AstraZeneca (Pfizer Bid)

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Tuesday 6th May 2014 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

I have asked about the potential implications of the General Electric takeover for Alstom in the west midlands and—as far as we can establish—it has no negative implications. The GE-Alstom takeover is an interesting example. My French opposite number took strong exception to it, but has accepted that in reality the French Government had no alternative but to go along with it.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

In answer to my right hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton South East (Mr McFadden), the Secretary of State said that any assurances given by Pfizer, were this deal to go ahead, would have to be binding. Can he clarify for the House in exactly what way he would be able to make them legally binding?

[Vince Cable]

My civil servants and I are devoting much thought to precisely that question. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman would not want me to spell out all the gory details.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 10th April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

I apologise for remaining standing; I was so gripped by the question, I could not tear myself away.

I commend my hon. Friend for establishing what I think he calls the Carmichael commission in his constituency to look at ways to improve growth. He is right that having a pipeline of skilled staff is essential. I am familiar with Renishaw and I shall see the company tomorrow at the MACH exhibition in Birmingham. The crucial requirement is a long-term train of apprenticeship, at graduate and sub-graduate levels.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Is the Secretary of State at all worried that the current economic picture is being driven so much by consumer spending, and why does our productivity remain so poor?

[Vince Cable]

The Office for Budget Responsibility forecast for 2014 is that business investment will rise by 8%. Given the depth of the crisis to which we have had to respond, this is a slow process, but business investment is now overtaking consumer spending as the driver of the recovery.

Royal Mail

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Tuesday 1st April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

That is an option we wish to keep open and we have no immediate plans to dispose of it.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Seventy per cent. of the issue was reserved for financial institutions, including hedge funds. This morning on the “Today” programme, the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Michael Fallon) repeatedly said, “We got it away”. Would it have been more accurate for him to say, “We gave it away to our hedge fund friends who have given £38 million to the Conservative party”?

[Vince Cable]

That series of connections does not appear very logical. The only significant hedge fund at the time of the offering was TCI, which has since sold most of its shares.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 6th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

The Secretary of State mentioned the importance of growth in his Department’s mission, and yet, as we have heard, the OECD has this morning revised its growth forecast for the UK economy from plus 0.5% to minus 0.7%. Does he not see the need to change course?

[Vince Cable]

We recognise the economic difficulties faced by most of the western democracies, including our own, and the hon. Gentleman knows the reason for them. We had a boom in this country that got out of control and left a substantial legacy; we have broken banks; we have a very serious consumer debt problem; and we have major problems in our export markets. Those are the factors that contribute to the current difficulties, but we have a range of policies, several of which have been announced today, that are designed to counter those areas of weakness in growth, especially in construction.

Office for Fair Access

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Monday 20th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

Yes, I can give my right hon. Friend absolute assurance on that score. I would like to pay tribute to him for the work he has done on universities, particularly on promoting fair access, for many years.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Before he went off to the south pole, did the Universities Minister say, “I’m just going out. I may be some time”? Will the Secretary of State give us an absolute assurance that no Minister communicated with any Conservative member of the Select Committee in an attempt to influence the ratification of this appointment?

[Vince Cable]

It would have been quite improper to have done so. To the best of my knowledge, that has certainly not happened. The decision is a Government decision, and we all stand behind it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 14th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State actively seek to get responsibility for competition policy in media ownership back into his Department? The fact that he was honey-trapped in his surgery does not mean that it should not be a Minister in his Department who takes such decisions. We have now seen the error of sending these matters to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

[Vince Cable]

Unlike my predecessors, I do not see my job in terms of empire building; I am more concerned that we should get good policy. The Deputy Prime Minister has spoken today on the need radically to reform policy in relation to competition and cross-ownership in the media. Indeed, we might well have to revisit the legislation, because it is clearly unsatisfactory.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 31st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills (Vince Cable)]

My Department has a key role in supporting business to deliver growth, rebalancing the economy, bringing enterprise, manufacturing, training, learning and research closer together and, in the process, creating a stronger, fairer British economy.

[Kevin Brennan]

On tuition fees, has the Secretary of State read the reports of the Deputy Prime Minister’s visit to Mexico, where he was humiliated first by a Mexican student who said that he could no longer afford to come and study in Britain, and then by the Mexican President, who said that British students should go to study in Mexico instead? Is the Secretary of State in any way embarrassed by the fact that his policy on tuition fees has become a laughing stock across the world?

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 13th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I was a former competition Minister in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, so will the Secretary of State tell me whether he regards the conversation he had with journalists before Christmas about the BSkyB case as a serious breach of the ministerial code?

[Vince Cable]

I did indeed express regret for the comments made, but they were not considered to be a breach of the ministerial code.

Higher Education Fees

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 9th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

The terms of the statutory instrument are narrow, but I think you ruled yesterday evening, Mr Speaker, that you would like us to entertain debate on the wider issues involved, because they arouse very strong feelings inside and outside the House. The instrument represents a central part of a policy that is designed to maintain high-quality universities in the long term, that tackles the fiscal deficit and that provides a more progressive system of graduate contributions based on people’s ability to pay.

I shall briefly go over the sequence of events that has led to this debate. I became Secretary of State in May, when the Browne report was being conducted. It had been commissioned by the previous Labour Government last November. They had asked the former chief executive of BP to conduct a report in order to prepare the way for an increase in tuition fees following the earlier introduction of fees, and then top-up fees, by the last Government.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Vince Cable]

I will take interventions later. You have asked, Mr Speaker, that both Front Benchers should keep their introductions brief. [Interruption.] As hon. Members know, I am very happy to take interventions, but I will take them when I have developed an argument. [Interruption.]

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 18th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

We have learned this week from the papers that the Secretary of State is participating in the “Strictly Come Dancing” Christmas special. [Hon. Members: “Hurrah!”] Does that mean that his policy towards business and the economy is “Slow, slow, quick, quick, slow”?

[Vince Cable]

I have been taught to dance “Quick, quick, quick, quick, quick”, and that is what I will be doing, both in my Department and on the Christmas show.

Higher Education and Student Finance

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Tuesday 12th October 2010 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

In his remarks, the Secretary of State made reference to the pledge that he and some of his colleagues apparently signed. I have not seen it. Could he tell us what it says? Will he place a copy of it in the House of Commons Library, so that hon. Members can study it more carefully and perhaps give it a wider audience?

[Vince Cable]

The sense of humour coming from Opposition Members is becoming a little bit tired even for those among their own ranks. If we want to play silly games, I am afraid that I will constantly have to go back to them and ask how, if they do not want a system of graduate contributions of the kind that we are recommending, they would fund the system, given the massive cuts that they would have to make if they were still in government clearing up the mess that they created.

Industry (Government Support)

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Wednesday 16th June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

The money has been made available; that is the key point. We know from the National Apprenticeship Service that there is a great deal of interest in this programme and those places will be taken. It is a big advance on the level we inherited. Let me emphasise that, unlike the previous Government, we do not believe that we can fund these things out of thin air. We have funded it by changing our priorities. We have made a decision to cut back on the Train to Gain programme in order to fund these additional apprenticeships. That was based on priorities and on a critical review by the National Audit Office of how the Train to Gain programme operated under the last Government. We discovered that a quarter of all training places would have been funded by the companies anyway, that the programme was paying for the accreditation of skills where those skills already existed and that it was paying for expensive middlemen rather than establishing direct links between businesses and colleges. We now have not just more apprenticeships, but a better mechanism.

Secondly, we want to support further education colleges, which are the basis for post-16 education and training among those who do not go to university. One of the Government’s initial steps was to create a £50 million capital fund, more details of which will be announced tomorrow by the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes). It is worth remembering the Labour Government’s record in respect of FE capital—

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

Huge investment.

[Vince Cable]

The hon. Gentleman says huge investment. I do not know what Department he served in, but the responsible Minister had to make a profound apology to the House for the complete catastrophe created by the Learning and Skills Council when it invited colleges to come forward with capital works projects. Bids were put in and then approvals followed for 10 times the value of the money available, so that many of those projects had to be cancelled. Colleges across the country are now living with the legacy costs of that. We are now putting in place a firm programme, properly costed, which will deliver serious capital investment to the FE sector.

I was asked what would happen to the regional development agencies. It is very clear from the coalition agreement that RDAs will be replaced by local enterprise partnerships. The right hon. Member for Wolverhampton South East asked perfectly valid questions about how that transition will be managed and how the enterprises and local councils will work together. My colleague, the Minister of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, my hon. Friend the Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr Prisk), will come forward in due course with proposals explaining how that will happen.

Lest we fall into the idea of believing that all RDAs made a remarkable contribution to the British economy, it is worth reflecting on some of the comments made by the Public Accounts Committee and then the National Audit Office. What we learned from that analysis is that the RDAs absorbed something like £10.6 billion in their lifetime. They did create some employment, that is for sure—at £60,000 per job. That was the cost—much more than twice the average wage, and at a time when there was a labour shortage in the economy and people were coming in from overseas. I repeat that £60,000 was being paid through the RDAs into creating employment. I do not deny that many of their activities were useful, but equally many were not. At Prime Minister’s Questions, the Prime Minister detailed some of the more absurd excesses, and I could have added a few more—the £50,000 party for the South West of England RDA in Center Parcs, champagne receptions in Cannes and many others. Some serious work was done, but it was very costly, raising very serious questions of cost-effectiveness. We now want to create a structure that reflects the real interest of enterprise and local councils.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Vince Cable

Thursday 3rd June 2010 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

Indeed; the hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. We are talking about the full range of skills in this regard. If he wishes to pursue his point in relation to his constituency, the National Apprenticeship Service is there to help him to steer the scheme in the right direction.

[Kevin Brennan (Cardiff West) (Lab)]

I warmly welcome the right hon. Gentleman to his position and welcome his apparent desire to carry on Labour’s outstanding record on growing apprenticeships. When I became the Minister with responsibility for apprenticeships, I thought I was being radical in appointing an apprentice to my private office, but I must admit that even I would not have been as brave as this Government and gone so far as to appoint an apprentice as the new Chief Secretary to the Treasury.

Given the need to set a good example to business, can the right hon. Gentleman tell us what the numbers will be for this year on public sector starts for apprenticeships?

[Vince Cable]

Of course we cannot give numbers for that, for the simple reason that it is an offer for businesses to take up. Many of them will be in the public sector, and many of them will be in the private sector. I will keep in touch with the hon. Gentleman and give him the information that he requires as it emerges.