Technical and Vocational Education

Lord Austin of Dudley Excerpts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

I am very pleased that the shadow Secretary of State called for this debate, because we have to make education and skills this country’s No. 1 priority. The biggest question that we face, as a country, is how we can bring new, better-paid and more secure jobs to places such as Dudley, which have lost their traditional industries. The only way our country will pay its way in this century, let alone prosper, is by equipping the British people with the skills that they need to compete. There is no more urgent priority or task.

Children who are at school today will spend their adult lives working with technologies that have not yet been invented, and that we cannot even imagine. On average, those who leave school today will have more than a dozen jobs over their lifetime. The key thing that they have to learn is how to adapt and acquire new skills. However, the CBI’s education and skills survey in 2013 found that nearly a third of employers were dissatisfied with school leavers’ basic literacy and numeracy. Too few students have good English and maths GCSEs by the time they reach 18.

Germany has three times as many apprentices as the UK. The number of young apprentices—those who are under the age of 19—is falling, as is the number of apprentices in information technology and construction. It is good that the Minister has introduced degree-level apprenticeships, but they account for less than 2% of apprenticeships.

Britain is also falling behind our competitors in basic numeracy and literacy. In basic skills, we now lag behind not only countries such as Finland, South Korea and Germany but even Estonia, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. England is the only country in the developed world where the generation approaching retirement is more literate and numerate than the one entering the work force.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

And when did that happen?

[Ian Austin]

If I may say so, that is a narrow party political point. I believe that the last Government took many great steps in education and skills, and if the hon. Gentleman bothers to listen, he might discover that I am saying some things that he and his party’s Front Benchers actually agree with. He ought to sit down, listen carefully and then perhaps contribute later to a serious debate about what I am saying should be the No. 1 priority for every political party.

We should agree as a country—all parties, Government, schools, universities, the teaching profession and businesses—clear long-term targets to transform education and ensure that we have the skills that we need to compete. We should set an ambition for Britain to produce the best-educated and most highly skilled young people in the world. Someone is going to do that, so why can it not be us? We have to drive up standards in our schools and get behind head teachers and teachers who are working to improve standards. If we recruit good teachers, motivate them, set high aspirations and tough targets, focus on standards and discipline and make the kids believe in themselves, the sky is the limit.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that companies such as Jaguar Land Rover need highly skilled and highly qualified technicians? Fairly recently, they were having difficulty recruiting them. If we cannot get people with high skills and technological qualifications, how will we expand our manufacturing base in the west midlands, for example? Does he agree that that is critical to the area?

[Ian Austin]

I completely agree. That is a critical issue, particularly in the black country, where we are getting the new engine plant. It is fantastic that Jaguar Land Rover is sponsoring a university technical college, and skills are crucial not just for JLR but for all the people in its supply chain.

[James Morris (Halesowen and Rowley Regis) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman and I both represent parts of Dudley. Does he agree that we need better matching of skills and employers? The black country local growth deal, signed this week, will bring significant investment to both Halesowen college and Dudley college in his constituency; it will go a long way towards addressing the issue that the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham) mentioned.

[Ian Austin]

I welcome every penny that will be spent on improving the facilities at Dudley college. It is fantastic that we will get a new construction centre to go alongside the new manufacturing centre that is being built, the new sixth-form college, and the new college buildings that the shadow Secretary of State visited a couple of weeks ago, which were funded entirely locally, rather than by central Government.

Research by the Sutton Trust shows that bringing the lowest-performing 10% of teachers in the UK up to the average would make our country the third best-performing country in reading, and the fifth best in maths—subjects in which we currently fail to make the top 20.

We need to recruit and train a new generation of head teachers. Ellowes Hall, a comprehensive school in my constituency, has gone from fewer than four in 10 students getting five good GCSEs a few years ago, to more than eight in 10 doing so today. They are kids from the same families, and largely with the same teachers, but what has changed is that there is a brilliant new head teacher, Andy Griffiths. We need to find new ways of identifying, recruiting and training head teachers and improving the quality of teaching. We should expand Teach First massively, and I commend the shadow Secretary of State’s proposal to introduce a new master teacher status, inspired by education reforms in Singapore. We should find new ways of enabling popular, well run and financially sound schools that are consistently over-subscribed to access the funding they need to expand, so that parents can send their children to the schools they want to, not ones that they would prefer them not to have to go to.

We should expand Lord Baker’s brilliant work on university technical colleges. Unfortunately, our bid for a UTC in Dudley was not successful, but undeterred, Lowell Williams, the brilliant principal of Dudley college, is working with local employers and Aston university to open Dudley Advance, a new technology and manufacturing centre that will soon be open to help students of all ages get new skills and jobs. We should aim for all apprenticeships to provide level 3 qualifications and to last for two years, and insist that every firm that wants major Government contracts provides apprenticeships. We need higher education, and a university campus in every town. It is a scandal that Dudley is England’s biggest town with no university campus.

People say to me, “Look Ian, what’s the point of going to university when there aren’t the jobs afterwards?”, but they are completely wrong. More than 94% of students who graduated from the university of Wolverhampton in 2013 are in work or undertaking further study. Three out of four were working in graduate-level professional and managerial jobs earning graduate-level salaries, with 60% earning between £15,000 and £30,000, and more than a fifth earning between £30,000 and £60,000. Scores of its students have gone on to set up their own business. Under Vice-Chancellor Geoff Layer’s leadership, Wolverhampton is achieving its ambition to be the university of opportunity, contributing to the local economy and economic regeneration, providing the skills and knowledge our economy needs, helping local businesses grow and succeed, setting up new businesses, and creating jobs and wealth in the black country.

Despite accounting for just 7% of school pupils, those from independent schools represent seven out of 10 High Court judges, more than half our leading journalists and doctors, and more than a third of MPs. Just five public schools send more pupils to Oxford and Cambridge than 2,000 state schools. I therefore reiterate my call for Ministers and those on our Front Bench to take up the Sutton Trust’s open access proposals.

In conclusion, let us agree as a country to make education the No. 1 priority, and to have the best-educated young people in the world. Let us support teachers and heads in improving schools. We need more technical colleges, more apprentices, and more people studying for technical qualifications. Let us open up the best schools in the country to the brightest students, whatever their background. Better schools, better skills, better jobs—that should be our rallying cry for the 21st century.