Oral Answers to Questions

Gillian Keegan Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Navendu Mishra (Stockport) (Lab)]

What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Transport on the availability of public transport for young people in further education during the covid-19 outbreak.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

We have been working closely with the Secretary of State for Transport to ensure that young people can travel and continue to travel to their place of education during the coronavirus pandemic. We have made £44 million available to fund additional dedicated transport to schools and colleges, and we will announce additional funding shortly.

[Navendu Mishra]

Does the Minister accept that the Government have a responsibility to ensure that local authorities have the funds available to operate low-cost travel schemes, such as the System One scheme in Greater Manchester? Does she agree that it is unacceptable for the Treasury to simply devolve cuts, which will ultimately have an impact on young people?

[Gillian Keegan]

Of course we have taken very seriously the issue of ensuring that children can get to school and colleges; there has been not only an extra £2 billion in funding to help people to walk to school and to make it safe for them to get to school, but £44 million for dedicated transport. So the Treasury is putting a lot of investment into this area.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

What estimate he has made of the number of school children that did not have access to (a) a laptop or (b) another device to facilitate home learning when schools were closed during the covid-19 lockdown.

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[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to increase the number of apprenticeships.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Gillian Keegan)]

I thank my hon. Friend for his question and for his support for apprenticeships. Apprenticeships will be more important than ever to support our economic recovery and help businesses to recruit the right people and develop the skills they need to recover and grow. To support employers to offer new apprenticeships, they can now claim £2,000 for every new apprentice they hire under the age of 25 and £1,500 for those aged over 25.

[John Howell]

As a country, we rightly champion our wonderful universities. However, we are often too slow—particularly in schools—to promote apprenticeships. Will my hon. Friend assure me that she is doing everything in her power to ensure that apprenticeships are seen as a valid part of our education system?

[Gillian Keegan]

I can reassure my hon. Friend that, as a former apprentice, this is very much at the forefront of my focus. The Prime Minister and the Chancellor have made it clear that further education is now more important than ever. That is part of the reason we are introducing once-in-a-generation reforms of the FE system through our skills White Paper, underpinning the progress we are already making with T-levels, which is backed by £500 million of funding per year, investing £1.5 billion in the transformation of the FE college estate, investing £2.5 billion through the national skills fund and introducing a new entitlement for adults without qualifications at level 3.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

The Minister is right to say that apprenticeships are more important than ever, but for all the rhetoric, the way that the Government introduced the apprenticeship levy saw level 2 and level 3 apprenticeship numbers falling to their lowest level for a decade before coronavirus. Since then, we have seen generous incentives in the new kickstart scheme and much less generous incentives for apprenticeships. For all that the Minister says, why do this Government consistently introduce policies that have the effect of reducing the numbers doing level 2 and 3 apprenticeships?

[Gillian Keegan]

The hon. Gentleman refers, I think, to the switch from frameworks to standards, which did have an impact on some of the numbers, but it was most important that we focused on the quality of apprenticeships. There were a number of apprenticeships early on, when we introduced the reform of the system, that were not of the desired quality. Young people put their trust in us, in the apprenticeship provider and in the employer, and it is most important that they get very high-quality apprenticeships; that is our focus.

[Virginia Crosbie (Ynys Môn) (Con)]

What steps his Department is taking to encourage more people to take up STEM subjects at university.