Employment (North-West)

Iain Wright Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Iain Wright (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

I am particularly pleased that we are serving under your chairmanship today, Mr Bayley. For my sins, I was campaign manager for the Oldham East and Saddleworth by-election earlier this year. I have fond and vivid memories of driving through the snow on the M62 to deliver the keynote speech for the celebration of achievements at a spectacular and ambitious college called York college. I understand that you are a massive champion of that fantastic further education institution, Mr Bayley, so it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship.

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Mr Marsden) on securing the debate. I pay tribute to him not only for being a first-class Member of Parliament on behalf of his constituents, but for his excellent work on the Front Bench in respect of further education colleges and adult skills. He knows how important it is for young people to have opportunities provided to allow them to have fulfilling and rewarding careers and lives and for professionals to have the support and resources to navigate the young people through the options that they face.

We have had a good debate. Hon. Members from all parties have articulated the enormous potential of the north-west. As I was listening to the debate, it struck me that the north-west is very similar in terms of its history and potential to my region of the north-east. We were once the workshop and powerhouse of the world, and we also suffered too much from changes to industry in the latter half of the 20th century. However, our economies have diversified and both areas now have great potential to take advantage of the opportunities in the 21st-century global economy.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South said, the north-west has a strong network of further and higher education institutions. It is also very similar to my area of the north-east in having a positive culture of welcoming apprenticeships. My hon. Friend mentioned world-class apprenticeship schemes in the north-west such as those run by BAE Systems. I should like to mention companies such as MBDA in Bolton. I greatly enjoyed going to that factory when I was a Minister. A few months ago, I welcomed apprentices from the firm to the House with my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling). The quality of MBDA’s apprenticeship scheme is absolutely first class. I particularly like the way that apprentices visit schools to teach younger pupils about science and engineering. They spark pupils’ interest in the issues, ignite their ambition and encourage mentoring and work experience opportunities. The MBDA apprentices are the very model of professionalism. They are marvellous ambassadors not only for their firm and Bolton, but for young people across the country.

The debate has provided a good opportunity to ask the Government what they have against the young people of this country. In the space of a few short months since coming to office, they have stripped young people of opportunities through the abolition of the future jobs fund, the cancellation of education maintenance allowance, the trebling of tuition fees, the ending of Aimhigher, the cancellation of the youth opportunities fund, the ending of young apprenticeships and the loss of the careers service without any replacement put in place.

Any Government should be judged on their ambition for the future by the way in which they help, support and nurture young people. I am afraid that this Government have been found wanting at best and downright neglectful and damaging to the next generation at worst. It is little wonder that the Education Committee concluded in its recent report on services to young people:

“we comment that the Government’s lack of urgency in articulating a youth policy or strategic vision is regrettable. The Government needs to acknowledge the reality of what is happening to many youth services on the ground and act now.”

We have heard in the debate how the economic certainties that the post-war generation had have gone for ever. People in the north-west in the 1950s and ’60s might have had a very clear form of career road map, as was also the case in my patch. People might have gone into the Ferranti works in Hollinwood, Oldham, or been employed by Crossley in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South. Alternatively, they might have worked at the docks in Liverpool or on the railways in Crewe. Those places were the absolute bedrock of the local economy and provided a certainty of long-term employment that is no longer there. My hon. Friend recalled vividly how his father left school at the age of 14 and expected to work in the same place for 30, if not 40, years.

Young people are starting their careers in a much more complex and more challenging world, which has been made even more difficult by the global financial crisis. In an economic downturn, young people will find it especially difficult to secure and maintain employment, because by definition they do not have experience of work. They face that Catch-22 situation—they cannot find work because they have not got experience, but they cannot secure experience because they have not got work. We in the House have to help young people to break that cycle.

In these challenging times, it is more vital than ever that young people have the support, help and tools they need to navigate the various options that they face when trying to secure further education, training or employment. Now, more than ever, we need an effective careers service for young people. That is why the Government’s inept and shambolic attempts to reform the careers service are particularly damaging. The move from Connexions to a national careers service, with schools having a greater responsibility for the provision of such information, advice and guidance, has been botched. I like the Minister very much—I should like to consider him as a friend—but I have to tell him that on this occasion and on this issue he is guilty of being asleep on the job.

I have a series of questions that the Minister needs to address, and he needs to address them urgently. Will he update the House as to where we are on the transition plan? In March, during the consideration in Committee of the Education Bill, I stressed to him the urgency of producing rapidly a comprehensive transition plan for the careers service. We are now at the stage, more than three months after discussing this in Committee, where we still have no real additional information. That is not good enough. School leavers have a matter of days—literally, days—left in education, but no real clarity on what will happen come September. How shambolic is that? Will the Minister get his finger out and do something quickly to prevent those young people, in the north-west and elsewhere, from drifting because of ambiguity, uncertainty and dithering by the Government into a lifetime of low pay, low skills and low expectations?

I understand that the careers summit between the Minister and professionals will take place soon—I think it is on 15 July. I fear that this is far too little far too late, but will the Minister provide further information on the agenda and invitees to the event? Parliamentary questions from me were answered by the Minister of State, Department for Education, the hon. Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton (Mr Gibb)—it is unusual to get Education Ministers to answer parliamentary questions, but I will leave it at that—but the answers were spectacularly uninformative. Does the Minister now accept that the summit is happening too late? What does the Minister hope to achieve from the summit and how will practical recommendations and suggestions arising from it be communicated and disseminated to schools and other stakeholders, particularly given the time of the year? The summer holidays will start a matter of hours after the summit.

Face-to-face guidance was mentioned in the debate, and that is a good part of good-quality information, advice and guidance. It worries me that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills states on its website that it will provide:

“free face to face guidance to priority groups”.

Will the Minister confirm or deny that not all pupils will receive face-to-face information, advice and guidance? Will he articulate what the phrase “priority groups” actually means, and what will the criteria be for such groups? Will he reassure me that priority groups will include all children—all children in schools—to let them have the opportunity to have face-to-face guidance on careers to allow them to make meaningful choices and decisions about their future career?

The Minister’s Department’s website states:

“the network of organisations funded by BIS will be able to offer services on the open market to those individuals/organisations which are willing to pay”.

Will the Minister explain that in more detail? In particular, will he rule out the prospect of high-quality information, advice and guidance, including that important point about face-to-face careers advice and guidance being provided to pupils only where parents are willing to pay an additional fee for such a service? Can he rule that out immediately?

Many careers professionals lost their jobs when local authorities dispensed with Connexions at the end of March. The Government talk a good game when they say they wish to trust professionals in education policy but not, evidently, when it comes to careers professionals. How will the Minister ensure that that experience, skills and professionalism will not be lost permanently for young people, when thousands of staff lost their jobs in March?

The Minister is aware, because my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South rightly pointed it out, that funding for careers has been cut severely. My hon. Friend mentioned the pooling of 22 separate funding streams, including that for Connexions, into a single early intervention grant. He made the point, in a great and articulate way, about the additional services that this early intervention grant has to produce. In addition to Connexions and youth services, it is intended to fund Sure Start children’s centres, build capacity for local authorities to extend free early education to disadvantaged two-year-olds, provide short breaks for disabled children, support vulnerable young people to engage in education and training, prevent young people from taking part in risky behaviour such as crime, substance misuse or teenage pregnancy, support young people at risk of mental health problems and help young people who have a learning difficulty or disability. There is simply not the funding in place to have an effective careers service. Can the Minister do something about that, especially when we are thinking that the early intervention grant will be cut by a further 11 per cent next year?

The Government have failed to articulate their vision about how they will help young people develop and prosper in the most difficult economic circumstances for a generation. More damning is that the Government have simply failed young people. We have seen the Secretary of State for Education lose control over his Department, fail to address the real needs that young people and industry require and fail to be on the right side of the argument on the careers service, school capital, school sport and the education maintenance allowance. He has emphasised elitism in education at the expense of excellence for all. As we have heard several times during the debate this afternoon, we now face the appalling prospect of a lost generation failing to achieve its potential and having a poorer quality of life than the previous generation. That is not how it should be. The Minister needs to raise his game and do something to help the young people of the north-west and, indeed, the young people of the entire country.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Hayes]

In South Holland and The Deepings the increase in apprenticeships was 43%—but I did not know that until I came to the Chamber.

[Mr Iain Wright]

What about Hartlepool?

[Mr Hayes]

I am saving Hartlepool—I am building up to it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Wright]

The Minister has mentioned macro-economics. Economic growth has been forecast downwards repeatedly and quite dramatically. Will that impact on his target of 500,000 apprenticeships, which is obviously based on demand in the wider economy?

[Mr Hayes]

I never have targets; I only have ambitions—it would be vulgar to describe them as targets. The hon. Gentleman is right that, at the next stage of implementation, we need to tie our skills strategy more closely to growth, so next I want to identify those parts of the economy with the biggest growth potential and where skills gaps might inhibit that potential growth. Over the coming weeks and months, I hope to look specifically at the inhibitors to growth in those areas where we can create maximum opportunities for employment, including employment for young people. He is right that, in developing the strategy that I laid out last November, we certainly need to be mindful of growth and, in particular, of sectors and subsectors where there are real skills gaps that are impacting on productivity and competitiveness. For example, I was at Ravensbourne academy today, talking about the creative industries, which have real capacity for growth but also unmet demand, and we need to address that issue of skills. Advanced manufacturing is another such example. We need to look at such challenges, and he is right to raise the issue.

I have spoken about macro-economics and apprenticeships, although I am at risk of becoming an apprenticeship bore. Suffice to say that, for the whole time that I am the Minister, which my hon. Friends throughout the Chamber hope will be for a long time, although that is down to the Prime Minister and not to me, apprenticeships will be the pivot. Shaping the skills system around apprenticeships creates a different dynamic and a different set of expectations, as well as a vocational pathway that is as navigable, progressive, seductive and rigorous as the academic route on which so many of us travelled. We need a longer vocational ladder, which is rigorous and provides opportunity for young people, and which means that those with practical and vocational tastes and talents do not see vocational learning as a cul-de-sac. For too long, people have not seen the route to higher learning in that vocational pathway, which they need to do if they are to make the right choices at the right time that are most likely to allow them to fulfil their potential.

I have said that I will discuss careers advice and guidance; it would be wrong for me not to do so. I will be making a major speech on the subject tomorrow, so the hon. Member for Hartlepool can look forward to that with bated breath. I could say more now but, in fact, I will do more than that, although my officials will shudder: I will deal with all the questions that he asked today in that speech tomorrow—it will require some redrafting, because we did not know what questions he would pose until a few moments ago—but I will ensure that I do, as I owe the hon. Gentleman that.

In summary, however, the hon. Gentleman grossly overstated my few weaknesses and understated my many strengths. I do not mind his doing that, because I like him as he likes me. I believe passionately in advice and guidance, for the reasons that my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral West (Esther McVey) has mentioned. She is doing such incredible work: for example, by pulling together the Wirral youth summit, in just a few days’ time, and by doing immense work promoting careers advice and guidance. My hon. Friend the Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) and the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg) understand the difference for social mobility of ambition and rebalancing advantage in society—as a Tory, I believe in rebalancing and redistributing advantage in society—and the hon. Member for West Lancashire (Rosie Cooper) feels the same. Therefore, we need to ensure that we give those young people who do not have access to familial networks or similar social networks the best advice, so that they get their chance of glittering prizes as well. That is why we need good advice and guidance.

So we will do three things. First, over the past year, we have done a great deal with the careers profession, which in the coming months—certainly by the autumn—will be in a position to announce an unprecedented degree of co-operation among careers professionals, leading to a new set of professional standards with linked training and accreditation. The national careers service will be founded on the expertise and professionalism of the careers sector, reprofessionalised and emerging from the dark days under the previous regime to a new era of purposeful drive, in which it is valued and its role is central to the work that we will do to foster social mobility. That will be laid out in the autumn—I always said that the national careers service would be up and running next year, not this year. The hon. Gentleman will have a chance to look at those proposals, and I think that he will be proud of the work that the Careers Profession Alliance has done following the work of the task force led by Dame Ruth Silver.

Secondly, we will change the statutory duty on schools to ensure that they secure independent professional advice—the Bill is going through the House now—which I expect them to do. For too long provision has been patchy. The hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby talked about the difference between the independent sector and the state sector, and he is right. Connexions did not do the job—let us be frank. Connexions did some good work, of course, and many people were dedicated to that work, but the structure itself was faulty, because it had to be a jack of all trades rather than a master of careers. We are therefore changing the statutory duty incumbent on schools, and we will deliver a tough statutory arrangement to ensure that schools live up to it.

Finally, we will provide national access to the national careers service through co-location with colleges throughout the country and Jobcentre Plus. We will lay all those proposals before the House, so the hon. Member for Hartlepool can be confident that, in every part of Britain, young people and others will be able to obtain the careers advice and guidance that they need to make the best of themselves—to be their best and to do their best. I will say more tomorrow, but I know that you, Mr Bayley, and others will leave this Chamber with a spring in your step, because you know that the Government are committed to the young people of the north-west and to all the young people of Britain.