Preventing Crime and Delivering Justice

Gill Furniss Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Gill Furniss (Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough) (Lab)]

After 12 years of a Conservative Government, they now promise that this will be the Queen’s Speech to fix regional inequality. Forgive me if I do not take the Government’s words at face value. We have heard all this before, and just like before, this Government are all talk and no action. First it was the long-term economic plan—remember that? The Conservative party cynically used that phrase time and again to justify slashing services for those who needed them most. Then it was the northern powerhouse. Let us check how that is going—major infrastructure projects scrapped, living standards down and inequality up.

When I say “inequality”, I know that it is a word we can knock about a bit, but it means people, families and children living in abject poverty and having no way out of it. Let us be clear about that, and let us remind everyone again whose fault that is. This Government have been in power for 12 years, but from some of the rhetoric we have heard today, we would imagine this Government were elected only two years ago. When these hon. Members talk about resetting things and getting on with things, what they are actually doing is admitting that they have got it wrong for the last few years. If they had got it right, we would not be seeing them coming up with such policies now, so I do not think that is anything to talk about or celebrate.

To move on, the latest buzzword now is “levelling up”, but just like all those other times before, the Government are hoping that a catchy slogan will be enough to distract us from their chronic inaction. It is yet another piece of the empty rhetoric we have come to expect from the Conservatives, but their record speaks for itself. In my constituency of Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough, we have borne the full brunt of more than a decade of Tory cuts. The spending power of Sheffield City Council has been slashed by almost a third since 2010. Communities such as mine do not need catchphrases; they need investment.

Turning to a particular area very close to my heart, further education has a huge role to play if we are truly to level up. Sadly, we are seeing worrying trends in skills and in education. In a recent survey, a third of British businesses said that their workforces are lacking basic literacy and numeracy skills. Our further education institutions go above and beyond to upskill their students. Having worked in colleges for most of my life, I know that education is one of the most powerful tools in lifting people out of poverty, and I have seen that in action in my constituency. The Sheffield College and Longley Park Sixth Form do fantastic work to ensure that their students leave with the skills that they need to succeed, but that commitment is not matched by the support they need from Government. The Prime Minister speaks about the importance of getting people into high-paid jobs, but he refuses to take the action needed to get them there. More investment in further education and post-16 education and careers is needed now.

The Government’s further education and post-16 reforms risk leaving behind completely the students who need the most help. T-levels are an important addition to our education system, but they should not come at the expense of existing qualifications that have proved to be successful. BTECs are taken by almost a third of 16 to 18-year-old students and help to ensure that young people enter adulthood with a level 3 qualification, which is vital when entering the workforce. Rolling them back will undermine that work as well as cut student choice and degrade the variety of qualifications that employers can look for. Students who do not qualify for T-levels could end up falling through the cracks and miss out completely on any levelling-up exercise, should it even exist.

[Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)]

I agree with the hon. Member that apprenticeships and technical education have not been promoted enough, but does she agree that that was not helped by the previous Labour Prime Minister but one having an obsession with a 50% university target and that many people who have gone to university would have been better served by doing an apprenticeship?

[Gill Furniss]

I thank the hon. Member for his intervention, but I would say: your Government have been in power for 12 years and, if you did not like it, why did you not do something before?

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

Order. The hon. Lady knows that she must not address the hon. Gentleman directly.

[Gill Furniss]

I apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Cutting BTECs flies directly in the face of levelling up. Instead of that, the Government should be championing them alongside T-levels. That is just one example of the Government’s actions failing to meet their rhetoric. Ministers are already making excuses on levelling up. The Levelling Up Secretary has spent the last week trying to cover up his own failures and those of the Government. He is trying to lead us to believe that deepening inequality is purely a result of external events such as covid and the war in Ukraine, but we know the truth.

We know that responsibility for the entrenched inequalities in our society falls at the door of this Conservative Government and their policies. Pensioners are having to ride buses all day to keep warm and families are struggling to afford the basic essentials, but, instead of stepping in, the Government are stepping aside. They are too busy trying to cover their own shortfalls to provide the support that people are crying out for. We all know why they are doing that: one day, just like the long-term economic plan and the northern powerhouse, levelling up will be retired as a political slogan with nothing to show but deeper inequality and worsening living standards.

The Government have once again shown that they are all talk and no action. The Queen’s Speech is yet another missed opportunity that fails to fix the deep-rooted inequalities caused by 12 years of this Conservative Government. They are out of ideas and out touch—and hopefully, following the Conservatives’ dire local election results on Friday, they will soon be out of office. Britain deserves so much better than this.