Education: Lifelong Learning

Lord Shipley Excerpts

Tuesday 19th October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shipley]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Sharp of Guildford for the opportunity to have this debate. I declare an interest as a retired member of staff of the Open University and as a very strong supporter of investment in adult education and lifelong learning. Three weeks ago, the play, “The Pitmen Painters”, opened on Broadway to rave reviews. It had transferred there after many sell-out performances at the National Theatre and at the Live Theatre on Newcastle’s Quayside, where it was first produced. “The Pitmen Painters” is about a group of Ashington miners who studied art appreciation with the Workers’ Educational Association. Written by Lee Hall, the play is based on a true story of how this group of miners took the art world by storm in the 1930s through their paintings, and the WEA in the north-east was part of their story.

A week on Friday, 29 October, will be the centenary of the creation of the WEA in the north-east of England. It has a long and proud history of providing part-time courses and projects in local community venues throughout the north-east, from the Tees Valley to Berwick, to meet the needs of local people. It provides learning opportunities for those who have previously missed out on education and supports people from diverse and disadvantaged neighbourhoods to acquire new skills and encourage them to take a more active role in their communities. With over 1,500 members and over 7,000 enrolments a year, the WEA in the north-east, as elsewhere, is very much part of the big society as it seeks to build social capital from its volunteer and community base.

WEA learners in the north-east are drawn predominantly from the region’s disadvantaged postcode areas. Many are without qualifications or lack them beyond level 2 and beyond. A high percentage of them declare health, physical or learning disabilities and enrolment of ethnic minority learners is higher than the proportion of ethnic minorities in the region’s population. Some 48 per cent live in postcodes that indicate deprivation; 48 per cent do not have to pay fees for economic reasons; 53 per cent have qualifications below level 2 when joining their courses; 38 per cent have a declared physical disability; 17 per cent have a declared learning disability; and 6 per cent are from a declared ethnic minority. Similar figures will be found throughout the country and are clear evidence that the WEA can reach people that other organisations may not be able to. This is because WEA courses can be set up anywhere—in clubs, community centres, village halls, schools, pubs and workplaces.

The WEA is the largest voluntary sector provider of adult education in the country with 12,000 part-time courses reaching over 70,000 people, but it is not the only provider. Some 1.8 million people over the age of 19 study as adults in our colleges, many over the age of 25, and, of course, many more with other providers. In recent years, much of the Government’s funding for education and training for adults has focused on work-related training, such as through Train to Gain, where employers receive a subsidy to train their staff to minimum standards. Colleges were funded only for this training, placing much greater pressure on “non priority” courses that no longer attracted as much public subsidy. The Government need to recognise perhaps more than they do the importance of informal learning for adults which supports active citizenship, community cohesion and social inclusion at the same time as it promotes individual progression. Our colleges are strongly placed to do this, as are our local authorities, our trade unions, our secondary schools and our universities, all of which engage so effectively with the lifelong learning agenda.

In a recent letter to the Deputy Prime Minister, the general secretary of the WEA pointed out the direct community benefit of adult education in improving the mental and physical health of individuals, raising aspirations within families and helping people and communities to adapt to change. With such a strong volunteer base, adult education gives enormous value for money, and in the context of the spending review two things might be considered. First, bureaucracy is a major cost and irritation to part-time adult learners. Exactly the same enrolment processes, regulation and audit apply to an adult on a 30-hour course as to a young person on a full-time qualification. If altered, this could cut administrative costs. Secondly, as a country we spend large sums of money in some areas of training that might be more effectively spent. For example, £737 million is being spent on Train to Gain in this financial year, some of which was described by the National Audit Office in 2009 as providing poor value for money.

The future of adult education as a whole is very important to an educated, cohesive society. It also represents very good value for money, repaying our investment many times over.