady that I agree with her. I agree that the Government need to look at the equality legislation. I note the Attorney General’s recent comments that, as well as unpicking the Human Rights Act 1998, which we certainly should do without delay, we need to revisit the Equality Act 2010 and the rest of the long tail of Blairism. The hon. Lady is right that some of that unfortunate legislation on the statute book is inhibiting much of the very good work that the Government are trying to do. In particular, she is right—this was raised in Committee by me and others—that the Government need to be very clear that this legislation can be squared with other statute and, so the means by which it might be challenged.

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[Emma Hardy]

I think it might also be worth the Government having a look at the recent legislation that they have already passed on the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the issues around protest and free speech. We could end up with a situation where free speech is the preserve of students who attend university, but those outside university will have their free speech limited unless they are very, very quiet and do not protest too loudly. We could end up with more conflict, with one part of the Government saying one thing in terms of restricting protest, and another part of the Government saying something else about supporting free speech. It is fair to say that having this Bill along with existing and proposed legislation will create a muddle.

[Sir John Hayes]

We are dealing with a complex subject. Free speech by its very nature means people saying all kinds of things in all kinds of ways about all kinds of subjects. The hon. Lady is right that there will be tensions to be settled, which is precisely why the Government have put in place mechanisms to do that. They are going to appoint, as was said earlier, an office with responsibility for ensuring that this Bill’s intentions and provisions are applied consistently. The Government acknowledge the difficulties that she has highlighted, which is precisely why they are putting in place a person and team to do exactly that.

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[Sir John Hayes]

Burke said, as you well know, Mr Deputy Speaker:

“He that struggles with us strengthens our nerves, and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper.”

Part of developing intellectually and personally, particularly for young people at university—we should not assume that only young people go to university—is exactly that. It is being stimulated, sometimes being excited, sometimes being challenged and, yes, sometimes being offended. I am often offended in this Chamber by all kinds of things, and not always things that I hear from those on the Opposition Benches.

[Emma Hardy]

Even if the right hon. Gentleman is offended, he is never offensive, so I always enjoy debating with him. On the issue of the need to challenge and to shock, there is always a line to be drawn somewhere. In Committee we talked about the offensiveness of holocaust denial. Okay, there is not a physical threat from holocaust denial, but I think that we would all agree that it is very offensive and it is therefore very hurtful. A line will always have to be drawn when it comes to free speech, but we have the difficulty, which I keep going back to, of who makes the decision on where that line is drawn—what experience do they have, what criteria is set, what is their knowledge, and what is their understanding of the subject. Having the right person at the top is important. I am sure that the right hon. Member will accept that, yes, someone might want to offend, to shock or to stimulate discussion, but there is always a point at which we say, “No, that is not intellectual stimulation. That is just offensive and rude and not part of an intellectual debate at university.”

[Sir John Hayes]

Yes, but the problem is that that line moves with the times, with fad and fashion, with what I described earlier as the zeitgeist. Perhaps the most chilling example of that is the case of Kathleen Stock. The hon. Lady will remember that Kathleen Stock gave evidence to the Bill Committee of which she was part. Within a few weeks, Kathleen Stock was driven out of her job as a distinguished professor at the University of Sussex by the mob, a group of students who pursued her and intimidated her and her family.

Kathleen Stock received scant support from many of her academic colleagues, although latterly the university authorities claimed they were supportive, and she was so affected and so damaged by all that that she ended up leaving the job she loved. I thought how chilling and ironic that she should have been one of the people who came to us, as Members of this House, to a Bill Committee debating this Bill, and yet just weeks later found herself a victim of the very problem she highlighted and emphasised in her evidence.

I will move fairly rapidly on to the amendments that stand in my name, Mr Deputy Speaker, because otherwise you will claim that I am making a Second Reading speech—and with some just cause.

Children’s Education Recovery and Childcare Costs

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend raises an important point, not least because, throughout the pandemic, we saw vast quantities—billions of pounds—of Government waste, with personal protective equipment literally burnt because the Government had failed to deliver what was necessary. Money was lost to fraud and money was lost in waste. We take our responsibilities on public spending incredibly seriously.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

Perhaps another pot of money for the Government to look at is how every pound spent in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs on tax fraud delivers £16 back. If the Government were really serious about raising some extra money for important issues such as our children, perhaps they could look at tax fraud, which they seem to be quite ignorant of at the moment.

[Bridget Phillipson]

My hon. Friend is right to highlight that, as with all these things, it is a question of political priorities. A Labour Government would have prioritised our children’s recovery from the pandemic. They would have been at the heart of what we needed to see as we started to rebuild our country. That is what we would have delivered from government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Walker]

The answer is none, because the £5 billion for recovery is on top of the additional funding that we are putting into schools: the £4 billion coming in for this academic year and the £7 billion over the course of the spending review period. The £5 billion is a targeted intervention specifically for recovery. I will break it down in a little more detail. It includes £1.5 billion for tutoring in schools and colleges, with which we will provide 100 million hours of tuition for five to 19-year-olds by 2024. That is backed by extensive evidence that small group tutoring is one of the most effective tools to support learning and accelerate pupil progress.

[Emma Hardy]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Walker]

I will in a moment.

More than half a million courses have been started by pupils across England, and regionally, the north-west, Yorkshire and the Humber, the north-east and the midlands are leading the way with the highest proportions of participating schools. Now I give way to the hon. Lady.

[Emma Hardy]

I thank the Minister, who is always very generous. If he is looking for something that actually works and has an extremely strong evidence base, I hope he will note that, according to evidence from the Education Endowment Foundation, oracy has a greater impact on children’s progress than extending the school day, small group tutoring, or any of the other elements that he has mentioned in connection with the £5 billion. It was disappointing not to see it included in the schools White Paper, and I hope he will revisit the evidence, because if he wants to use something that works, here is something that is ready to go—“oven-ready”, one might say.

[Mr Walker]

We believe that oracy is very important as part of an overall strategy supporting literacy, language and development in schools. As the hon. Lady will know, our package includes specific interventions in early language development. However, I have engaged and will continue to engage with her in the oracy all-party parliamentary group, which she chairs.

We have listened to feedback on tutoring, and next year we will allocate all tutoring funding directly to schools, improving the programme’s simplicity and flexibility. Great teaching transforms children’s life chances, and we know that great teachers are not born but made. That is why we are investing more than £250 million of additional funds to help provide 500,000 teacher-training opportunities through initial teacher training, the early career framework, and our new suite of national professional qualifications. Supporting teachers, including headteachers, throughout their careers is fundamental to delivering the best outcomes for children.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Walker]

I will take the hon. Lady’s intervention in a moment, if I may finish this point first. As I was saying, this is making it easier for schools to identify and embed the most evidence-based, informed practices and interventions, which will have the greatest impact on disadvantaged pupil outcomes—

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Mr Walker]

The hon. Lady mentioned the important work of the Education Endowment Foundation, and she is right to do so, because the EEF’s endowment, all those years ago, has proved very valuable for the sector. It has built an evidence base on which everybody, across parties and across different parts of the educational community, can agree.

One really important intervention we were able to confirm in our White Paper is the £100 million re-endowment of the EEF so that it can continue its work, making sure that initiatives such as the recovery premium and the pupil premium are as evidence-based and effective as possible. I am now going to take the intervention from the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) because I promised to do so.

[Mr Walker]

Pupil premium funding rates are increasing this year by 2.7%. They are reaching the highest level in cash terms that they have ever been, and that is a proud achievement. Yes, the pupil premium was agreed during the coalition Government, but we have continued to invest in and support it, and we have added the recovery premium on top of that.

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Mr Walker]

I have a lot to say, so I am going to make a bit of progress now. I have taken an intervention from the hon. Lady already.

Regular attendance at school is also vital for children’s education, wellbeing and long-term development. Our priority is to maximise the number of children regularly attending school. We recognise that the lessons learned during the pandemic must help us to strengthen and improve the overall system, which is why we recently published guidance for schools, trusts and local authorities, setting out how we expect them to work together to improve attendance.

The Secretary of State has also established an alliance of national leaders from education, children’s social care and allied services, who have taken pledges to raise school attendance. That includes work by Rob Tarn, the chief executive officer of the Northern Education Trust, a multi-academy trust serving areas with high levels of disadvantage, to work with other trust leaders to identify and disseminate best practice. Alongside that, we are running a series of effective practice attendance training webinars, which have been accessed by more than 12,000 school staff so far. Our team of expert attendance advisers also continues to work closely with a number of multi-academy trusts and local authorities with high levels of persistent absence to review their current practice and develop plans to improve.

I am pleased to confirm that legislative measures to establish a registration system for children not in school were included as part of the Schools Bill introduced by Parliament on 11 May 2022, which is currently in the other place. These measures will help local authorities to ensure that all children are safe and receive a suitable education. Through our attendance action alliance, the Children’s Commissioner has also begun a review to understand more about children missing education, and where and why they may be falling through the gaps. She has consulted the alliance on her initial findings, but her review is ongoing.

We know that the worries that children and young people may have about their progress at school and how this affects their future are important factors in their wider wellbeing, and subject learning is part of what children and young people enjoy most about school. That is why the additional support we have put in place to ensure that children feel supported in their education, and on track with their learning and wider development, is so vital and integral to their mental wellbeing.

I wish to be clear that children and young people are not alone on this journey and the onus is not on them to catch up; it is something that the whole school and the whole education system is looking to achieve together. It is our priority to support education settings to do so. The things we are doing to support schools are reflected more widely in our schools White Paper.

We have provided specific support for teaching about mental health and wellbeing as part of health education. Taking part in enrichment and extra-curricular activities is well known to support children’s wellbeing, but we know that participation fell during the pandemic. The longer, richer school week that we are securing through the White Paper will help to ensure that all pupils have the chance to have a wide range of experiences, including in sport, music and the arts, and we are supporting the expansion of opportunities to take part in specific schemes such as the cadets and the Duke of Edinburgh award.

We are also updating our behaviour in schools guidance to support schools to create calm, safe and supportive environments, which are important to pupil mental health and wellbeing. The guidance recognises that reasonable and appropriate adjustments may need to be made for pupils and that schools may wish to ensure that their staff are trained on matters that may affect pupils’ behaviour, including special education needs, disability or mental health needs. The guidance also makes it clear that following a behaviour incident staff should take into account any contributing factors and whether a pupil has mental health needs, and consider what support is required.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

I join in wishing Brannagh a happy birthday—I hope she has a lovely day.

I wish to start by talking about the points I made in my intervention on the importance of oracy. The Government talk an awful lot about the importance of being evidence-led. The evidence from the Education Endowment Foundation is conclusive on the importance of oracy. It is a shame that the Minister for School Standards is not here right now, because I was slightly concerned that in his response he seemed to be talking about oracy in relation just to the early years, whereas good oracy education needs to be continued throughout the early years, all the way through primary school and on into secondary school.

Through the all-party parliamentary group on oracy, I was recently able to invite some wonderful year 6 pupils from Cubitt Town Junior School in Tower Hamlets to show off their oracy skills. They were absolutely outstanding. Their confidence, the way they spoke to the different adults in the room and the way they articulated everything they had gone through was incredibly impressive. It was even more impressive given the fact that they were children from one of the most deprived areas in the country. Many of the pupils at the school are pupil premium children and some of them have English as an additional language. Despite all the barriers, they have overcome them through sustained and explicit oracy teaching.

It is not just me or the Education Endowment Foundation saying this: Ofsted is saying it as well. In its report on its English review, published on 23 May, Ofsted talks about the importance of oracy—in fact, a whole section is dedicated to it. It says that

“a strong command of the spoken word is a crucial outcome of English education. The benefits of spoken language extend beyond just success at school. Becoming an articulate, effective communicator forms the basis of democratic engagement within wider society.”

Ofsted goes on to say:

“Opportunities for pupils to develop their proficiency in spoken language require explicit teaching”.

I really wanted the Minister for School Standards to hear that point about explicit teaching. Too many people think that skills in oracy are developed through osmosis by just being in an environment. We are talking about explicit teaching. According to Ofsted, those opportunities

“require explicit teaching of the knowledge, for example vocabulary, and ideas necessary for effective communication. These opportunities should be planned carefully, both in English lessons and across other subjects.”

So we are talking about the explicit teaching of oracy. In my opinion, and that of the APPG, oracy teaching should be as explicit as the teaching of reading and writing. Reading, writing and oracy are the three pillars that should underpin all English education.

My hon. Friends have already made for me the points in my speech about how expensive childcare is, so the House will be pleased to hear that I am not going to repeat them all now, but it is worth pointing out that net childcare payments in the UK account for 29% of average income. That is clearly unsustainable and cannot be allowed to continue. Why is the cost so shockingly high? Is it because wages are too low? Is it because childcare costs are too high? It is probably a mix of both.

My hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) made an excellent point about the number of women who are—I hate the phrase—economically inactive because they are unable to go out to work because of the cost of childcare. I recently shared something to do with the cost of childcare on my social media and there were nearly 200 comments under it. I would like to share with the Minister a couple of the points that were made.

One commenter gave the childcare provider’s point of view. They said:

“If the government wants it to work they have to increase the amount that childcare providers get. Currently that is a national lottery. Some providers get most of the funding rate, some providers get about half, as their”—

local authority—

“keeps a large proportion. There are early years providers all over the country closing their doors as they just can’t make it work. Even those that are committee run, not-for-profit and that just take funded 3 and 4 year olds still can’t make it work.

On top of that there’s a massive staffing crisis in early years. Settings are shutting left, right and centre. Many providers, including me, are having to reduce the age range and numbers we care for because we can’t attract qualified staff. There’s a massive national shortage. We would love to pay our fabulous staff more but the funding rates are just too low.”

The hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds) made a thoughtful speech. The only point on which I disagree with him is about the childcare ratio. I used to work in children’s nurseries before I trained as a teacher: believe me, if someone has more than two or three two-year-olds, they have their hands full. We should think seriously about the ratio. It is also worth thinking about how things work in a nursery when we look at the ratio of adults to children, because often one of the adults might be doing nappies, another might be feeding and another might be playing with the children, so the ratio can be higher during the time the adult is physically with the number of children, because it is to do with the number of adults and children in the building. I warn against trying to change that as a way to reduce costs.

I want to conclude by quoting what a constituent told me about her difficulty paying for childcare. She said

“I work full-time with a 2-year-old and a 5-year-old. I’m an early years teacher, so see the struggles of many parents with regard to childcare. My 2-year-old is in nursery for ONLY 3 mornings and this costs us around £400 each month. My 5-year-old is in school, but we have to pay breakfast club and after-school club fees. This is another £150 plus per term. Myself and my partner work full-time, and keeping up with payments is a massive struggle. We rely heavily on my mum who is in her 60s and also works, which is a huge strain on her. I think working parents need more support for children under 3.”

I completely agree with my constituent. I do hope that the Government will not put pride in front of accepting Labour’s plan for education recovery and the free breakfast and after-school clubs that would make a great difference to many working families.

Independent Review of Children’s Social Care

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Will Quince]

I thank my hon. Friend for all the work he did as Children’s Minister when he was at the Department. He is right to say that we have to ensure that the implementation of this report and review is different from what has gone before. It may not shock him to know that in the back of my mind I have the 2014 special educational needs and disability review; that plan was bold and ambitious, and many considered it to be the right one, but the implementation was not and, as a result, it was not delivered and we have had to revisit it. That is why I am not going at this like a bull at a gate.

There are 80-plus recommendations and they have to be considered very carefully. We have to listen to the sector, stakeholders and others to make sure we get it right. That is why, although I have responded immediately to set out the things we can do right now, I am also setting up an implementation board to ensure that we listen to the sector experts with experience of transformational change, so that we can deliver the change that we all so desperately want to see. I know that my hon. Friend will welcome the level of ambition and that he is desperate to see change, too.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

I urge the Minister to look in particular at what happens to care leavers when they reach the age of 18 and how the support immediately falls away. Two organisations have been working on this issue for a long time: one, Every Child Leaving Care Matters, has been campaigning for a long time for additional support for people when they reach 18, and the other, Wild Intervention, is in my constituency. When the Minister does his review and comes to his conclusions, will he find out what happens when somebody goes from 17 to 18 years old? I do not want to speak for everyone, but I am not sure that I would have been capable of doing everything independently at the moment I turned 18. We seem to expect an awful lot from these young people.

[Will Quince]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. By bringing about some of the changes I have outlined, we will really change the game and turn around the life chances of some of the young people who have adverse experiences both in the care system and after it. I will of course look carefully at the detailed recommendations in the review. The key thing is not to see children’s social care as a siloed issue, because it is not just a Department for Education issue. Every Department, every local authority and even, dare I say, businesses need to step up, recognise some of the challenges that care leavers face and make appropriate changes. We are taking some immediate steps—over the next two years, we are investing £172 million in programmes such as staying put and staying close, and in support for personal advisers—but I am conscious that we need to do far more in this policy space.

Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Review

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Tuesday 29th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Nadhim Zahawi]

I know that my right hon. and learned Friend is passionate about this issue. It is important to remind ourselves that the co-signatories on today’s Green Paper are myself and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, and his ministerial team is here on the Front Bench with us. His pledge is that health will look at the local provision and local resources, and of course, we will publish the dashboard. I spoke about data and transparency, and the best way to reform complex systems is through data and transparency. However, we are going further by simplifying the EHCP process, because there is no consistency in that. That also needs to be identified and dealt with, and we will do that. My right hon. and learned Friend is also right to point out that we need to ensure that every school—this is what my schools White Paper dealt with yesterday—is a great SEND school, because we have an equal ambition for children with special educational needs and disabilities as for all the children in our school system.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

I wonder whether the Secretary of State is slightly divorced from reality and is seeing the school system for what he wishes it was, rather than what it is. In many schools, SENCOs are also full-time teachers, deputy heads, subject leads and, often, the safeguarding leads in their schools. Although the additional training and qualification is welcome, if the SENCOs do not have the time, they are not able to do justice to the role in the way it deserves. Where is the additional funding, resourcing and support to give SENCOs the time to focus as much as they need to on that crucial role?

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [Lords]

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 21st February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Perkins]

I absolutely agree with all of that. BTECs are also a qualification that is understood and respected by employers. They have a long-standing track record; they are respected by learners and understood by institutions. I am not hostile to the idea of improving them, if something can be done to bring in a better qualification. There is real merit in the potential of T-levels, and as a brand they have immediate buy-in, but the Government need to tread carefully. T-levels are changing shape in front of our eyes. They were brought in as a vocational qualification, but the Secretary of State’s current favourite anecdote is about a student from Barnsley who he met, who said he can go to any university he wants.

The T-level qualification started off on a vocational path, but the Government are now saying that it is a route towards universities—[Interruption.] It could potentially be both, but I must say that the Secretary of State’s predecessor, when it was discovered that Russell Group universities were not accepting T-levels, was very sanguine about it. He said, “They’re not about universities. They’re all about going towards the world of work.” This qualification is changing shape in front of our eyes, and the Government need to be careful before they get rid of things that work and replace them with their new qualification.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

One concern I have around T-levels, which I have raised with the Government before, is the work placement aspect and the fact that the availability of the T-level is therefore based on the availability of businesses to provide those work placements. My fear for areas such as Hull, which I represent, and others around the country is that if they do not have the placements, they cannot have the T-level. Therefore, that opportunity is denied to many students, unlike the generalisation of a BTEC, which means that wherever people are in the country, they can study for the same qualification.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend characteristically raises an important point, and she is entirely right. When I go and speak to FE colleges, there is widespread concern about the availability of the amount of T-level work experience that is required. Particularly in some communities that do not have high numbers of larger employers and for the smaller colleges, we think there will be real difficulty getting the amount of work experience that is currently envisaged. I suspect that if we look at this qualification in two or three years’ time, it will not have the same demands for work experience; that remains to be seen. However, I share my hon. Friend’s concern.

The amendments proposed by the Opposition and many of the 29 other amendments proposed by hon. Members on both sides of the House seek to make substantive changes to the Bill that could make a real difference and offer a possibility that it will fulfil the proud boasts we have heard from the skills Minister, and his predecessor about the scale of reform proposed.

The other huge disappointment that many of us feel about the Government’s approach to this whole question is their failure to get what further education and vocational education is all about, as my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) mentioned a moment ago. Further education is magical and transformative. For so many people who leave our statutory educational providers disillusioned and uninspired by education, FE has been life-changing. In my family, it was learning in FE that changed my son’s life and career opportunities; the same thing happened 20 years before for my sister, and I know it has happened for so many other people in all our constituencies. Yet the Government’s approach to this sector has been to inflict eye-watering cuts on it while continually repeating the same lament about employers not being in charge.

As we listen to the latest skills Minister’s claims about his reforms, it is worth recalling what went before them. In January 2011 the then skills Minister, the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes), said that the entire focus of our Government’s skills strategy was in

“building a training system that is employer led.”

In 2015 the former Chancellor, George Osborne, told us that we now had a system in the hands of an employer-led institute of apprenticeships, and his skills Minister at the time said of the levy:

“At the heart of the apprenticeship drive is the principle that no one better understands the skills employers need than employers themselves.”

Two years further on, in 2017, the Government said:

“The Apprenticeship Levy is a cornerstone of the government’s skills agenda, creating a system which puts employers at the heart of designing and funding apprenticeships to support productivity and growth.”

A year later, the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) described local enterprise partnerships as

“business-led partnerships…at the heart of responding to skills needs…that will help individuals and businesses gain the skills they need to grow.”

So if the reforms in 2011, 2015, 2017 and 2018 all put employers in the driving seat, and if putting employers in the driving seat is the solution to addressing our productivity and skills crisis, why are the Government now coming back saying that there has been a generation of failure?

--- Later in debate ---

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

In rising to speak to my new clauses 1, 2 and 3, I give notice that I do not intend to press them to a Division.

The Government have already made it clear that they will make changes to prisoner apprenticeships. I am conscious of the financial considerations that need to be given to new clause 2. I have faith that the Secretary of State for Education believes deeply in skills and vocational education, and I hope to be able to continue to work with him to make improvements with regard to careers guidance and the Baker clause. I thank the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins) for his support for my new clauses.

I welcome this Bill, which will revitalise an incredibly important part of the education sector that has seen its per-student funding reduced since 2010, although it is now going up again. The lifetime skills guarantee, the kickstart programme and the increase in support for FE colleges offer a revolutionary approach to building an apprenticeship and skills nation like never before. I commend the Secretary of State, Ministers and the former skills Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Chichester (Gillian Keegan), on bringing forward this legislation.

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Robert Halfon]

I am delighted to give way to a former member of the Education Committee.

[Emma Hardy]

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins), I support the right hon. Gentleman’s new clauses. Does he agree that we urgently need the lifelong loan entitlement consultation before we try to bring forward primary legislation—this Bill—to ensure that when that legislation comes, it actually deals with the problem that we are all trying to address?

[Robert Halfon]

I am all for consultations, but I want this Bill to happen as soon as possible. I have wanted something like this for many years. I do have issues with it that I am going to talk about, but I am very excited about it and just want it to happen without any further delay.

As I mentioned, I support the Bill as a whole, but I have always lived and worked by the mantra, “Good, better, best.” When I was growing up and learning to walk, my old physio used to say, “Good, better, best, may you never rest, until your good is better and your better is your best”—it is the sort of thing you see on a toilet wall sometimes, but it has been my mantra, and it is what I want for this Bill. That is why I proposed these three new clauses to make sure that the ladder of opportunity can be extended to those most in need.

--- Later in debate ---

[Selaine Saxby (North Devon) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak today in support of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill. Ensuring that everyone has access to high-quality training and education throughout their lives is vital. I come from a family of teachers, and I retrained in my 40s so that I myself could teach, so I am particularly passionate about the opportunities that the Bill will open up. I want to take this opportunity to highlight the support of my local FE college for some of tonight’s proposed amendments.

Much is said of talent being spread equally across our country, but opportunity is not. That is particularly true in North Devon: it is not just in the country where opportunity is not equally spread, but in our county as well. We are over 60 miles from any university, and our youngsters do not in general see university as a natural next step post 18. Devon is particularly short of highly-qualified young people. Just 24% of 20 to 29-year-olds have a degree, which is one of the lowest levels in the country. It is against this backdrop that our excellent and sole further education college, Petroc, which educates over 9,000 learners and works with hundreds of employers, is well placed not only to welcome this Bill, but to highlight areas it would like to see strengthened.

Like me, the college highlights how coastal and rural areas such as North Devon have particular challenges that are masked by aggregating data, even to a county level, when our county is the size of Devon and has such variance in opportunity across its beautiful rural and coastal spread. The college was keen that I should highlight its support for new clause 7, as it is particularly concerned that the lifetime skills guarantee includes subsequent level 3 courses, so that those without an A-level or equivalent qualification, or those who hold such a qualification but would benefit from reskilling, are able to study on a fully-funded and approved course. This would facilitate adults being able to remain in North Devon and acquire new skills, enabling them to take advantage of the new jobs opening up in the area, whereas at present staying in North Devon means remaining in low-paid, low-skill employment, despite the multiple high-skilled job vacancies that do not match our local skill base.

We also hope that steps can be taken to revisit universal credit conditionality, as in new clause 5, so that those on benefits are encouraged to increase their skills to enable them to seek better employment. I recognise the challenges in this space, but similarly we need to encourage those who, due to the seasonality of our vital tourism and hospitality economy, spend part of each year on universal credit, as in North Devon, to upskill so that they can work throughout the year, as well as to encourage employers to stay open longer and extend our tourism season, given the growth in winter visitors we have seen post pandemic.

North Devon, like many other remote, rural and coastal locations, has particular challenges in raising aspiration, improving educational outcomes and enabling adults to upskill.

[Emma Hardy]

The hon. Lady is making an excellent speech and I just want to echo the support for universal credit conditionality. I represent an urban seat that faces similar but different challenges from hers, and I completely support the idea that universal credit should still be allowed; we do not have an issue of seasonal workers, but we do have an issue of people on universal credit not always being able to get the opportunity to do the training they want, because they are forced to take zero-hours contracts instead. As the hon. Lady says, there is opportunity everywhere, but only if we make it so. I just wanted to speak in support of what she was saying on this.

--- Later in debate ---

I can perhaps understand the Government’s reluctance to accept a large raft of amendments, but I am not asking for the earth. What new clause 5 seeks is a review of a system that is not working at present. The end result, currently, is that the UK economy suffers and many people are denied the opportunity to better their lives. We owe it to them to remove these barriers.

[Emma Hardy]

It is always a genuine pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous), who spoke passionately and articulately of his desire to support, through new clause 5, the people who need that support the most. It was an excellent speech with which I wholeheartedly agreed.

I will not detain the House for too long in speaking about my amendment 17, which is intended to provide additional support for people with special educational needs and disabled people. The Bill proposes that there should be an employer representative body in each area to create local skills improvement plans, to which colleges would have regard. The implication is that colleges would train their students in the skills that they need, thereby improving the labour supply—that is the theory—but the Bill, in its current form, is silent on how that will work for students with special educational needs or disabilities. One of the aims of the national disability strategy is to reduce the disability employment gap, but we see no evidence of that in the Bill as it stands. I tried to raise those points in Committee, although unfortunately I missed some of the sittings because of covid.

I would like the Minister to go away and have a look at a few issues. First, LSIPs should explicitly include actions to tackle the disability employment gap. Although there have been positive moves to narrow it in recent years, the gap remains significant. That is one of the points I raised with the Minister in Committee. Figures show that the employment rate of disabled people is 28.4 percentage points lower than that of people who are not disabled.

Secondly, LSIPs should be informed by consultation with organisations representing the needs of disabled people. We know that, all too often, disabled people feel that their voices are not being heard in those forums. I think it will be a missed opportunity if we do not use the Bill, and the new process of local skills planning that it offers, to help ensure that people with disabilities are asked to contribute to their local economy, and that their voices are heard in the discussion about what that future local economy looks like. An amendment to this effect was voted down in Committee but has been incorporated in the Department’s statutory guidance. I hope that reviewing the extent to which employer representative bodies acted upon this element of the guidance, and what impact it had, will form part of the evaluation of the LSIP trailblazers.

Finally—this is the issue that amendment 17 seeks to address—the Bill should contain measures to ensure that ERBs are composed of employers who demonstrate reputable practice in relation to equality and diversity in employment, in respect of matters including disability. We do not want a board of employers planning and determining skills policy if they have no record of being inclusive and decent, because without inclusive and decent employers on the board, there will not be an inclusive and decent LSIP. That is why my amendment states:

“Representative bodies which are employers, and employer organisations which are members of employer representative bodies, must sign up to the Disability Confident employer scheme within six months of being designated, or becoming a member of, the employer representative body.”

It is a small amendment that simply seeks to ensure that there is the best possible LSIP. If that is to happen, we need the best possible employers. We want employers with a record of treating disabled employees well.

There is another point that I raised with the Minister, and I hope he has had a chance to consider it again. The definition of “local”, and the difficulties of defining a geographical region, arose in Committee, and I have not yet seen any proposals explaining how that will be dealt with. To many Members, the definition must seem fairly obvious—why is it contentious that we do not know what constitutes a local region?—but, as I pointed out to the Minister, the local enterprise partnership in Hull is different from the local authority because it covers more than one region. It is different from some of the big employers such as the Humberside police and fire and rescue services, which are different from the chamber of commerce, which is different from the Ofsted regional body, which is different from the regional skills commissioner area, which is different from the new organisation proposed in the Government’s White Paper—a board to look across the Humber at large businesses and zero carbon, which has not even been created yet. All those bodies have slightly different geographies, so I am keen for the Minister to explain the definition of “local” in his local skills improvement plans.

[Sarah Champion]

I largely welcome the aims of this Bill to improve the quality and funding of post-16 education, but it will do little to tackle the major skills shortages in key sectors including health and social care, manufacturing and engineering. It introduces local skills improvement plans, which would be created by employer representative bodies to assess local skills needs and help shape the courses that further education providers should offer to fill those needs.

In principle, these measures are good, but the Bill is significantly weaker in its current form than it was on Second Reading, after it had been thoroughly improved by amendments voted for by the Lords. I was deeply disappointed that during Committee stage in the Commons, Conservative Members voted to reverse these changes, which would have hugely benefited students from all backgrounds. I urge the House to take this opportunity to support Labour’s amendments, especially amendments 15 and 16.

Previously, the Bill would have retained funding for BTECs for at least four more years, ensured that no student would be deprived of the right to take two BTECs, and allowed students to keep their universal credit entitlement while studying. It would also have required LSIPs to be developed in partnership with local authorities and further education providers, rather than just by the employer representative bodies. Now all those sensible and valuable improvements to the Bill have been scrapped, and I urge the Minister to reconsider.

I am particularly outraged by the Government’s plan to scrap funding for BTECs. BTECs make up the majority of level 3 qualifications in this country, with nearly a quarter of a million young people taking at least one last year. For many young people, they are the most effective pathway to higher education or skilled employment. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins) has made the important point that last year 230,000 students took a level 3 BTEC. It is the Government’s goal that in four years’ time only 100,000 students will be taking T-levels, which are the proposed replacement. Even if they achieve this, that could leave a gap of 130,000 students who will not be working towards an equivalent qualification if BTECs are no longer funded.

Who will be most affected by these changes? The Government’s impact assessment acknowledges that students with special educational needs and students from disadvantaged backgrounds are disproportionately represented on courses that risk losing funding. Some might be unable to achieve a level 3 qualification if these plans go ahead, so again I urge the Minister to reconsider. Research published by the Social Market Foundation in 2018 showed that students accepted to university from working-class and minority ethnic backgrounds are more likely to hold a BTEC qualification than their peers. Is this retrograde step really what the Government would consider to be levelling up?

I was proud to work with Natspec in tabling a series of amendments that would have strengthened the provision of LSIPs for students with special educational needs and disabilities. Some 21% of all students in general further education colleges have a learning difficulty or disability, and the figure rises to 26% among 16 to 18-year-olds. There is no mechanism in the Bill to encourage or require employers to use local skills improvement plans to help address the disability employment gap, which stands at nearly 30%.

My amendments would have required the LSIPs to include positive actions to improve the employment prospects of disabled people, and required members of employment representative bodies to demonstrate a commitment to equality and diversity, so that they can create an inclusive plan for all, especially disabled people. These amendments were debated in Committee, and though I regret that the Government did not agree to put these conditions in the Bill, I am pleased that the Minister gave assurances that these key requirements would be in statutory guidance. I thank the Minister for that, and I ask him to confirm his commitment to working with organisations such as Natspec and the Association of Colleges on the guidance to make it as effective as possible.

Disability employment and the needs of young people with SEND should not be thought of separately, or as an issue that will relate only to forthcoming SEND Green Paper. They must be integral to the Government’s plan for further education, and to addressing the nation’s skills needs.

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (Second sitting)

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Committee Debates: 2nd Sitting & Committee stage
Tuesday 30th November 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I was coming on to discuss amendment 34, in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington, which adds a new line to clause 1:

“lists specific strategies to support learners who have or have previously had, a statement of Special Educational Need or an Education and Health Care Plan into employment, including but not limited to provision for supported internships.”

Supported internships have huge potential. I saw an excellent example when I visited Derbyshire Education Business Partnership, which serves my constituency of Chesterfield, and witnessed its supported internship programme in Derby at first hand. Supported internships are incredibly important in supporting people who may be further away from the labour market, but they currently have a tiny take-up. Everything that can be done to drive up the number of supported internships should be done. They support people who might not be ready to go into the world of work right away but who, with the benefit of a programme like this, can get to know an employer really well; the employer can get to know their strengths as well as their challenges, and they can get into the world of work.

We tabled amendment 34 not only to encourage the Government to insist that strategies for those with special educational needs are expressly considered in local skills improvement plans, but to talk specifically about supported internships, which would make a real difference. Many of us are concerned that chambers of commerce and employers, who are experts in the needs of their workplaces and what skills they need, will not necessarily be aware of the challenges faced by those who are furthest from the labour market. They might be less likely to have strategies of that kind in LSIPs. However, if colleges had a more central role in the plans, chambers of commerce and employers would absolutely recognise the need for programmes of this sort.

I share the belief of my hon. Friends the Members for Rotherham (Sarah Champion) and for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle, and many others who put their names to the amendments, that employer representative bodies should have the required training, knowledge and understanding of the educational and health needs of people with disabilities in general and of how people with disabilities can best be supported within a local area in particular. I hope that, when he responds to this group of amendments, the Minister will commit to ensuring that people with disabilities are not forgotten in the Bill, and signal that the Government have specific strategies to ensure that employer bodies have a duty to represent the needs of people with disabilities and support them into the workplace, so that they are not excluded any more.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Efford. I rise to speak in favour of amendments 27 and 28 in my name, and amendments 1, 2 and 3, in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham. I want highlight that the Library briefing on the Bill states that 18% of the learners currently in the FE and skills sector have a recognised learning difficulty or disability. When we talk about people with disabilities, we are not talking about a very small minority; we are talking about 18% of those people. The amendments that I and my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham have tabled are very similar. They all basically try to do the same thing: to ensure that the voices of disabled people are heard and recognised in the Bill. They also address the disability employment gap. Mr Efford, I should have mentioned that I am vice-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on SEND, which is where a lot of my interest comes from. I know from the work of the APPG and on the amendments that there is a lot of cross-party support for these measures, which we also saw in the Lords. This is not a party political issue. I hope the Minister takes it seriously.

Recent figures show that disabled people have an employment rate that is 28.4 percentage points lower than people who are not disabled. There is a huge disability employment gap and the amendments hope to address that. I recognise that the issue is complex and that there are a number of Government initiatives to address it, but it would be a missed opportunity not to use the Bill and the new process of skills planning that it brings about to help ensure that people with disabilities can contribute to their local economy and that their voices are heard in the discussion of what that local economy should look like. All too often, people with disabilities feel that their voices are not heard. The amendments aim to ensure they are listened to and recognised, and that some action is taken on the disability employment gap. That is the aim of all the amendments in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

I welcome you to your place, Mr Efford. I want to lend my support to my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle and others on this group of amendments. They seek to ensure that the LSIPs take the needs of disabled people and those with special educational needs into account.

Currently, further education caters for a large number of students with such needs, which can be complex. The latest data shows that roughly half of disabled people are in employment—just 53%—compared with just over four out of five non-disabled people. The employment rate for disabled people with severe or specific learning difficulties was 18% back in 2019, the lowest rate of any impairment group. The House of Commons Library briefing notes that 52% of disabled people were in employment, down from 54%, which is really concerning.

The Workers Educational Association notes that

“adult learners in community provision are those with low or no qualifications, who require the most support in order to progress to higher level qualifications.”

Learning disabilities add to that complex state of affairs, which justifies the inclusion of an amendment to provide more support for people with learning disabilities. In its evidence to the Committee, Engineering UK said:

“38% of respondents…reported a lack of role models to be a barrier for pupils with special educational needs”.

One of the employers in my region, the National Grid, is doing extraordinary stuff in engaging and giving work opportunities to young people with complex needs, through its EmployAbility scheme. It is an exemplar project that it has been running for several years.

Those are some of the reasons why the amendments are important to the Bill. The Government’s impact assessment says that those from SEND backgrounds are “disproportionately” likely to be affected, and it is therefore a cruelty not to legislate where possible to mitigate that disproportionate impact. We think it is vital that such provisions be written into the Bill, which is why the amendments have been tabled. We need to highlight the challenges and make sure that we are as inclusive a society as possible, and that we allow for the needs of people with SEND in skills provisions.

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[Alex Burghart]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. That is absolutely right; something I will come on to in a moment is that when we help young people with special educational needs overcome the barriers to employment, and when we help employers overcome some of the barriers that they may feel exist to employing those young people, it is an extraordinarily mutually beneficial relationship.

[Emma Hardy]

I want to push the Minister a little more on the guidance. He has mentioned that it will be statutory, which I welcome, but I wonder whether it will include some of the wording that is in this amendment, which looks specifically at what action will be taken to reduce the disability employment gap. Will that be seen in the statutory guidance?

[Alex Burghart]

Obviously, we are very keen to reduce the disability employment gap, and we are always mindful of ways in which we can achieve that. I am sure that it will be in the Secretary of State’s mind when he considers the statutory guidance.

Local skills improvement plans are not the only solution to this issue. Colleges already have a duty to use their best endeavours to secure the special educational provision called for by a student with special educational needs, as set out in the SEND code of practice. That should include a focus on preparing the young person for adulthood, including employment.

In addition to the duties on providers in relation to LSIPs, clause 5 introduces a broader duty for colleges and designated institutions to review how well their whole curriculum offer meets local needs. The duty requires governing bodies to consider the needs of all learners, including current and future learners, and those with special educational needs or a disability.

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[Alex Burghart]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention. The Government are also developing an adjustments passport that aims to smooth the transition into employment and support people changing jobs, including people with special educational needs and disabilities. That goes back to the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Ipswich made. When I was on the Work and Pensions Committee with the great Frank Field, that was exactly the sort of thing that we were calling for. I am very pleased that this Administration have seen it go out.

The 12-month pilots of the adjustments passport that are under way in HE and post-16 provider pilot sites are capturing the in-work support needs of the individual and we hope that they will empower individuals to have confident discussions about adjustments with employers. It goes back to my point about breaking down barriers both for the individual and for the employer. More broadly, the Government’s national disability strategy sets out how we will help disabled people to fulfil their potential through work, to help reduce the disability employment gap further.

[Emma Hardy]

With respect to the comments made by the hon. Member for Great Grimsby, if everything were all fine and dandy as it is, we would not have a 28 percentage points disability employment gap. The Minister talks about the statutory guidance. Will there be some sticks as well as carrots in the guidance? If employers and people do not feel that they are being represented, and they are not taking effective measures to deal with the disability employment gap, will there be sanctions?

[Alex Burghart]

As I said in the previous sitting, statutory guidance is a powerful tool. If employer representative bodies do not adhere to statutory guidance, they may lose their designation. That is in the essence of statutory guidance. Given the significant amount of work already under way in this space, we do not believe that the amendments are necessary, but we agree with the direction in which they push.

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[Mr Perkins]

I will go through these amendments relatively briefly. Amendment 33 is a probing amendment on the subject of the role of local enterprise partnerships and skills productivity boards. As I said at the start of this debate, those of us who were here in 2010 heard a huge amount from the Government about the role of LEPs. We have subsequently heard about the roles of SPBs, and they both sounded very similar in expectation to what we are now hearing, on a local level, for employer representative bodies.

It therefore strikes me that the Government do not have a great deal of confidence in the LEPs that they created, nor in the SPBs. If I was a chief executive of a LEP, I do not think I would be taking up any credit agreements right now. They must be looking at this Bill and wondering what the future holds for them.

I am interested in the Government’s response to this. Why is it that local enterprise partnerships, which—as we will all remember—were put forward as the way for business and Government to work together on a local basis on a variety of measures to drive economic growth, particularly around skills, are now seen as entirely superfluous in this Bill? Is this the beginning of the end of local enterprise partnerships?

I am interested in whether the Minister feels there should be a duty for employer representative bodies to work in collaboration with them, and what this says about the future of those organisations. Does he accept that it is a failure of Government policy to have set up these organisations that now appear to be being ignored at a time when there is a function that we would naturally think would fall to them?

Amendment 38 relates to designated distance learning. If the covid crisis has taught us anything, it is that more and more has gone online. In the skills arena in particular, that has been hugely transformational for the sector and for many learners. It creates opportunities that were not there previously. We are very concerned that designated distance learning is absent from the Bill, and that is why we have tabled amendment 38. Again, we are keen to hear the Government’s view on that.

Amendment 39 is about Government Departments working together; I think we have all been conscious, as my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish said previously, that that is not a particular strength of this Government. We saw that more than ever during the covid crisis when, on the one hand, there was a real lack of strategy around increasing apprenticeships at a time when we knew there was a boom in youth unemployment and, on the other hand, we had the Department for Work and Pensions introducing the kickstart scheme, which was much more expensive than apprenticeships and offered much less to young people. There was no sense that the different Government Departments were working together.

Our amendment would require the Government and any future Government to have a national strategy for education and skills that is agreed across the Department for Education, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, and of which all local skills improvement plans would have to take account. Our particular concern is the lack of cross-departmental work between the Department for Work and Pensions and the Department for Education; that is something the Labour party takes very seriously, and there have been regular meetings between teams to work on that whole area.

Amendment 40 asks the Government to publish guidance setting out the criteria used to determine the boundaries of a specified area. There is a real lack of clarity about what is meant by “local area”, as my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle referred to, in different parts of our forms of local government. What is our local area keeps changing. Again, that is not specified within the Bill and I think there will be real concern that we now have this document, which is of tremendous importance to an FE college; it could be the reason why a chief executive loses their job—

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Mr Perkins]

On that rather foreboding note, I will give way.

[Emma Hardy]

I mentioned to the Minister before that I have a lot of sympathy for the Government trying to work out what constitutes a local area. I was talking to a local Conservative MP and we were having a bit of a laugh about it ourselves, because in our area we have Humberside Police, Humberside Fire & Rescue Service and a police and crime commissioner for Humberside, but then we have the Hull and East Yorkshire LEP, and the regional schools commissioner, who has a different geographical area from the LEP, which has a different geographical area from the area that Ofsted covers. Apparently, they are creating a pan-Humber organisation, after the LEP was removed, to look at skills in the area. Good luck to the Minister in trying to work out what exactly the local area looks like, because it is incredibly complicated when we have a myriad different organisations with different geographical boundaries.

[Mr Perkins]

I think we are all dying to know who this Conservative Member of Parliament was—I have a suspicion who it may have been. My hon. Friend makes a really important point. If it is, “Good luck to the Minister”, more importantly, it is “Good luck to employers” in actually working out where they should go, which area they are a part of and which local skills improvement plan is responsible for them if they have two sites that are 10 miles apart and there are different providers they have to engage with. This is something that puts businesses off engaging in this kind of skills arena. We have seen it with apprenticeships and the barriers that have been put in the way for businesses to take up apprentices; making it difficult for businesses to engage guarantees that they will not do so. That is a really important point and it is why we have moved this probing amendment.

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[Mr Perkins]

As I said previously, we support the principle of local skills improvement plans. Having something that everyone understands is of real value. We are not saying that there should not be any localisation. This is a probing amendment to help us understand. Colleges tend to have a specified area. The Government decided that the local enterprise partnerships would all have their own area. We cannot be, as we used to be in Chesterfield, across two different local enterprise partnerships. We are in one area. The Government have attempted to put firm lines around it, but it has been made slightly more fuzzy.

[Emma Hardy]

I think the hon. Member for Great Grimsby has misunderstood. When creating a local skills plan, we need to define a local area. As the hon. Member for Great Grimsby, whose constituency is opposite mine on the south bank, will be fully aware, the chamber of commerce is actually a pan-Humber organisation, but the LEPs are separate organisations. I am pointing out to the Minister that, if we are looking at creating a local skills plan for a local area, quite obviously we need to work out what that local area is.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend puts it very well.

Amendment 41 asks the Secretary of State to publish guidance relating to implementation, subject to consultation with the metro Mayor or relevant local authority. Under the terms of the Bill, the Secretary of State has the potential to amass new powers, which could be used without appropriate consultation or due diligence. We can see the hand of the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Gavin Williamson) right through the Bill. I am confident that if the Bill had been devised when the current Secretary of State had been in place for a year or two, it would look very different. The sense of a man who had lost control and was desperately trying to get back control runs right through the Bill.

Our amendments seek to establish a clear duty for the Secretary of State to consult with combined and local authorities before local skills improvement plans are finalised in areas that do not have metro Mayors, ensuring that the relevant local representative bodies are part of the formation of a board. It is about bringing together the various different organisations that would make up a strategic approach to skills. We are saying that, if there is not an employer representative body that is able to broadly represent private and public sector employers, further education colleges, independent training providers and such, the Government should appoint a board made up of those in order to deliver that local skills improvement plan, rather than the current approach, which is just a single body. Amendment 44 says that colleges and other providers

“may propose revisions where they consider that the plans do not appropriately reflect the full diversity of priorities across the locality.”

I am keen to hear the Minister’s response to the amendments.

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[Andrew Gwynne]

Absolutely, and the same is true even at the level below that, within a city region. I can speak with experience about my own city region, where there are divergent trends between those living in the north of Greater Manchester, where there are fewer opportunities, and those living in the so-called arc of prosperity around south Manchester. We need to finely tune our local skills strategies to reflect the different make-ups of particular areas.

Talking about how we define areas, I think amendment 40 matters. We are talking about defining “local” which matters for several reasons. First, I am a bit of an obsessive compulsive disorder neurotic and I like things to be neat and tidy. For clarity of purpose, it makes sense to have coterminosity, wherever possible, with other organisations and bodies.

Again, unlike my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle, I am lucky that my local enterprise partnership, my chamber of commerce, my combined authority and all 10 local councils in Greater Manchester all cover the same boundaries.

[Emma Hardy]

So lucky.

[Andrew Gwynne]

Things get a little bit messy. I was nervous when my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington mentioned health trusts, because my own health trust, Tameside and Glossop, crosses the county boundary, although that will be sorted out by the Bill currently going through Parliament. That is the only bit of non-coterminosity I have.

These boundaries matter because if we draw up strategies, plans and proposals, and we want to collaborate with business, education providers, local government and the wider public sector, then we have to have a defined set of boundaries. The closer those boundaries match, the easier it will be to get a strategy in place.

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[Andrew Gwynne]

Boundaries matter. I say that as a patron of the Friends of Real Lancashire.

Coming back to amendment 40, the cleaner these boundaries can be, the better. I get that local economies can spread across artificial local government boundaries. I know that because just down the road from where I live is Glossop, in the High Peak in Derbyshire. To all intents and purposes, Glossop is a Greater Manchester town. It looks to Greater Manchester, all its transport links are into Manchester and its healthcare is currently part of Greater Manchester. I get that there is always going to be a degree of “This boundary does not work,” but if we are looking at a particular strategy and then having to engage with a whole range of public bodies in developing and signing off that strategy, it gets overly complicated if we end up having a mismatch of different boundaries, in the way that my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle has already described.

[Emma Hardy]

To return to the conversation we were having about SEND and disabilities, and the disability employment gap, we will have to collect data to know whether the skills plan is delivering on its objectives and addressing the disability employment gap, so we will need some kind of boundary or defined area from which to collect that data. The Minister said that the guidance would include information on the disability employment gap, but unless there is a boundary, we cannot accurately collect data and we cannot judge whether the plan is a success.

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[Alex Burghart]

I rise to speak to amendments 33, 38 to 41, and 44. I will start with amendments 33 and 38 in the names of the hon. Members for Chesterfield and for Warwick and Leamington.

Amendment 33 would require that local skills improvement plans draw on the views of local enterprise partnerships and the Skills and Productivity Board. We have been clear that local skills improvement plans should be informed by the work of the national Skills and Productivity Board and build on the work of local enterprise partnerships and their skills advisory panels. We will reiterate that in statutory guidance.

[Emma Hardy]

This is a quick one on statutory guidance. To clarify, will that statutory guidance state “act in accordance with” or “have regard to”? We all know that statutory guidance that states “have regard to” means “read and ignore.”

[Alex Burghart]

I am horrified to hear the hon. Lady’s attitude to statutory guidance. Our intention will be set out in statutory guidance, so that local skills improvement plans will be informed by the work of the national Skills and Productivity Board and build on the work of local enterprise partnerships and their skills advisory panels.

[Alex Burghart]

We have been clear that we want to have an approach that is completely employer-led. Local enterprise partnerships, which have much to recommend them, are partially informed by employers, but they are public-private partnerships and we want an employer-led process.

Amendment 38 relates to local skills improvement plans taking account of providers of distance learning. I very much acknowledge the remarks made by Opposition Members about the importance of distance learning and how valuable it is to many members of the public who are studying. All relevant providers that provide English-funded post-16 technical education or training that is material to a specified area will have a duty to co-operate with the designated employer representative body for that area in developing a plan. That will be true even if they are based elsewhere and offer the provision by distance or online learning. That will help to ensure that the views of distance learning providers are taken into account.

Amendment 39, tabled by the hon. Members for Chesterfield and for Warwick and Leamington, would require the Government to have a national strategy for education skills that is agreed across DFE, DWP, BEIS and DLUHC, and of which LSIPs would have to take account. The Government have already set out their strategy for skills reform in the “Skills for jobs” White Paper published in January last year, which was agreed by all Departments—not just the ones listed in the amendment. The proposals set out the aim to support people to develop the skills that they need to get good jobs. They form the basis of the legislation we are discussing.

On the local skills improvement plans, we have been clear that they should take account of the relevant national strategies and priorities related to skills, as well as being informed by the work of the national Skills and Productivity Board. The specific strategies and priorities will evolve and change over time. We think the best place to do that is in statutory guidance.

Amendment 40, tabled by the hon. Members for Chesterfield and for Warwick and Leamington, relates to the publication of guidance setting out the criteria used to determine a specific area. The specified areas for local skills improvement plans will be based on functional economic areas. The Government are working with local enterprise partnerships to refine the role of business engagement in local economic strategy, including skills, and to ensure that the structures are fit for purpose for the future. That includes looking at geographies—

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Alex Burghart]

I am sure that the Secretary of State, as he engages in the process, will be mindful of the muddle that is Hull and, indeed, mindful of the many economic areas in which hon. Members find their constituencies.

[Emma Hardy]

I want to clarify that, whatever boundary it might be, defined boundaries will be set. If we do not set a defined boundary of any type, I cannot see how it will be possible to collect the data and the intelligence to know whether a strategy is working.

[Alex Burghart]

We are clear that these will be based on functional economic areas, that they will have a defined geography and that we will ensure that no part of the country is left out.

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[Emma Hardy]

I know I am not intervening on the Minister, but I wonder whether a proposed map of the different areas will be put out for consultation before they are agreed and set by Government, and whether there will be an opportunity for local people to influence what the geographical areas will be.

[Mr Perkins]

It is the boundaries nightmare all over again. The Minister will have heard my hon. Friend’s question, and I am sure that he and his officers will think carefully on it. Again, we will put only one amendment in this group to a vote. We will not press amendment 44, but we will divide the Committee on amendment 41. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave withdrawn.

Amendment proposed: 1, in clause 1, page 3, line 6, after “evidence” insert

“, including the views of relevant community groups including those representing the interests of disabled people,”.—(Mr Perkins.)

This amendment intends to ensure that the evidence informing LSIP development includes information directly relevant to improving the employment prospects of disabled people.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

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[Mr Perkins]

We appear to have raced on to clause 2. Amendment 35 is important, because so much of the Government’s narrative makes it clear that when they talk about employers, they really mean private sector employers. There are huge skills shortages within the public sector. The public sector is an important employer, and it is of particular importance in some of the most deprived communities. Labour’s approach to the Bill will be about asking the Government to place employers and those responsible for education at the heart of a skills strategy.

It is essential that employers in the public sector, including those in health and social care, as my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington mentioned, be consulted in the formation of local skills improvement plans. Employer representative bodies must ensure that LSIPs fully reflect both private and public sector employers.

Amendment 45 is a probing amendment designed to test how the Secretary of State will determine what mix of employers is considered “reasonably representative”. The Bill refers to the Secretary of State being

“satisfied that…the body is reasonably representative”.

I think it would be interesting to define what exactly is a reasonably representative mix of employers on LSIPs. It is highly likely that chambers of commerce will be the employer representative body by default in most LSIP areas. We have had representations from organisations such as the Federation of Small Businesses, which has concerns about the powers to be handed to those chambers.

The Minister has said that ERBs that are not performing could be sacked and potentially replaced, but there are not numerous organisations that have the capacity to undertake that kind of work. Indeed, there is some question over whether many chambers of commerce will immediately have that capacity, but they will have the responsibility either way. As has been said, some areas have an active and vibrant chamber of commerce, and our proposals should not be viewed as being hostile to them. There are many excellent professionals in chambers of commerce and many really excellent chambers that make an incredibly important contribution to our local economies and to skills. However, it is important to recognise that membership and attendance can vary greatly within localities. The priorities of some chambers can be dominated by a small number of particularly loud voices. It is important that there are safeguards to ensure that any ERB is representative. I look forward to the Minister’s assurance that that will be the case and that ERBs will consult widely in the formation of the LSIP.

What mechanisms are in place should the Secretary of State consider that an ERB is not representative? What mechanisms are in place to deal with complaints from others, such as further education colleges, which may consider that an ERB is not representative?

[Emma Hardy]

Much as I hate to return to the boundary issue, our local chamber of commerce is the Humber-based chamber, which may not end up being the geographical area represented by the skills body. To return to small and medium-sized enterprises, and the concerns of the Federation of Small Businesses to which my hon. Friend referred, in areas where most employment comes from SMEs or the public sector, how can we ensure that they are heard when the skills plan is developed?

[Mr Perkins]

That is a really important point. In some cases, chambers of commerce and branches of the Federation of Small Businesses have constructive relationships; in other areas the relationship is less constructive. To place the role of one above the other in respect of an ERB is potentially exclusive.

Amendment 36 would add local further education colleges, independent training providers, local authorities, including mayoral combined authorities, and local enterprise partnerships to those of which employer representative bodies must be representative to be designated as a representative body by the Secretary of State. We are seeking to ensure that colleges, independent training providers, local authorities and LEPs are not shut out of LSIPs and that all form part of the consultation when LSIPs are drafted by ERBs.

Amendment 46 seeks to ensure that ERBs include a wider range of local employer interests, including SMEs, the self-employed, sole trader businesses, and public and third sector employers. In some sectors such as construction, a huge number of those responsible for ensuring that a new generation of people come into the sector are self-employed or sole traders. Historically, they would just have taken on a young apprentice to work with them; they will now potentially be excluded from doing that. We have seen the danger in the way the apprenticeship levy was introduced. Big business was very much in mind when it was introduced, and the way it was designed has massively reduced the number of small businesses offering apprenticeships.

There is a danger of SMEs being excluded from the measures in the clause, particularly in smaller town communities where there are not the major employers that there are in larger cities. We are really concerned that SMEs, alongside charities, community organisations and others, will be excluded from the decision-making process in the formation of LSIPs. Amendment 46 would ensure a role for them, alongside the self-employed, in the drafting of LSIPs.

Amendment 37 moves towards the heart of what a Labour local skills improvement plan would look like. The other amendments attempt to ensure that there is proper consultation by the employer representative body. Given that the Bill gives wide-ranging, undetermined powers to the Secretary of State, we want to ensure that local enterprise partnerships and metro Mayors have their role in local decision making enshrined in the Bill. Amendment 37 therefore proposes that, if no suitable employer representative body is found that can represent all aspects, the Secretary of State be required to set up a board in that area, which would have wider representation from organisations like FE colleges, metro Mayors and local authorities.

[Emma Hardy]

I recall the Minister saying that the Secretary of State will have the power to take control from chambers of commerce if they are seen not to be working properly. I wonder whether the Minister would seriously consider our amendment as a model they could use. If there is only one chamber in the area, and that chamber loses control or oversight, who are we going to use instead? Does the Minister anticipate that there will be some form of inspection to check the competency of chambers? Will there be key performance indicators, or some way of flagging whether the chamber is successful or deemed to be failing?

[Mr Perkins]

Those are all important questions. My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There are significant warnings to employer representative bodies in the Bill about failing to satisfy the Secretary of State. In the event that they are dismissed, as the Bill makes clear may happen, who is responsible for the local skills improvement plan after that? Many Members have said that some chambers are really strong, others have different strengths and others are not so strong. Putting all our eggs in one basket, which the Bill pretty much does in the vast majority of geographies, is a cause for concern.

Amendment 42 would place a statutory duty on the Secretary of State to consult and seek consent from local authorities and combined authorities on the formation of employer representative bodies. Given that ERBs will be responsible for the formation of LSIPs, which will have budgetary commitments, it is vital that they have the confidence of local authorities and combined authorities, and that organisations are working in collaboration rather than in opposition, as we have said time and again would be the Labour approach.

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It is also important to future-proof the strategies. If the Secretary of State sees the local chamber of commerce as failing in its duty with regard to the strategy, there must be a plan B. Who takes over responsibility for the strategy? It makes perfect sense for that to be the metro Mayor or local government.

[Emma Hardy]

I hope that when the Minister responds, he defines whether there is going to be a transparent judgment or transparent criteria. Will the criteria be judged and evaluated? Who will do that judgment and evaluation to determine whether a chamber has failed? It surely cannot be at the whim of the current Secretary of State, whoever that may be, to decide whether a chamber is seen as successful or failing.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend is right. There has to be a fair arbitration process as well, because it may well be that the chamber of commerce does not agree that it is failing, in which case we will have a problem in trying to resolve the matter. I do not want to focus on possible failure, but we have to legislate for it, just in case. I want each and every one of these bodies to be a success but if, for whatever reason, one is not, we must know what the mechanisms are to ensure that the skills strategy for a given geographical area is carried on and made successful. My hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield’s amendment seeks to get that information from Ministers on what happens if, for whatever reason, things go wrong.

Lastly, I come back to the issue of how boundaries matter. If, for whatever reason, the boundaries for the skills strategy are different from those of whoever takes over that responsibility in the event of the chamber of commerce failing, we need to make sure that it is clear that the replacement covers the same area as what went before it.

[Rachel Hopkins (Luton South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairship, Mr Efford. I rise to support amendments 35, 45, 36 and 46, which were well presented by my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield. It is particularly important to reflect the points well made by my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish about public and private employers. Much has been said about the potential for formulating the employer representative body from the chamber of commerce. The clue is in the name: it is about commerce and business, as much as employers.

That leads me on to the bit in between: our strong and vibrant voluntary sector. Recently, we have seen the greater rise of commissioning over many years by many public sector organisations. They have had 10 years of cuts, to be frank, so they have thought of innovative ways to deliver what I believe to be public services still. They have commissioned the voluntary sector, and it is vital for the voluntary sector—as suggested by amendment 46 —to have a seat on that employer representative body, whether as a collective in an overarching grouping or as key individual employers in the designated area, whatever it might be. Equally, we must ensure an interrelationship with other significant public sector bodies—put well by my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish. Not being explicit is not recognising what the employment market looks like.

[Emma Hardy]

When the Government design the LSIP areas, I wonder whether it would be helpful to produce some data on the respective public-private employer difference in each area. Each area will look different, so I imagine that the employer representatives would be reflective of that particular labour market.

[Rachel Hopkins]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Exactly that—this is an employer representative body. The Bill must be open and explicit about ensuring that the public and voluntary sectors, and others—small businesses, the self-employed—have a seat at the table, through whatever mechanism. It is for them to outline how they wish to do that, but perhaps through something like the Federation of Small Businesses. I think that is vital, because otherwise it just gets lost in the grain. If the measure is to be a success in pushing forward on the skills agenda, we need to be explicit about who is at the table, who is shaping the plans and which areas. I hope that the Minister addresses my comments in his response.

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (First sitting)

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 30th November 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Perkins]

I encourage my hon. Friend to expand on that point, because he is absolutely right. It is remarkable that the Government have been forced to introduce Government amendment 5, because it means that they brought the Bill forward without recognising any role for authorities that already have this funding devolved to them in the first place. It is a fairly dramatic change. The approach that Labour would take to local skills improvement plans is fundamentally different from that of the Government.

The Government are taking the approach that these are employer-led documents—that phrase again. They are documents of tremendous importance, so presumably the chambers of commerce will be holding the pen on them and will now, as a result of Government amendment 5, be forced to convince the Secretary of State that they have properly taken on board the views of those democratically elected to lead on skills policy in their areas. So many other important contributors are left on the side lines.

Labour’s approach would be to say that we need to recognise the importance of local skills improvement plans that will dictate the direction of skills policy. What we need is a local skills improvement plan that brings together the role of public and private sector employers; that brings in further education colleges; that brings in significant independent training providers within an area; and that is held together by those with democratic accountability, such as metro Mayors and local authorities. That holistic approach would deliver a skills policy that everyone would be able to get behind and recognise as representative.

The Government’s approach is very much about placing the chambers of commerce at the heart of this, but in fact they have had to bring forward an amendment to even put the metro Mayors and combined authorities back into that role. We support Government amendment 5, but it is remarkable that it was necessary at all.

I would like the Minister to expand on whether Government amendment 4 impacts clause 6 in terms of the duty placed on local skills improvement plans for compliance with section 1 of the Climate Change Act 2008. It is crucial that skills policy drives us towards a net zero future, so it is important to understand whether the intention is to undermine that commitment when it comes to Government amendment 4.

Again, we support Government amendment 5, although we are confused about why it is needed and why it was not central to the approach. As my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish mentioned, it is important that we recognise that mayoral combined authorities and the Greater London Authority already have responsibilities in terms of policy and funding for further education and skills, and that they both have good professional relationships with employers, colleges and training providers in their areas. I have been along to meet them in Manchester and have seen their excellent work on careers guidance and their constructive approach to independent providers and the FE sector. That is a great example of how devolved decision makers are better in touch with the needs of their communities than a centralised approach.

It is a shame that the Bill, the brainchild of the former Secretary of State, is a return to the centralisation agenda that has too often bedevilled Whitehall thinking. It was clearly a driving force in the legislation. It is inconceivable that local skills improvement plans could have flown in the face of decisions made locally. It is therefore important to understand what protections there will be for existing funding arrangements with regard to those put in place by metro Mayors. Will they be transferred to employer representative bodies or will there be a dual system?

The Government propose that employer representative bodies consider the views of mayoral combined authorities or the Greater London Authority but, as was said by the hon. Member for Ipswich on Second Reading, what does that say about those communities that are not within metro Mayor areas? The majority of my colleagues on the Labour Benches are in metro Mayor areas—I am one of the relatively few who are not—but many colleagues on the Conservative Benches are in areas that have local enterprise partnerships, which were originally meant to bring together many of the different power brokers. It seems that democratic accountability is missing entirely in areas outside the metro Mayor areas.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

This is a crucial point, which I hope we will come to as our consideration of the Bill develops: how do we define regions and regional consultation? The hon. Member for Great Grimsby might have an idea completely different from mine about what constitutes the best region when looking at skills and skills development. I hope that the Minister will take that point away and look to define that later as we go through the Bill.

[Mr Perkins]

Absolutely. To return to the subject of the amendment concerning mayoral combined authorities, the phrase “due consideration” is noticeably vague. The kind of due consideration that the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire might have given to the views of the Mayor of Manchester would have left me—and, no doubt, the Mayor of Manchester—with sleepless nights. We hope that a more thoughtful approach is now in place and we welcome the change of tone, but we are not seeing a change in policy.

[Emma Hardy]

On that issue of “due consideration” and its vagueness, will the Minister agree to look at producing some guidance on what constitutes due consideration? Is that a consultation that has happened on one occasion, or on a number of occasions? How do we define “due consideration” to ensure that the democratic accountability to which my hon. Friend is referring is put at the heart of the Bill?

[Mr Perkins]

I agree with that absolutely. The next part of that—to extend what my hon. Friend is saying—is to ask whether there is a right of appeal for a combined authority or metro Mayor in the event that they do not consider that due consideration has been given to their views. If they think that the employer representative body has put together a local skills improvement plan that has not taken into account the representations made on one or more areas, will there be a right of appeal? Will the fact that the metro Mayor considers that due consideration was not given be able to pause the local skills improvement plan and bring people together?

What role does the Secretary of State consider that he will have? As I said, the previous Secretary of State was very much a centraliser—he wanted his hands on every single decision—and that clearly runs through the Bill. He had all these frustrations with the fact that individual organisations were not doing exactly what he wanted, so he wanted the power to tell them that they had to. Is that the sort of approach that this Secretary of State will take? Having appointed the chambers of commerce to make decisions before those who are democratically elected to do so, he appears to be positioning himself as the arbiter in a whole variety of local decisions. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Emma Hardy]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. Looking at the room, I see that people on both sides are genuinely interested in education matters. I hope that this will be a good Committee that really scrutinises the legislation before us in a shared ambition to make the Bill the best that it can be.

I will be brief. I have already made an intervention about guidance on what constitutes due consideration and about the arbitration processes for conflict over whether someone believes they have been duly considered. Will there be a timeframe for that due consideration? Local engagement and agreement for the skills plans is absolutely crucial, so having that clearly laid out is fundamental.

I hope the Minister will clarify something. I may be misreading the Bill, but am I right in thinking that further education colleges have been removed from consultation, or is that part of a later amendment? The Lords tabled an amendment to ensure that local school improvement plans are co-developed with colleges, local government, elected Mayors, employers and so on. Am I right in thinking that colleges are no longer listed as part of the consultation process, or will that be addressed in another amendment? I may have made a mistake, in which case the Minister will correct me.

We are basing everything on employers and the jobs available now, but has the Minister thought about future-proofing the local skills development plans to include industries that will be developed in future, especially in relation to climate, green changes and so on? We might create the best possible plan for jobs that exist now, but that might not be the plan that we want in five years’ time, so will such future-proofing be included?

[Tom Hunt]

I will make just a few very brief comments. I think that the local skills improvement plans are a huge step in the right direction. It is clearly crucial that local businesses should play a role in shaping the curriculum of further education colleges. We need to have far more of an ecosystem approach when it comes to the role of employers, schools, FE colleges and further education. Too often, it seems as if they are kind of on the sides.

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[Andrew Gwynne]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. My comments follow neatly on from those of the hon. Member for Ipswich, because the reality is that much of what the Government want to achieve in the Bill is starting to happen anyway in devolved combined authority areas where the skills agenda has been devolved. I welcome the emphasis on skills improvement plans and, now, the involvement of the mayoral combined authorities in them. It was perhaps remiss that that was not in the Bill originally, and I am pleased that the Minister has tabled an amendment to ensure that it is clearly in the Bill.

Devolution matters. It works, and it is working. It was a Labour Government who introduced the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009, which facilitates the devolution agenda. Greater Manchester, my own city region, was the first to have a combined authority in 2011. It had an interim Mayor in 2015—my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd)—and a Mayor in 2017: Andy Burnham. The skills agenda is at the heart of the Greater Manchester combined authority’s strategies. It has a local industrial strategy. It has the Greater Manchester work and skills strategy and priorities. In 2019, it had the adult education budget devolved to it. It has Bridge GM, which links schools and employers.

The thing that I am most proud of, and which fits neatly in the agenda of the Bill, is the Greater Manchester skills for growth strategy, which is designed to fill occupational skills gaps in the Greater Manchester city region, and provide young people and adults with the skills needed to fill the gaps.

However, we need to go beyond that, and I urge the Minister to encourage combined authorities to future-proof and devolve them the powers to do so. Technology is moving at a rapid speed. Our city region economies are changing dramatically in a short space of time, and we need to ensure that the workforce of tomorrow has the skills of tomorrow, not the skills of today. I welcome the fact that the mayoral combined authorities will be included in the Bill.

[Emma Hardy]

On the skills for tomorrow, there is a huge concern about amendment 4, which removes subsection (6) on future issues around climate change and environmental goals. Surely those issues will only grow in importance. Removing that from the Bill seems incomprehensible.

[Andrew Gwynne]

It absolutely does. My hon. Friend is completely right to highlight that, because they are not only the challenges but the opportunities of tomorrow. I firmly believe that the United Kingdom can be a world leader in developing the technologies and equipment to help tackle some of the environmental challenges that the whole globe will face in the years to come. That is certainly true of my city region. It is also true of Hull, where there are huge opportunities not just on renewable power but to develop the next generation of technology.

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[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend has prompted me to point out that wind turbines are made in the great city of Hull, and we are going to be one of the green energy capitals of the UK. I wanted to get that in Hansard.

[Andrew Gwynne]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention—probably almost as grateful as she is to have had the chance to make that press release—and she is absolutely right.

I firmly believe that the skills agenda is linked to the industrial strategy agenda, not just for individual city regions, towns and counties, but for the country. If we want Britain to succeed, we must think not just about the here and now, but about the future. That involves bringing together skills and industrial strategy. In a small way, that is what we are doing in Greater Manchester through the devolution agenda.

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[Emma Hardy]

Let me offer the Minister a concrete example of the situation in Hull. We have the Hull and Humber chamber of commerce, which reaches over to the south bank, and we have a newly formed LEP that serves just Hull and the East Riding. We have a careers scheme for Hull and the Humber, and separate counties that have no overall mayoral authority, but an elected police commissioner for the whole of the Humber. To say that is muddled does not go far enough. I really feel that the amendment should make allowances for areas that are as muddled as Hull.

[Matt Western]

That is a good illustration of just how complicated these matters can be. I hope that there will be greater clarity on how the measures will work in future.

We have heard from colleagues how well things can work, including my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish, who told us about how Manchester is just getting on with it. Having been up there recently, I have seen the extraordinary work of that cluster of universities and colleges, and how they are co-operating and collaborating in their brilliant work to bring skills to their known geography—I want to place on the record how mighty impressive that was. I agree with the hon. Member for Mansfield on counties and how they work in their regions; that must be clarified as well.

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[Alex Burghart]

What an interesting debate to start off the Committee stage of the Bill. There are so many comments to come back to. As a general observation, it was very nice to hear the hon. Member for Chesterfield praise Conservative predecessors of mine for their comments about an employer-led system, which we have indeed been building up during our time in power. The Bill is simply the next stage in that process.

The fact that that process was required was first highlighted in a 2011 report by the Labour peer Lord Sainsbury. I do not want to get into the deep politics of it—we have the Bill to consider—but that report was written after Labour had been in power for 13 years. He felt that it was necessary to begin long-term reform of the skills system to make it more responsive to the needs of business and to make sure that students could get the qualifications they needed and the technical skills to go into the jobs that the economy demands. It is a great honour to present the Bill as a means of taking those ideas on to their next stage.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Chesterfield for saying that Labour will support the amendments and the local skills improvement plans. However, I need to clarify a point made by a number of Opposition Members: the Government are not removing clause 1(6). That seems to be a point of confusion. Clause 1(6) stands part of the Bill. Government amendment 5 would insert subsection (6A) to clause 1, on page 2, in line 32. It does not do anything to clause 1(6).

[Emma Hardy]

On a point of clarity—forgive me if I have this wrong— amendment 4 does seem to leave out subsection (6). My mistake—it says

“leave out ‘subsection (6)’ and insert ‘subsections (6) and (6A)’”.

[Alex Burghart]

With that in mind, and in answer to the point made by the hon. Member for Chesterfield on the impact of Government amendment 4 on clause 6, there is no friction at all between Government amendment 4 and clause 6. The amendment requires the Secretary of State to have regard to clause 1(6) and (6A) when deciding to approve and publish a plan. I hope that has cleared that up.

The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle raised a point about LSIPs and colleges, which will be dealt with in statutory guidance. The Secretary of State will lay very good statutory guidance on how employer representative bodies will work and how local skills improvement plans will be written.

We expect the whole process to be collaborative. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish spoke very well about the existing collaboration in the system. It is something that we recognise in all of our combined mayoral authorities. We do not see there being any great friction or need for friction. We want to see authorities, businesses and providers working in harmony, as many of them already do. What we are doing in the Bill, and in these clauses, is simply creating a process that helps establish that good working.

I was up in Salford not long ago, in MediaCity, where I saw some of the Government’s fantastic digital boot camps. Young people—and some not so young people—are learning the skills of tomorrow at speed in 16-week courses, getting apprenticeships in MediaCity and meeting people who have previously done the apprenticeships, who now have jobs in MediaCity. We saw that Government initiative backed by local business is not in friction with the good work the local Mayor was doing—instead, it complements it. We also saw the local economy boosted as a result.

Some of the remarks made by hon. Members suggested that there is always going to be a terrible tension between what local political leadership and businesses are trying to do, and what local providers want to do. I do not think that will be the case. In fact, there is an enormous amount of goodwill in the system and people are desirous of working towards the same aims.

On the points raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Ipswich and for Mansfield, do I see before me two future leaders in their respective areas? Well, one leader already, but who knows if they will become greater leaders still? Obviously, at the moment combined authorities have a greater responsibility for adult skills than local authorities do, which is why we put them on the face of the Bill. In the course of statutory guidance and as situations evolve, perhaps it will be possible for us to set out how we expect that work to evolve.

I do not recognise the comments made by some Opposition Members about this Government not having an appetite for devolution. Success has many fathers. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish talked about how Labour’s devolutionary reforms led to mayoral combined authorities, but I remember the Manchester devolution deal being done under the Conservatives.

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[Alex Burghart]

Thank you, Mrs Miller, and with your prompting I will refer to one more point.

[Emma Hardy]

I apologise if I am being tiresome, but just so I have understood this correctly, can the Minister confirm that the amendment leaves out subsections (6)(b), “adaptation to climate change” and (6)(c), “meeting other environmental goals”, but leaves subsection (6)(a)? Does the amendment remove paragraphs (b) and (c), lines 30 to 32, with those specific references to “climate change” and “other environmental goals”?

[Alex Burghart]

I believe I am right in saying that the amendment keeps clause 1(6)(a).

[Emma Hardy]

Yes, and removes paragraphs (b) and (c).

[Alex Burghart]

In the amendment, subsections (6)(b) and (6)(c) will not stand part of the Bill.

[Emma Hardy]

So that we are all clear, does that mean that “adaptation to climate change” and “meeting other environmental goals” are being removed?

[The Chair]

Minister, would you like to complete your remarks and maybe others can provide you with a little bit more information?

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[Mr Perkins]

These are four significant amendments. Notwithstanding the assurances that we have just received from the Minister, they specifically take out what I think was a very strong amendment, supported by Members across the House of Lords, that added the importance of a collaborative approach to the Bill. For all the Minister said in that contribution, and the one before, about the importance of these partnership arrangements, it is not really a partnership arrangement. It is clear that all those consultees are subservient to the chamber of commerce which, ultimately, holds the pen and makes the decision. That report will then have to meet with the approval of the Secretary of State. The hon. Member for Mansfield raised in a previous debate the question of what happens, given the huge variety in the strength of different chambers of commerce, different local enterprise partnerships and so on, in the event that a local skills improvement plan goes to the Secretary of State and is considered not be adequate? Obviously, we can only assume that the Secretary of State would send it back.

Chambers of commerce are very varied organisations; I think everyone would recognise that there are some excellent ones—I count those in Derbyshire and the east midlands as an example of that. However, there are others that are much smaller and have very different areas of responsibility. Chambers of commerce are membership organisations that represent some of the businesses in their community; that is unlike chambers of commerce in Germany, which are compulsory for businesses to join, and therefore are representative, quasi-governmental organisations. In this country, chambers of commerce are one of many different business organisations that businesses might choose to join. Different chambers have different areas of priority and expertise and different industries that are particularly important to them. Even among their memberships they have, in my experience, a small number of members who are very active within them, and large numbers of members who take a much less active role.

What we have in the context of many of the consultees that the Minister referred to going into the guidance notes, are a number of organisations that are in some ways more consistent, and will definitely offer a breadth of approach. Therefore, the fundamental difference of the approach that Labour would take in the Bill, compared with the Government, is around whether it is a true partnership. The difference is whether it is a partnership that recognises the voices of public and private sector employers and of further education colleges, that recognises the power of those independent training providers that do such great work across the country, and that recognises statutory organisations such as jobcentres, all of which have a role in this, or whether, as the Bill says, they are all consultees, but the chamber of commerce ultimately writes this plan. We would like to see far greater parity in that power; we think it is a local skills improvement plan that would have more buy-in and more belief in the local community, and would be much more respected on that basis.

[Emma Hardy]

I am sure that my hon. Friend shares my concern, given amendment 6, that the specific reference to further education providers is removed from the Bill. Any local skills plan needs to be done in conjunction with further education providers; there is no point writing a Bill that does not have the capacity to deliver in that local area. It seems slightly odd that a specific reference to further education has been taken out of the Bill.

[Mr Perkins]

I agree with my hon. Friend. She is right that Government amendment 6 removes the words,

“in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers for the specified area”.

The Minister says that we should not worry, it will be in the guidance. However, the different approach by the Lords recognised that it was a genuine partnership. These organisations are now consultees that will make their representations to the chamber of commerce, and hope that the chamber of commerce smiles on the view they put forward. It is a totally different type of relationship. The relationship is either one of partnership or of subservience; the approach the Government choose to take is one of subservience.

[Mr Perkins]

In terms of areas that are not already devolved, that is absolutely right, and adult education budgets will be very relevant.

Hon. Members will be pleased to know that I will not dwell on the subsequent amendments, because we will have an opportunity to debate them, but I will touch on some of our concerns about the way in which the needs of learners might not necessarily be at the forefront of people’s minds in chambers of commerce. For example, to what extent will chambers of commerce be aware of the specific needs of people with education and healthcare plans or other disabilities? The amendments seek to reduce the extent to which it is partnership working and move to a hierarchy, with the chamber of commerce holding the pen and driving the bus, and others making suggestions about the route.

[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right as to whether it is a true partnership relationship or a relationship of subservience. I draw hon. Members’ attention to amendment 7. Not only does amendment 6 leave out specific reference to further education providers; amendment 7 leaves out specific reference to community learning providers, designated institutions and universities. Again, it is no longer a partnership, as was written in the Lords amendment. It becomes a situation in which central Government make the decisions and education providers are in a subservient relationship with them. My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

[Mr Perkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for saying that, and I agree. Government amendment 7 is consequential to Government amendment 6, and she is right about what that means. We have real concerns about how employer-representative bodies and LSIPs will fit within sectoral expertise in sectors such as construction and manufacturing, which transcend local areas but are incredibly important, particularly where our economy is hugely lacking in the development of the next generation.

It is really important to recognise that we have huge skills shortages in the public sector as well as the private sector. Health and social care is a classic example, but there are many others. The voice of the public sector must be heard, and we must ensure that it is able to support people who aim to get from unemployment into a trained-up place in the workplace, because they are also central to this sort of approach. I am interested to hear from the Minister what framework he envisages for LSIPs aligning with sectoral programmes and a national industrial strategy.

Government amendment 8 removes the words, “by people resident”, from the sentence about the skills required in a local area. The purpose of the Lords amendment was important: it was to ensure that LSIPs focused not just on the needs of employers but on the people resident in a community. What would happen in a situation whereby employers were satisfied with the extent to which they were able to access the skills that they needed, but a large number of people were employed and unable to get into the labour market? Ultimately, it is not the responsibility of chambers of commerce to address youth unemployment; it is the Government’s responsibility. If businesses consider that they are able to access the skills that they need, but there is still a large number of people who are unemployed, who takes responsibility for that? The Lords amendment ensured that the people who were resident in a local area were considered in the local skills improvement plan. The Government are taking those words out, which means that it goes back to being a plan put together by businesses to solve the needs of businesses, regardless of whether that addresses the problems of people struggling to access the labour market.

[Emma Hardy]

My other concern with the amendments, which I hope the Minister will address, is about areas with many small and medium-sized enterprises. Areas with large numbers of big employers can obviously exercise that strong voice, for example through chambers of commerce, but I am worried that in areas such as Hull, with predominantly SMEs, as I am sure Government Members will recognise, that voice will not come through as strongly.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend worries with due cause. Since the introduction of the apprenticeship levy, small businesses have found it incredibly difficult to access apprenticeships. There has been a huge driving down in the number of people getting apprenticeships within small businesses. In areas such as Chesterfield, where smaller employers make up the majority of the economy, the apprenticeship opportunities are much lower than they were a few years before. Ensuring that the voice of small business is heard within this is incredibly important.

The Minister did not really talk about this amendment at all, but the Government might say that the skills plan also needs to have a focus on those relevant to a local employer who are not currently resident—we might call it the “on your bike” amendment, with the Government saying, “We want an approach that identifies skills needs of people who are not currently here.” If that was their intention, then it could have been worded to ensure that there was a strategy for attracting new workers. Simply taking those words out means that this is a plan for the employer community that does not have to consider those questions around the learners who are excluded from the labour market if those employers consider that they are relatively satisfied with what they are able to attract.

There is an important point here. At the moment, shortly after Brexit, there is a lot of focus is on skills shortages and staff shortages, and the sense, which I totally agree with, that we need to make more of the people we have. However, there may be other times when there is a real surplus of unemployed people, and we need a strategic approach that, in those times, supports those people into work, even if there are not a huge number of vacancies in the labour market. I think that those words are important.

Government amendment 9 removes the words “and other local bodies” from the clause concerning post-16 technical education, which was an amendment that the much-respected Lord Baker of Dorking added to the Bill. The Lords amendment that this Government amendment seeks to undo was drafted to avoid being too prescriptive, but it would have allowed LSIPs to work closely with other agencies, including Jobcentre Plus and careers advisory services, in providing careers information, advice and guidance.

All those organisations are important to ensuring that they are able to get into schools and support young people to get representation and ideas from both the business community and environments that they have not been familiar with. I would have thought that an amendment recognising that the careers responsibility is not just a responsibility of schools, but something that should be open to businesses, would have very much fitted with the spirit of the Bill. It was an opportunity for the Government to enable other bodies to play an important role in that post-16 technical education and careers guidance, and it is therefore disappointing that it was taken out.

We agree with their lordships on the introduction of these amendments, and we are disappointed that the Government are seeking to remove them. On that basis, we will look to support the amendments brought in by their lordships and disagree with these Government amendments.

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[Rachel Hopkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for that fantastic intervention. It leads on to a couple of other points about those who are not in employment, and particularly local authorities with responsibility for young people who are NEET—not in education, employment or training. It is absolutely vital that those are addressed and that they have a formal seat at the table in that area. Equally, on my hon. Friend’s point about looking to the future, local authorities do a great amount of work to understand their populations and trends so they can project how many young people are coming through or whether school or training places will be needed. Employers do not always have easy access to that, but local authorities need to have an equal seat at that table in developing the plans, rather than just being tucked away in some statutory guidance. We know what happens with guidance; it is just guidance and it is often ignored.

[Emma Hardy]

On that point, I hope that the Minister will clarify that this will be statutory guidance, not just guidance that has been issued as a general idea that we can do it if we would like to. Statutory guidance is needed.

[Rachel Hopkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that important point about statutory guidance. In fact, if the guidance is going to be statutory, why not just make it statute and have it in the Bill? That is what I would like to see. It is important that local people have democratic oversight of what is happening in their areas. That is why I want to see local authorities, combined authorities and other organisations that can shape what is going on in their local areas.

[Emma Hardy]

On that point, the removal of

“schools, further education institutions, community learning providers, specialist designated institutions and universities”

means the people who actually deliver the skills strategies are being removed from a Bill about skills. It is a little odd.

[Rachel Hopkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for making yet another fantastic intervention. Yes, it is a little odd. Equally, amendment 9 removes other organisations, such as our Jobcentre Plus.

Mrs Miller, you will forgive me for intervening on an earlier intervention. What I was trying to get at with regard to universities is that they are also very much involved in skills development. I refer to the University of Bedfordshire, which is in my constituency. It has a fantastic new STEM building—science, technology, engineering and maths. Industry-standard equipment has been brought into the science labs, so the students studying for degrees such as biochemistry are using the equipment that is used out in industry. This is not just about theoretical and academic issues; it is also about key skills.

[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to point out how incorrect the intervention was. One of the areas where we are desperately short of workers is social work. How do we train up social workers? They are trained up at a university. The idea that universities are only for academic knowledge and not places where people can be trained for jobs is ludicrous.

[Rachel Hopkins]

My hon. Friend also must have eyes in the back of her head, because one of the other points I want to talk about is health and social care. Again, I will talk about my fantastic home town of Luton. Someone can study for a BTEC in health and social care at Luton Sixth Form College, or study at the University of Bedfordshire and get practical skills training as a nurse, paramedic or midwife, before going on to be a nurse, paramedic or midwife at Luton and Dunstable University Hospital. All of those bodies will not be included in developing a skills plan if they are not set out in the Bill. I want to see them included, so that everyone feels that there is equality of partnership work, to ensure that what is needed is recognised.

I will not prolong my remarks any longer, but I just want to reiterate the points made from the Opposition Front Bench and say that taking out these important clauses that were inserted by the Lords weakens the Bill.

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[Andrew Gwynne]

I do not want to prolong the debate on this group, but the Minister, in the discussion on the previous group, sought to assure the Committee that the approach was genuinely collaborative. Yet this group of amendments strikes out Lords amendments that would make the approach genuinely collaborative. I do not understand the thinking here. I cannot understand what the Minister thinks he is gaining or achieving by striking out the Lords amendments.

Let us look at the amendments in detail. Government amendment 6 would strike out, in clause 1(7)(a),

“in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers”.

The explanatory notes state that the reference to mayoral combined authorities is not required because that point has now been made clear through the earlier Government amendment that we have passed. I accept that point, but there is still a role for other local, non-mayoral combined authorities to have a view and an input into the skills agenda for their area, whether that is a unitary authority or a county council. These issues are part and parcel of what those local authorities do.

[Emma Hardy]

It feels like removing the Lords amendment will result in democratic accountability if the area has a Mayor; if it does not, there is no democratic accountability. An area such as Hull, which has no mayoral authority, has no democratic accountability or reference in the Bill. That feels unfair.

[Andrew Gwynne]

It not only feels unfair; it is unfair. I get that mayoral combined authorities have specific skills responsibilities devolved to them, so clearly the level of input from a mayoral combined authority is greater than that of a county council or a unitary authority that does not have those specific responsibilities devolved to them, but the council’s strategy for that area will involve education, skills and economic development. Those are important elements for county and unitary authorities.

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[Matt Western]

rose—

[Emma Hardy]

rose—

[Andrew Gwynne]

I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington, because he was first, and then to my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle.

[Andrew Gwynne]

I completely agree. Every layer of local government has an interest in the health and wellbeing—in the broadest sense—of the population. The best way to improve the health and wellbeing of the population is to ensure that people have good skills, good education and good job opportunities. That is the route to health and wellbeing, and that is true both at the district level and at upper levels.

[Emma Hardy]

I want to highlight to Government Members, although I am sure the hon. Member for Mansfield will know this as leader of a local council, that local councils have a statutory duty for all children with special educational needs or disabilities up to the age of 25. They have a statutory duty for looked-after children. They have a statutory duty regarding the number of young people not in employment, education or training—NEETs—as well. They have those statutory duties, yet the Government amendments remove their voice from the local skills plan. That does not seem right.

[Andrew Gwynne]

It absolutely does not seem right. I have spent a lot of time on local government, but the same part of subsection (7)(b) that will be struck out if Government amendment 7 is made goes further. While the line

“draws on the views of…employers operating within the specified area”

stays in, regional and local authorities, mayoral combined authorities and their strategies are taken out, but so are

“post-16 education providers active in the specified area, including schools, further education institutions, community learning providers, specialist designated institutions and universities”.

It is incomprehensible that those bodies would not be part and parcel of the deliberations on and the creation of the strategies.

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[Alex Burghart]

It has been another lively and interesting debate on this group of amendments. The Government want to build an employer-led system, but the statutory guidance—yes, statutory guidance—will make it clear that the employer representative bodies that the Bill creates must consult a range of partners and collaborate with them.

On the removal of schools and other providers, the Bill is already clear that all relevant providers, including further education colleges, independent training providers, universities and sixth-form colleges need to be involved in the development of the LSIP—that is stated in subsection (4)—and if designated employer representative bodies do not have regard to relevant statutory guidance on engaging with relevant providers and do not comply with the terms and conditions of their designation, the Secretary of State may not approve or publish the local skills improvement plan and could remove their designation.

The national dimension is very important, and we expect local skills improvement plans to be informed by national skills priorities and to help address national, as well as local, skills needs. However, where there are national skills shortages in critical areas, we can expect the Government to carry on playing a role in helping alleviate them, as we are doing at the moment. We put £17 million into rapidly upskilling people to help meet the needs of the heavy goods vehicle sector, where we have significant shortages, and I have been pleased to see that that is going very well. That will not fall away.

Turning to the question of dropping the reference to long-term national skill needs, the Bill already makes reference to the fact that LSIPs will need to look at future skills needs—that is stated in subsections (2) and (7)(b)(iii). The Opposition made a very important point about the role of the public sector. Let us think about the phrase “employer representative bodies”: there is a very big role for business, but in many areas, the public sector is a major employer and will need to be involved in this process. We want ERBs to reach beyond their existing membership and cover both public and private employers.

[Emma Hardy]

The Minister has mentioned the employer-led bodies in the public sector. Could he pick up on my point about SMEs, which might not be part of an employer-led body but, in some regions, are the main employers?

[Alex Burghart]

We are expecting ERBs to draw up local skills improvement plans that take account of the economic area that they represent, which should absolutely include small and medium-sized employers, as well as self-employment opportunities.

While Opposition Members may feel that these things can be done only if every detail is written out in primary legislation, we know that that is not the case, because we have eight excellent trailblazer areas at the moment that are doing this job without a mite of primary legislation. With that in mind, I commend the amendment to the Committee.

Question put, That the amendment be made.

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (First sitting)

Emma Hardy Excerpts

Tuesday 30th November 2021 Public Bill Committees

Mr Perkins

- - Excerpts

I encourage my hon. Friend to expand on that point, because he is absolutely right. It is remarkable that the Government have been forced to introduce Government amendment 5, because it means that they brought the Bill forward without recognising any role for authorities that already have this funding devolved to them in the first place. It is a fairly dramatic change. The approach that Labour would take to local skills improvement plans is fundamentally different from that of the Government.

The Government are taking the approach that these are employer-led documents—that phrase again. They are documents of tremendous importance, so presumably the chambers of commerce will be holding the pen on them and will now, as a result of Government amendment 5, be forced to convince the Secretary of State that they have properly taken on board the views of those democratically elected to lead on skills policy in their areas. So many other important contributors are left on the side lines.

Labour’s approach would be to say that we need to recognise the importance of local skills improvement plans that will dictate the direction of skills policy. What we need is a local skills improvement plan that brings together the role of public and private sector employers; that brings in further education colleges; that brings in significant independent training providers within an area; and that is held together by those with democratic accountability, such as metro Mayors and local authorities. That holistic approach would deliver a skills policy that everyone would be able to get behind and recognise as representative.

The Government’s approach is very much about placing the chambers of commerce at the heart of this, but in fact they have had to bring forward an amendment to even put the metro Mayors and combined authorities back into that role. We support Government amendment 5, but it is remarkable that it was necessary at all.

I would like the Minister to expand on whether Government amendment 4 impacts clause 6 in terms of the duty placed on local skills improvement plans for compliance with section 1 of the Climate Change Act 2008. It is crucial that skills policy drives us towards a net zero future, so it is important to understand whether the intention is to undermine that commitment when it comes to Government amendment 4.

Again, we support Government amendment 5, although we are confused about why it is needed and why it was not central to the approach. As my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish mentioned, it is important that we recognise that mayoral combined authorities and the Greater London Authority already have responsibilities in terms of policy and funding for further education and skills, and that they both have good professional relationships with employers, colleges and training providers in their areas. I have been along to meet them in Manchester and have seen their excellent work on careers guidance and their constructive approach to independent providers and the FE sector. That is a great example of how devolved decision makers are better in touch with the needs of their communities than a centralised approach.

It is a shame that the Bill, the brainchild of the former Secretary of State, is a return to the centralisation agenda that has too often bedevilled Whitehall thinking. It was clearly a driving force in the legislation. It is inconceivable that local skills improvement plans could have flown in the face of decisions made locally. It is therefore important to understand what protections there will be for existing funding arrangements with regard to those put in place by metro Mayors. Will they be transferred to employer representative bodies or will there be a dual system?

The Government propose that employer representative bodies consider the views of mayoral combined authorities or the Greater London Authority but, as was said by the hon. Member for Ipswich on Second Reading, what does that say about those communities that are not within metro Mayor areas? The majority of my colleagues on the Labour Benches are in metro Mayor areas—I am one of the relatively few who are not—but many colleagues on the Conservative Benches are in areas that have local enterprise partnerships, which were originally meant to bring together many of the different power brokers. It seems that democratic accountability is missing entirely in areas outside the metro Mayor areas.

Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)

-

This is a crucial point, which I hope we will come to as our consideration of the Bill develops: how do we define regions and regional consultation? The hon. Member for Great Grimsby might have an idea completely different from mine about what constitutes the best region when looking at skills and skills development. I hope that the Minister will take that point away and look to define that later as we go through the Bill.

Mr Perkins

- - Excerpts

Absolutely. To return to the subject of the amendment concerning mayoral combined authorities, the phrase “due consideration” is noticeably vague. The kind of due consideration that the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire might have given to the views of the Mayor of Manchester would have left me—and, no doubt, the Mayor of Manchester—with sleepless nights. We hope that a more thoughtful approach is now in place and we welcome the change of tone, but we are not seeing a change in policy.

Emma Hardy

-

On that issue of “due consideration” and its vagueness, will the Minister agree to look at producing some guidance on what constitutes due consideration? Is that a consultation that has happened on one occasion, or on a number of occasions? How do we define “due consideration” to ensure that the democratic accountability to which my hon. Friend is referring is put at the heart of the Bill?

Mr Perkins

- - Excerpts

I agree with that absolutely. The next part of that—to extend what my hon. Friend is saying—is to ask whether there is a right of appeal for a combined authority or metro Mayor in the event that they do not consider that due consideration has been given to their views. If they think that the employer representative body has put together a local skills improvement plan that has not taken into account the representations made on one or more areas, will there be a right of appeal? Will the fact that the metro Mayor considers that due consideration was not given be able to pause the local skills improvement plan and bring people together?

What role does the Secretary of State consider that he will have? As I said, the previous Secretary of State was very much a centraliser—he wanted his hands on every single decision—and that clearly runs through the Bill. He had all these frustrations with the fact that individual organisations were not doing exactly what he wanted, so he wanted the power to tell them that they had to. Is that the sort of approach that this Secretary of State will take? Having appointed the chambers of commerce to make decisions before those who are democratically elected to do so, he appears to be positioning himself as the arbiter in a whole variety of local decisions. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Emma Hardy

-

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. Looking at the room, I see that people on both sides are genuinely interested in education matters. I hope that this will be a good Committee that really scrutinises the legislation before us in a shared ambition to make the Bill the best that it can be.

I will be brief. I have already made an intervention about guidance on what constitutes due consideration and about the arbitration processes for conflict over whether someone believes they have been duly considered. Will there be a timeframe for that due consideration? Local engagement and agreement for the skills plans is absolutely crucial, so having that clearly laid out is fundamental.

I hope the Minister will clarify something. I may be misreading the Bill, but am I right in thinking that further education colleges have been removed from consultation, or is that part of a later amendment? The Lords tabled an amendment to ensure that local school improvement plans are co-developed with colleges, local government, elected Mayors, employers and so on. Am I right in thinking that colleges are no longer listed as part of the consultation process, or will that be addressed in another amendment? I may have made a mistake, in which case the Minister will correct me.

We are basing everything on employers and the jobs available now, but has the Minister thought about future-proofing the local skills development plans to include industries that will be developed in future, especially in relation to climate, green changes and so on? We might create the best possible plan for jobs that exist now, but that might not be the plan that we want in five years’ time, so will such future-proofing be included?

Tom Hunt

- - Excerpts

I will make just a few very brief comments. I think that the local skills improvement plans are a huge step in the right direction. It is clearly crucial that local businesses should play a role in shaping the curriculum of further education colleges. We need to have far more of an ecosystem approach when it comes to the role of employers, schools, FE colleges and further education. Too often, it seems as if they are kind of on the sides.

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Andrew Gwynne

- - Excerpts

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. My comments follow neatly on from those of the hon. Member for Ipswich, because the reality is that much of what the Government want to achieve in the Bill is starting to happen anyway in devolved combined authority areas where the skills agenda has been devolved. I welcome the emphasis on skills improvement plans and, now, the involvement of the mayoral combined authorities in them. It was perhaps remiss that that was not in the Bill originally, and I am pleased that the Minister has tabled an amendment to ensure that it is clearly in the Bill.

Devolution matters. It works, and it is working. It was a Labour Government who introduced the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009, which facilitates the devolution agenda. Greater Manchester, my own city region, was the first to have a combined authority in 2011. It had an interim Mayor in 2015—my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd)—and a Mayor in 2017: Andy Burnham. The skills agenda is at the heart of the Greater Manchester combined authority’s strategies. It has a local industrial strategy. It has the Greater Manchester work and skills strategy and priorities. In 2019, it had the adult education budget devolved to it. It has Bridge GM, which links schools and employers.

The thing that I am most proud of, and which fits neatly in the agenda of the Bill, is the Greater Manchester skills for growth strategy, which is designed to fill occupational skills gaps in the Greater Manchester city region, and provide young people and adults with the skills needed to fill the gaps.

However, we need to go beyond that, and I urge the Minister to encourage combined authorities to future-proof and devolve them the powers to do so. Technology is moving at a rapid speed. Our city region economies are changing dramatically in a short space of time, and we need to ensure that the workforce of tomorrow has the skills of tomorrow, not the skills of today. I welcome the fact that the mayoral combined authorities will be included in the Bill.

Emma Hardy

-

On the skills for tomorrow, there is a huge concern about amendment 4, which removes subsection (6) on future issues around climate change and environmental goals. Surely those issues will only grow in importance. Removing that from the Bill seems incomprehensible.

Andrew Gwynne

- - Excerpts

It absolutely does. My hon. Friend is completely right to highlight that, because they are not only the challenges but the opportunities of tomorrow. I firmly believe that the United Kingdom can be a world leader in developing the technologies and equipment to help tackle some of the environmental challenges that the whole globe will face in the years to come. That is certainly true of my city region. It is also true of Hull, where there are huge opportunities not just on renewable power but to develop the next generation of technology.

Emma Hardy

-

My hon. Friend has prompted me to point out that wind turbines are made in the great city of Hull, and we are going to be one of the green energy capitals of the UK. I wanted to get that in Hansard.

Andrew Gwynne

- - Excerpts

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention—probably almost as grateful as she is to have had the chance to make that press release—and she is absolutely right.

I firmly believe that the skills agenda is linked to the industrial strategy agenda, not just for individual city regions, towns and counties, but for the country. If we want Britain to succeed, we must think not just about the here and now, but about the future. That involves bringing together skills and industrial strategy. In a small way, that is what we are doing in Greater Manchester through the devolution agenda.

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Matt Western

- - Excerpts

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I think many hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Mansfield, will be disappointed about that. It is really important that the Government send clear messages about devolution and what they want to see, but in many facets of Government business there seems to be a greater concentration of powers coming into Whitehall and Ministers’ offices than devolution to the likes of Mansfield, Manchester, Liverpool the north-east and so on.

As I said, one of the great learnings of the last 20 months is just how brilliantly our local services and authorities can deliver things. That is because they understand their geography, their communities and their populations. I am concerned about how due consideration, a much-vented issue in the last half hour, might work, particularly given the reliance on the personality of the individual who happens to be in the seat at the time. I will not go into any further detail on that because it has already been much explored.

Will the Minister provide a bit more information on what factors will be considered in the designation of an LSIP? The Local Government Association has stated:

“the reforms need to be implemented as part of an integrated, place-based approach. Without a meaningful role for local authorities, the reforms risk creating an even more fragmented skills system, with different providers subject to different skills plans”

I urge the Government and the Minister to listen and respond to the experience of the Local Government Association.

Emma Hardy

-

Let me offer the Minister a concrete example of the situation in Hull. We have the Hull and Humber chamber of commerce, which reaches over to the south bank, and we have a newly formed LEP that serves just Hull and the East Riding. We have a careers scheme for Hull and the Humber, and separate counties that have no overall mayoral authority, but an elected police commissioner for the whole of the Humber. To say that is muddled does not go far enough. I really feel that the amendment should make allowances for areas that are as muddled as Hull.

Matt Western

- - Excerpts

That is a good illustration of just how complicated these matters can be. I hope that there will be greater clarity on how the measures will work in future.

We have heard from colleagues how well things can work, including my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish, who told us about how Manchester is just getting on with it. Having been up there recently, I have seen the extraordinary work of that cluster of universities and colleges, and how they are co-operating and collaborating in their brilliant work to bring skills to their known geography—I want to place on the record how mighty impressive that was. I agree with the hon. Member for Mansfield on counties and how they work in their regions; that must be clarified as well.

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Alex Burghart

- - Excerpts

What an interesting debate to start off the Committee stage of the Bill. There are so many comments to come back to. As a general observation, it was very nice to hear the hon. Member for Chesterfield praise Conservative predecessors of mine for their comments about an employer-led system, which we have indeed been building up during our time in power. The Bill is simply the next stage in that process.

The fact that that process was required was first highlighted in a 2011 report by the Labour peer Lord Sainsbury. I do not want to get into the deep politics of it—we have the Bill to consider—but that report was written after Labour had been in power for 13 years. He felt that it was necessary to begin long-term reform of the skills system to make it more responsive to the needs of business and to make sure that students could get the qualifications they needed and the technical skills to go into the jobs that the economy demands. It is a great honour to present the Bill as a means of taking those ideas on to their next stage.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Chesterfield for saying that Labour will support the amendments and the local skills improvement plans. However, I need to clarify a point made by a number of Opposition Members: the Government are not removing clause 1(6). That seems to be a point of confusion. Clause 1(6) stands part of the Bill. Government amendment 5 would insert subsection (6A) to clause 1, on page 2, in line 32. It does not do anything to clause 1(6).

Emma Hardy

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On a point of clarity—forgive me if I have this wrong— amendment 4 does seem to leave out subsection (6). My mistake—it says

“leave out ‘subsection (6)’ and insert ‘subsections (6) and (6A)’”.

Alex Burghart

- - Excerpts

With that in mind, and in answer to the point made by the hon. Member for Chesterfield on the impact of Government amendment 4 on clause 6, there is no friction at all between Government amendment 4 and clause 6. The amendment requires the Secretary of State to have regard to clause 1(6) and (6A) when deciding to approve and publish a plan. I hope that has cleared that up.

The hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle raised a point about LSIPs and colleges, which will be dealt with in statutory guidance. The Secretary of State will lay very good statutory guidance on how employer representative bodies will work and how local skills improvement plans will be written.

We expect the whole process to be collaborative. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish spoke very well about the existing collaboration in the system. It is something that we recognise in all of our combined mayoral authorities. We do not see there being any great friction or need for friction. We want to see authorities, businesses and providers working in harmony, as many of them already do. What we are doing in the Bill, and in these clauses, is simply creating a process that helps establish that good working.

I was up in Salford not long ago, in MediaCity, where I saw some of the Government’s fantastic digital boot camps. Young people—and some not so young people—are learning the skills of tomorrow at speed in 16-week courses, getting apprenticeships in MediaCity and meeting people who have previously done the apprenticeships, who now have jobs in MediaCity. We saw that Government initiative backed by local business is not in friction with the good work the local Mayor was doing—instead, it complements it. We also saw the local economy boosted as a result.

Some of the remarks made by hon. Members suggested that there is always going to be a terrible tension between what local political leadership and businesses are trying to do, and what local providers want to do. I do not think that will be the case. In fact, there is an enormous amount of goodwill in the system and people are desirous of working towards the same aims.

On the points raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Ipswich and for Mansfield, do I see before me two future leaders in their respective areas? Well, one leader already, but who knows if they will become greater leaders still? Obviously, at the moment combined authorities have a greater responsibility for adult skills than local authorities do, which is why we put them on the face of the Bill. In the course of statutory guidance and as situations evolve, perhaps it will be possible for us to set out how we expect that work to evolve.

I do not recognise the comments made by some Opposition Members about this Government not having an appetite for devolution. Success has many fathers. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish talked about how Labour’s devolutionary reforms led to mayoral combined authorities, but I remember the Manchester devolution deal being done under the Conservatives.

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Alex Burghart

- - Excerpts

Thank you, Mrs Miller, and with your prompting I will refer to one more point.

Emma Hardy

-

I apologise if I am being tiresome, but just so I have understood this correctly, can the Minister confirm that the amendment leaves out subsections (6)(b), “adaptation to climate change” and (6)(c), “meeting other environmental goals”, but leaves subsection (6)(a)? Does the amendment remove paragraphs (b) and (c), lines 30 to 32, with those specific references to “climate change” and “other environmental goals”?

Alex Burghart

- - Excerpts

I believe I am right in saying that the amendment keeps clause 1(6)(a).

Emma Hardy

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Yes, and removes paragraphs (b) and (c).

Alex Burghart

- - Excerpts

In the amendment, subsections (6)(b) and (6)(c) will not stand part of the Bill.

Emma Hardy

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So that we are all clear, does that mean that “adaptation to climate change” and “meeting other environmental goals” are being removed?

The Chair

Minister, would you like to complete your remarks and maybe others can provide you with a little bit more information?

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Mr Perkins

- - Excerpts

These are four significant amendments. Notwithstanding the assurances that we have just received from the Minister, they specifically take out what I think was a very strong amendment, supported by Members across the House of Lords, that added the importance of a collaborative approach to the Bill. For all the Minister said in that contribution, and the one before, about the importance of these partnership arrangements, it is not really a partnership arrangement. It is clear that all those consultees are subservient to the chamber of commerce which, ultimately, holds the pen and makes the decision. That report will then have to meet with the approval of the Secretary of State. The hon. Member for Mansfield raised in a previous debate the question of what happens, given the huge variety in the strength of different chambers of commerce, different local enterprise partnerships and so on, in the event that a local skills improvement plan goes to the Secretary of State and is considered not be adequate? Obviously, we can only assume that the Secretary of State would send it back.

Chambers of commerce are very varied organisations; I think everyone would recognise that there are some excellent ones—I count those in Derbyshire and the east midlands as an example of that. However, there are others that are much smaller and have very different areas of responsibility. Chambers of commerce are membership organisations that represent some of the businesses in their community; that is unlike chambers of commerce in Germany, which are compulsory for businesses to join, and therefore are representative, quasi-governmental organisations. In this country, chambers of commerce are one of many different business organisations that businesses might choose to join. Different chambers have different areas of priority and expertise and different industries that are particularly important to them. Even among their memberships they have, in my experience, a small number of members who are very active within them, and large numbers of members who take a much less active role.

What we have in the context of many of the consultees that the Minister referred to going into the guidance notes, are a number of organisations that are in some ways more consistent, and will definitely offer a breadth of approach. Therefore, the fundamental difference of the approach that Labour would take in the Bill, compared with the Government, is around whether it is a true partnership. The difference is whether it is a partnership that recognises the voices of public and private sector employers and of further education colleges, that recognises the power of those independent training providers that do such great work across the country, and that recognises statutory organisations such as jobcentres, all of which have a role in this, or whether, as the Bill says, they are all consultees, but the chamber of commerce ultimately writes this plan. We would like to see far greater parity in that power; we think it is a local skills improvement plan that would have more buy-in and more belief in the local community, and would be much more respected on that basis.

Emma Hardy

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I am sure that my hon. Friend shares my concern, given amendment 6, that the specific reference to further education providers is removed from the Bill. Any local skills plan needs to be done in conjunction with further education providers; there is no point writing a Bill that does not have the capacity to deliver in that local area. It seems slightly odd that a specific reference to further education has been taken out of the Bill.

Mr Perkins

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I agree with my hon. Friend. She is right that Government amendment 6 removes the words,

“in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers for the specified area”.

The Minister says that we should not worry, it will be in the guidance. However, the different approach by the Lords recognised that it was a genuine partnership. These organisations are now consultees that will make their representations to the chamber of commerce, and hope that the chamber of commerce smiles on the view they put forward. It is a totally different type of relationship. The relationship is either one of partnership or of subservience; the approach the Government choose to take is one of subservience.

Mr Perkins

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In terms of areas that are not already devolved, that is absolutely right, and adult education budgets will be very relevant.

Hon. Members will be pleased to know that I will not dwell on the subsequent amendments, because we will have an opportunity to debate them, but I will touch on some of our concerns about the way in which the needs of learners might not necessarily be at the forefront of people’s minds in chambers of commerce. For example, to what extent will chambers of commerce be aware of the specific needs of people with education and healthcare plans or other disabilities? The amendments seek to reduce the extent to which it is partnership working and move to a hierarchy, with the chamber of commerce holding the pen and driving the bus, and others making suggestions about the route.

Emma Hardy

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My hon. Friend is absolutely right as to whether it is a true partnership relationship or a relationship of subservience. I draw hon. Members’ attention to amendment 7. Not only does amendment 6 leave out specific reference to further education providers; amendment 7 leaves out specific reference to community learning providers, designated institutions and universities. Again, it is no longer a partnership, as was written in the Lords amendment. It becomes a situation in which central Government make the decisions and education providers are in a subservient relationship with them. My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

Mr Perkins

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I thank my hon. Friend for saying that, and I agree. Government amendment 7 is consequential to Government amendment 6, and she is right about what that means. We have real concerns about how employer-representative bodies and LSIPs will fit within sectoral expertise in sectors such as construction and manufacturing, which transcend local areas but are incredibly important, particularly where our economy is hugely lacking in the development of the next generation.

It is really important to recognise that we have huge skills shortages in the public sector as well as the private sector. Health and social care is a classic example, but there are many others. The voice of the public sector must be heard, and we must ensure that it is able to support people who aim to get from unemployment into a trained-up place in the workplace, because they are also central to this sort of approach. I am interested to hear from the Minister what framework he envisages for LSIPs aligning with sectoral programmes and a national industrial strategy.

Government amendment 8 removes the words, “by people resident”, from the sentence about the skills required in a local area. The purpose of the Lords amendment was important: it was to ensure that LSIPs focused not just on the needs of employers but on the people resident in a community. What would happen in a situation whereby employers were satisfied with the extent to which they were able to access the skills that they needed, but a large number of people were employed and unable to get into the labour market? Ultimately, it is not the responsibility of chambers of commerce to address youth unemployment; it is the Government’s responsibility. If businesses consider that they are able to access the skills that they need, but there is still a large number of people who are unemployed, who takes responsibility for that? The Lords amendment ensured that the people who were resident in a local area were considered in the local skills improvement plan. The Government are taking those words out, which means that it goes back to being a plan put together by businesses to solve the needs of businesses, regardless of whether that addresses the problems of people struggling to access the labour market.

Emma Hardy

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My other concern with the amendments, which I hope the Minister will address, is about areas with many small and medium-sized enterprises. Areas with large numbers of big employers can obviously exercise that strong voice, for example through chambers of commerce, but I am worried that in areas such as Hull, with predominantly SMEs, as I am sure Government Members will recognise, that voice will not come through as strongly.

Mr Perkins

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My hon. Friend worries with due cause. Since the introduction of the apprenticeship levy, small businesses have found it incredibly difficult to access apprenticeships. There has been a huge driving down in the number of people getting apprenticeships within small businesses. In areas such as Chesterfield, where smaller employers make up the majority of the economy, the apprenticeship opportunities are much lower than they were a few years before. Ensuring that the voice of small business is heard within this is incredibly important.

The Minister did not really talk about this amendment at all, but the Government might say that the skills plan also needs to have a focus on those relevant to a local employer who are not currently resident—we might call it the “on your bike” amendment, with the Government saying, “We want an approach that identifies skills needs of people who are not currently here.” If that was their intention, then it could have been worded to ensure that there was a strategy for attracting new workers. Simply taking those words out means that this is a plan for the employer community that does not have to consider those questions around the learners who are excluded from the labour market if those employers consider that they are relatively satisfied with what they are able to attract.

There is an important point here. At the moment, shortly after Brexit, there is a lot of focus is on skills shortages and staff shortages, and the sense, which I totally agree with, that we need to make more of the people we have. However, there may be other times when there is a real surplus of unemployed people, and we need a strategic approach that, in those times, supports those people into work, even if there are not a huge number of vacancies in the labour market. I think that those words are important.

Government amendment 9 removes the words “and other local bodies” from the clause concerning post-16 technical education, which was an amendment that the much-respected Lord Baker of Dorking added to the Bill. The Lords amendment that this Government amendment seeks to undo was drafted to avoid being too prescriptive, but it would have allowed LSIPs to work closely with other agencies, including Jobcentre Plus and careers advisory services, in providing careers information, advice and guidance.

All those organisations are important to ensuring that they are able to get into schools and support young people to get representation and ideas from both the business community and environments that they have not been familiar with. I would have thought that an amendment recognising that the careers responsibility is not just a responsibility of schools, but something that should be open to businesses, would have very much fitted with the spirit of the Bill. It was an opportunity for the Government to enable other bodies to play an important role in that post-16 technical education and careers guidance, and it is therefore disappointing that it was taken out.

We agree with their lordships on the introduction of these amendments, and we are disappointed that the Government are seeking to remove them. On that basis, we will look to support the amendments brought in by their lordships and disagree with these Government amendments.

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Rachel Hopkins

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I thank my hon. Friend for that fantastic intervention. It leads on to a couple of other points about those who are not in employment, and particularly local authorities with responsibility for young people who are NEET—not in education, employment or training. It is absolutely vital that those are addressed and that they have a formal seat at the table in that area. Equally, on my hon. Friend’s point about looking to the future, local authorities do a great amount of work to understand their populations and trends so they can project how many young people are coming through or whether school or training places will be needed. Employers do not always have easy access to that, but local authorities need to have an equal seat at that table in developing the plans, rather than just being tucked away in some statutory guidance. We know what happens with guidance; it is just guidance and it is often ignored.

Emma Hardy

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On that point, I hope that the Minister will clarify that this will be statutory guidance, not just guidance that has been issued as a general idea that we can do it if we would like to. Statutory guidance is needed.

Rachel Hopkins

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I thank my hon. Friend for making that important point about statutory guidance. In fact, if the guidance is going to be statutory, why not just make it statute and have it in the Bill? That is what I would like to see. It is important that local people have democratic oversight of what is happening in their areas. That is why I want to see local authorities, combined authorities and other organisations that can shape what is going on in their local areas.

Emma Hardy

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On that point, the removal of

“schools, further education institutions, community learning providers, specialist designated institutions and universities”

means the people who actually deliver the skills strategies are being removed from a Bill about skills. It is a little odd.

Rachel Hopkins

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I thank my hon. Friend for making yet another fantastic intervention. Yes, it is a little odd. Equally, amendment 9 removes other organisations, such as our Jobcentre Plus.

Mrs Miller, you will forgive me for intervening on an earlier intervention. What I was trying to get at with regard to universities is that they are also very much involved in skills development. I refer to the University of Bedfordshire, which is in my constituency. It has a fantastic new STEM building—science, technology, engineering and maths. Industry-standard equipment has been brought into the science labs, so the students studying for degrees such as biochemistry are using the equipment that is used out in industry. This is not just about theoretical and academic issues; it is also about key skills.

Emma Hardy

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My hon. Friend is absolutely right to point out how incorrect the intervention was. One of the areas where we are desperately short of workers is social work. How do we train up social workers? They are trained up at a university. The idea that universities are only for academic knowledge and not places where people can be trained for jobs is ludicrous.

Rachel Hopkins

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My hon. Friend also must have eyes in the back of her head, because one of the other points I want to talk about is health and social care. Again, I will talk about my fantastic home town of Luton. Someone can study for a BTEC in health and social care at Luton Sixth Form College, or study at the University of Bedfordshire and get practical skills training as a nurse, paramedic or midwife, before going on to be a nurse, paramedic or midwife at Luton and Dunstable University Hospital. All of those bodies will not be included in developing a skills plan if they are not set out in the Bill. I want to see them included, so that everyone feels that there is equality of partnership work, to ensure that what is needed is recognised.

I will not prolong my remarks any longer, but I just want to reiterate the points made from the Opposition Front Bench and say that taking out these important clauses that were inserted by the Lords weakens the Bill.

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Andrew Gwynne

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I do not want to prolong the debate on this group, but the Minister, in the discussion on the previous group, sought to assure the Committee that the approach was genuinely collaborative. Yet this group of amendments strikes out Lords amendments that would make the approach genuinely collaborative. I do not understand the thinking here. I cannot understand what the Minister thinks he is gaining or achieving by striking out the Lords amendments.

Let us look at the amendments in detail. Government amendment 6 would strike out, in clause 1(7)(a),

“in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers”.

The explanatory notes state that the reference to mayoral combined authorities is not required because that point has now been made clear through the earlier Government amendment that we have passed. I accept that point, but there is still a role for other local, non-mayoral combined authorities to have a view and an input into the skills agenda for their area, whether that is a unitary authority or a county council. These issues are part and parcel of what those local authorities do.

Emma Hardy

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It feels like removing the Lords amendment will result in democratic accountability if the area has a Mayor; if it does not, there is no democratic accountability. An area such as Hull, which has no mayoral authority, has no democratic accountability or reference in the Bill. That feels unfair.

Andrew Gwynne

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It not only feels unfair; it is unfair. I get that mayoral combined authorities have specific skills responsibilities devolved to them, so clearly the level of input from a mayoral combined authority is greater than that of a county council or a unitary authority that does not have those specific responsibilities devolved to them, but the council’s strategy for that area will involve education, skills and economic development. Those are important elements for county and unitary authorities.

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Matt Western

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rose—

Emma Hardy

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rose—

Andrew Gwynne

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I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Warwick and Leamington, because he was first, and then to my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle.

Andrew Gwynne

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I completely agree. Every layer of local government has an interest in the health and wellbeing—in the broadest sense—of the population. The best way to improve the health and wellbeing of the population is to ensure that people have good skills, good education and good job opportunities. That is the route to health and wellbeing, and that is true both at the district level and at upper levels.

Emma Hardy

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I want to highlight to Government Members, although I am sure the hon. Member for Mansfield will know this as leader of a local council, that local councils have a statutory duty for all children with special educational needs or disabilities up to the age of 25. They have a statutory duty for looked-after children. They have a statutory duty regarding the number of young people not in employment, education or training—NEETs—as well. They have those statutory duties, yet the Government amendments remove their voice from the local skills plan. That does not seem right.

Andrew Gwynne

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It absolutely does not seem right. I have spent a lot of time on local government, but the same part of subsection (7)(b) that will be struck out if Government amendment 7 is made goes further. While the line

“draws on the views of…employers operating within the specified area”

stays in, regional and local authorities, mayoral combined authorities and their strategies are taken out, but so are

“post-16 education providers active in the specified area, including schools, further education institutions, community learning providers, specialist designated institutions and universities”.

It is incomprehensible that those bodies would not be part and parcel of the deliberations on and the creation of the strategies.

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Alex Burghart

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It has been another lively and interesting debate on this group of amendments. The Government want to build an employer-led system, but the statutory guidance—yes, statutory guidance—will make it clear that the employer representative bodies that the Bill creates must consult a range of partners and collaborate with them.

On the removal of schools and other providers, the Bill is already clear that all relevant providers, including further education colleges, independent training providers, universities and sixth-form colleges need to be involved in the development of the LSIP—that is stated in subsection (4)—and if designated employer representative bodies do not have regard to relevant statutory guidance on engaging with relevant providers and do not comply with the terms and conditions of their designation, the Secretary of State may not approve or publish the local schools improvement plan and could remove their designation.

The national dimension is very important, and we expect local skills improvement plans to be informed by national skills priorities and to help address national, as well as local, skills needs. However, where there are national skills shortages in critical areas, we can expect the Government to carry on playing a role in helping alleviate them, as we are doing at the moment. We put £17 million into rapidly upskilling people to help meet the needs of the heavy goods vehicle sector, where we have significant shortages, and I have been pleased to see that that is going very well. That will not fall away.

Turning to the question of dropping the reference to long-term national skill needs, the Bill already makes reference to the fact that LSIPs will need to look at future skills needs—that is stated in subsections (2) and (7)(b)(iii). The Opposition made a very important point about the role of the public sector. Let us think about the phrase “employer representative bodies”: there is a very big role for business, but in many areas, the public sector is a major employer and will need to be involved in this process. We want ERBs to reach beyond their existing membership and cover both public and private employers.

Emma Hardy

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The Minister has mentioned the employer-led bodies in the public sector. Could he pick up on my point about SMEs, which might not be part of an employer-led body but, in some regions, are the main employers?

Alex Burghart

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We are expecting ERBs to draw up local skills improvement plans that take account of the economic area that they represent, which should absolutely include small and medium-sized employers, as well as self-employment opportunities.

While Opposition Members may feel that these things can be done only if every detail is written out in primary legislation, we know that that is not the case, because we have eight excellent trailblazer areas at the moment that are doing this job without a mite of primary legislation. With that in mind, I commend the amendment to the Committee.

Question put, That the amendment be made.