National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard - part two): House of Lords
Tuesday 25th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction to the Bill and thank the House authorities for arranging matters so that those noble Lords who also serve on the Charities Select Committee have been able to participate in the debate. Their contribution has been very helpful.

What a rich debate it has been, despite being—as one might say—a game of two halves or a debate separated by a new runway. We covered many aspects of volunteering and the contribution that charities and third-sector organisations make to our civic life. I certainly learned a lot about what has been going on out there.

Like many noble Lords, I, too, am grateful to the agencies and charities that have provided briefings and made very helpful suggestions for improvements that might be made to the Bill during its passage through your Lordships’ House. I also thank the Library for its very helpful note about the Bill and its antecedents in the big society.

The Minister said in his introduction that the National Citizen Service Bill is intended to secure the future of the NCS and make the NCS Trust more accountable to Parliament and the public. He said that the Bill, although slim, was large in aspiration. I have to say that the preponderance of comments have pointed out the opportunities missed and the lack of ambition in the Bill to solve problems in the broader area of civic engagement, volunteering and citizenship education. But we are where we are.

In May 2016 the briefing notes for the Queen’s Speech explained that a National Citizen Service Bill would,

“expand National Citizen Service by encouraging thousands more young people to take advantage of the skills building programmes offered”,

that it would be granted a royal charter and that the NCS would,

“benefit from a £1.2 billion cash injection”.

So the organisation is well funded and sufficiently well regarded by government to be given the benefit of the stardust—as I think it was called—of the special protection that can be accorded by a royal charter. I noted, as did a number of noble Lords, the reservations expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, with which I have great sympathy. I understand where he is coming from. Those of us who have been grappling with the BBC royal charter and the fallout from the Leveson report might well have good reason to pause at this point—but, by and large, it probably is a good thing that we are proceeding down this route.

My noble friend Lord Blunkett and the noble Lord, Lord Maude—who did not need to dress up for this occasion; we are quite capable of doing this in a democratic and open way—raised the independence of the new organisation and whether it would be possible to arrange for the board and chair to be appointed independently of the Government. They wanted the organisation to be not so much at arm’s length but insulated from government. As my noble friend Lord Lennie said, there is concern about the role of the Inland Revenue, whose letters do not always bring good news and may be viewed with suspicion.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, that the key point here is the need to ensure that the organisation is both independent and seen to be independent of government; otherwise, as many noble Lords pointed out, it may destroy the possibility that it will become the rite of passage for young people that we all hope it will be. I am sure we will return to this issue in Committee.

A number of noble Lords raised the question of scale. The November 2015 spending review included funding to expand the NCS to deliver up to 300,000 places a year by 2019-20—which, as the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, said, is an ambitious uplift even allowing for the fact that NCS is as much an enabler of other organisations to run their courses as it is a direct provider. Indeed, a number of noble Lords suggested that in future it should concentrate on being an enabler and not a provider—more Channel 4 than BBC, as the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, suggested.

Several noble Lords focused on one of the distinctive aspects of the NCS, which is that it seeks to bring together young people from different backgrounds, to help participants develop greater confidence, self-awareness and responsibility by meeting people they would not ordinarily meet. It is not the only organisation in the UK that does this sort of work but its determination to run mixed geographical and cultural groupings marks it out. I took the feeling across the House to be that the new organisation will have to use all the tricks in the book to do this, combined with what the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, called a relentless focus on those who are disadvantaged and a steely determination to ensure that they participate—not forgetting those with disabilities or those who live in rural settings, who often have their own barriers to participation, as the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Portsmouth reminded us.

The introduction of the Bill gives Parliament and the country an opportunity to reconsider the potential of the title words: “national”, “citizen” and “service”. On “national”, under the Bill the NCS’s funding and current activities are restricted to England, as we were reminded by the noble Lord, Lord Wei. I support him in this. As he said, of course it is right to respect the wishes of the nations of the UK to come up with their own models but it seems strange that more has not been done to seek partner organisations in Scotland, for example, and to give them the carrot of an opportunity to have guaranteed funding and royal charter protection.

Incidentally, I assume that Barnett consequentials flow from the funding that is going into the NCS. Can the Minister help us here and point out where the money is being spent in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland if it is not being spent on the NCS? After all, £1.3 billion is quite a lot of extra cash to be accounted for.

On “citizen”, a number of noble Lords took up my noble friend Lord Blunkett’s plea that the NCS should not and cannot exist in isolation from wider considerations of citizenship. As we have heard, the risk is that citizenship as a curriculum subject is going to disappear. Can the Minister see how this might be resolved in practice? I would be grateful if he could spend some time on this—or perhaps write to us if it takes the input of other departments to do that.

On “service”, it was argued by my noble friend Lady Royall and others that the NCS makes up part of a mosaic of volunteering opportunities for young people. The research done on the pilot cohorts shows that the NCS has had a positive impact on social integration and whets young people’s appetite for further volunteering. So it makes good sense to see the current NCS programmes as a beginning and not an end of opportunities to serve.

This raises the need for proper recognition for all young people who serve by creating a legal status for full-time volunteers, who are—in the eyes of many, and as we were reminded—currently punished for their efforts by an outdated legal set-up that considers them to be NEETs: not in education, employment or training. In America, France and Germany, full-time volunteering has a legal status and engages hundreds of thousands of young people every year. The figures are impressive: 75,000 in America, 45,000 in Germany and, in France, more than 100,000 places a year by 2018. Will the Minister share with us where the Government have got to on this issue, and whether this would be a fruitful line to take up in Committee?

On evaluation and monitoring, we have had reports from NatCen and Ipsos MORI, which have been reviewing and reporting on the pilot and the early rollout of the NCS. It is, however, unfortunate that the Bill has been introduced in the midst of an NAO review of whether the Cabinet Office is achieving value for money in its delivery of NCS. It seems to be rather germane to the issues that we are discussing. It remains to be seen whether the review, due to be published, it says, in winter 2016—it seems like winter now—will be available by the time the Bill goes into Committee in the House of Lords next month. Will the Minister enlighten us on this point?

Can the Minister also comment on the plea made by my noble friend Lord Blunkett and others that the performance measures to be used for this project should be outcome based and not simply raw throughput? If we want this to be a rite of passage for the youth of our country, and to change the way that young people engage with civic society, we have to allow the programme to find its place in the volunteering and civic engagement ecosystem. If we are to be truly ambitious, which the Minister asked us to be, we should allow NCS the space and time to work out what works, and give it the independence, the structure and the resources to do it brilliantly.

We on this side support the idea of the NCS and we will support the Bill. We welcome the work that the NCS has done so far; it has real potential to be part of young people’s journeys into adulthood and a starting point for more active participation in civic society. It could inculcate the habit of volunteering throughout their lives. For this potential to be realised, the social action element of NCS needs to be of consistently high quality and participants should be supported into other volunteering arrangements. The law must be changed to make sure that that is a viable way forward. This must be the focus of the Bill. We support the Bill, but we will—as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, enjoined us to—give it proper scrutiny in Committee. We look forward to a constructive dialogue with the Government as the Bill progress through your Lordships’ House.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 16th November 2016 Grand Committee

which would be in line with the earlier recommendation that this role is no longer necessary.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

Well, my Lords, what a good debate we have had. Possibly most of it could have been said at Second Reading but I think that it gained in acuity by focusing on our series of amendments. I say to the Minister, “If these are your friends, I wish you luck in trying to unscramble where you have got to on this Bill”.

First, let us be clear about the nodding. I was not agreeing; I was simply encouraging a previously hesitant Member of your Lordships’ House to speak on. I hope that it was not misunderstood in any way.

Having dealt with the serious stuff, let us move on. Here, we are debating the question of how to balance independence and accountability—a crucial area. Of course, those things are capable of being interpreted in many ways and I am sure that the Minister has had much advice about what the various modes lead to. I do not think that any of them would have led to the idea that this would not be an NDPB because it was genuinely unique and unclassifiable. I think that that might be a step too far for those who have to advise Ministers on such matters. I think that this is genuinely not a unique institution, and it is certainly not unclassifiable, even though we might wish it to be.

I will start with a problem that comes up from time to time—indeed, we have discussed it in your Lordships’ House on a number of occasions. There are some models here that we might want to look at. If you are looking for genuine independence from government in a body, even though it may be in receipt of government funds, I think that you have to look at the green bank and the rather difficult discussions that we had about how to ensure that it was a truly independent body, although it retained at its heart the mission statement agreed by the Government and for which the Government offered funding. That was done by creating a break between Ministers and the bank by invoking a charitable body which would have the power to hold on to and sustain the mission statement. The Minister might want to look at that to see whether it is a route down which some of the arguments that we have heard today lead us.

If there is a sense abroad, and it is widely bruited, that the NCS is of government, that may well be the kiss of death, as my noble friend Lord Blunkett said; others supported him in that thought. I think that the noble Lord, Lord Maude, said that nothing could kill it more definitely than that. If that is the case then we will obviously have a serious problem. I think that there is another argument—I am sure that the Minister will make it—that if you are going to have a body which has truly national aspirations and which is a rite of passage for all our children and all those who aspire to contribute to our society, then there is some value in having an association, whether a royal charter or some other organisation, which shows that it is given that accolade. I do not think that we can just discount that by saying that independence is inconvenient for a better and more exciting future. There must be a way of brokering that.

I think that more time has to be spent on this issue before we come back to it, but I am pretty confident that it would be a very brave Minister who rejected such a strong coalition of interests as have argued this case today. I am sure that we will see this again on Report.

My Amendments 16 and 41 were predicated on the basis that this was an uncontroversial area, that there would be a royal charter and that there would be an arrangement under which this body would have to become a non-departmental public body. I am simply probing—because that is the nature of what we do in Committee—whether there will be an accounting officer. I think I will hear the response that there will be an accounting officer under this model, should it be approved. The National Audit Office will be the designated auditor, so I think that that follows. I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm that, if I am right and we are in that mode and have an accounting officer, the normal cycle of reports and appearances—if necessary—before the Public Accounts Committee will ensure the sort of scrutiny and accountability that other noble Lords have been seeking.

There is another point that I want to pick up, because I have been in this position before. Where an NDPB has an accounting officer and the PAC makes an inquiry, the Permanent Secretary as the accounting officer of the department responsible answers for the Government’s side of the equation. So there is very tight accountability, and it is a model which I hope we can retain the essences of if it is decided to move down a different route in terms of independence.

I do not want in any sense to be too critical but I think that Amendment 41 is the Kids Company amendment. It suggests that there has to be a strong line of responsibility over and above that which is placed on an accounting officer to ensure that, where there is any sense of financial impropriety or difficulty, the accounting officer is named as the person who will tell the Secretary of State in the—I hope—unlikely circumstances that there is a problem. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Lab)]

My Lords, can I add something, slightly tongue in cheek? One good reason for the NCS not being an NDPB is that it cannot be abolished under the Public Bodies Act.

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Moved by

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

2: Clause 1, page 1, line 8, after “England” insert “and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland”

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, this should not take too long. I appreciate that there is also an amendment here from the noble Lord, Lord Cope, and I look forward to hearing his case for an England-only solution to these issues.

My question was based on page 4 of the Explanatory Notes, which tries to do what many Bills try and fail to do: to explain the difference between its extent and its application, should it become law. That page explains that the Bill extends to England and Wales, but applies only in England. I suspect that that will be an opening for the noble Lord, Lord Cope, to come in on his point. It continues:

“While the Bill includes provisions that are within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament, the National Assembly for Wales and the Northern Ireland Assembly, the Bill applies in England only, so no legislative consent motion is being sought in relation to any provision of the Bill”.

I can understand why that is so, but I regret that it is not the aspiration of the Government for what it calls a national citizenship scheme to operate in all parts of the United Kingdom. Failure even to put forward LCOs to the various national Parliaments and Assemblies does seem a rather fragile approach to this, so I would be grateful if the Minister could spell out in his response the ambition for this programme, and reassure us that there is a sensibility within the Government’s intentions to require that the NCS becomes a truly national—in all senses of the word—service. I beg to move.

[Lord Cope of Berkeley (Con)]

My Lords, first, I apologise for not taking part in Second Reading, because a Select Committee meeting that I had to attend took place at the same time. I do, however, support the Bill and the NCS.

My Amendment 51 has been grouped here. It is a small amendment that has large implications. It suggests that Clause 13 should state that the Bill extends to England only, instead of to England and Wales. Clause 1 makes absolutely clear that the effects of the Bill are limited to young people from England. The draft royal charter is equally clear and limited in exactly the same way. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, that the benefits of the NCS should be extended in some form to all parts of the United Kingdom. We are, after all, citizens of the UK, not only of England—or wherever else it may be in the noble Lord’s case. I strongly support anything that strengthens the union.

A different Bill would, however, be required to extend these provisions to the other parts of the UK. This Bill—Clause 1 in particular—limits them to England. On the other hand, Clause 13 refers to England and Wales. It is a lawyer’s nonsense—a lawyer’s fiction. It is a deliberate fiction: a lawyer’s fib is embodied in Clause 13. I hope that the Minister will confirm that when the Bill goes to another place, he expects it to be certified by Mr Speaker as an English Bill. I cannot see that any other decision could possibly be made at that stage.

I learned some law a good few years ago in the course of becoming a chartered accountant, and I have been a legislator for something like 40 years, so I know that when lawyers talk about the laws of England, they really mean the law of England and Wales—it is typical English arrogance that that happens, but there it is. We now know that there is “a body of Welsh law”. The Wales Bill, which was discussed again yesterday and a few days previously actually says so in terms. Why is there not also a body of English law, of which this would be part? If Tuesday’s Bill can talk about Welsh law, why cannot Wednesday’s Bill talk about English law?

I do not really expect my noble friend to respond to this great matter today in the way that I would like. However, I would like him to go back to his departmental solicitor and suggest that parliamentary counsel needs to reconsider this point, not only in relation to this Bill but much more widely. They should look out the windows of the parliamentary counsel’s office at the wider world—actually I think if they look out the windows of the office they will see Whitehall, which is not quite the wider world in the way I mean it; unless they look out the other way on to Horse Guards Parade. What is required in this is some common sense. Of course, I have been around long enough to know that common sense is not the same as legal logic.

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[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I thank the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Cope, for their contributions to the debate. When you put down a probing amendment you sometimes do not quite know what will come back, but I was slightly surprised by the range of issues raised in that brief response. For instance, we did not hear the word “Barnett” in the discussion, which is pretty odd, because the Minister cut his teeth in the Treasury in previous years so he should have had the word rammed up him many times. By my calculation, some £15 million will go to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland for Barnett consequentials, which is money that they would not otherwise have received and presumably will spend wisely on matters sufficiently close to the NCS to make sure that it operates effectively in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—across the whole United Kingdom.

If it is true as the Minister said that HMRC will write only to those with English addresses, which rather reinforces the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cope, what would happen if somebody like my young self in the remote highlands of Scotland—near Skye, for those of your Lordships who want to know—wanted to apply to do the NCS in England? Would I be refused on the grounds that I was not English or British enough? How very strange. There is perhaps a little more here than we had thought about, but I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 2 withdrawn.

Moved by

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

3: Clause 1, page 1, line 9, leave out “different” and insert “all”

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, this group of amendments covers another meaty topic. I am sure that the Committee will be aware that it is the one that has generated the most submissions from those bodies which are directly or indirectly affected by the establishment of the NCS on a statutory basis under a royal charter.

The key element to come out of the submissions is that the unique selling point of the NCS is its social mixing—the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, cited that as a main issue in our debate on earlier amendments. A subsidiary concern in the submissions we have received is that there is expertise out there on how to attract and get involved with children who are hard to reach because of their upbringing, background, location or geography. It is a worry for all concerned that sufficient thought may not yet have been given to how the scaling-up of NCS will happen as it becomes more difficult to get the attention of those people who would otherwise miss out.

Our Amendment 3 tries to get at the sense of inclusiveness necessary for the NCS to succeed by suggesting a change in the wording about children to stress a more positive “all” and not a negative “different”, as in the current wording. Amendment 5 would make it a requirement that NCS should seek—and then be judged on whether it has achieved—social integration. That might be a difficult issue to define, but the impetus is important, and it is an important point to bear in mind when the reporting cycle starts.

On the point that I made earlier about hard-to-reach groups, Amendment 7 poses some questions; I should be grateful if the Minister would respond to them. Is he confident that there are credible plans to reach the hard-to-reach groups? Has the current organisation got the expertise to do that and, if not, how will it get it? Have the Government built in additional costs for the greater effort that will have to be expended on the last few per cent, as it were, of the cohort they are trying to reach, because that will be difficult? Are we confident that disabled young people, whether physically or mentally and ambulant or not, are sure that the programme will be for them? Unless it is arranged and presented in an appropriate way for them, it will be difficult to sell. That concern about the disabled came up in a number of submissions that I have received. It might be helpful to have that in the Bill.

I think that many other noble Lords wish to speak to this group, because their amendments go in the same vein but are based much more widely. I look forward to hearing the debate and I beg to move.

[Lord Shipley (LD)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 18 and 26 but first, I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson of Balmacara, on his amendments. I shall not repeat his arguments but they are very well made and I hope that the Government will agree with them.

I thank a number of organisations, including the National Deaf Children’s Society, the Royal National Institute of Blind People, together with Sense and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists for their advice on my two amendments. I hope that the Minister will understand that our aim is constructive, but there is a need to include the amendments in the Bill to give it the necessary statutory force. Amendment 18 would ensure that there are ring-fenced funds made available for which NCS providers may apply to meet the cost of providing the support that disabled young people may require to enable them to participate fully in the scheme. Amendment 26 would put in place regular reporting about the participation of disabled young people. This will enable the NCS Trust, the Government and all those involved in the National Citizen Service to judge the reality of the scheme’s accessibility to individuals.

The Minister may argue that the Equality Act 2010 is sufficient, but I would say two things about that. First, it is not sufficient in providing access to the education system without additional funding. This has been generally recognised by successive Governments in a range of educational areas since 2010. Secondly, the Act provides insufficient protection for disabled people to access services because many organisations simply do not make the “reasonable adjustments” required by law to enable access for individuals to participate. As an example, many deaf young people can find it difficult to access mainstream extracurricular activities which can be vital for their personal development. With the NCS scheme being Government-funded and with £1 billion of public money going to the service, there will be no excuse for failure to ensure that young people with disabilities get equal access to NCS schemes.

On the reporting requirements under Amendment 26, as an example of the problem, the NCS website has few details about the support available for disabled participants. For example, subtitles have not been created for many of its promotional videos and there are no videos in alternative accessible formats such as British Sign Language. The duties of the NCS to act as a leader in support of young people with disabilities are clear, given the level of funding it will have and the responsibilities that the trust will carry.

In conclusion, it cannot be left to NCS providers to meet the cost of any support that disabled young people may require to access the scheme. A considerable proportion of the NCS budget will be spent on marketing the scheme and unless promotional materials are fully accessible to all young people, there will not be high take-up of the scheme by those with a disability. The NCS Trust will have to deliver its responsibilities to those who have a disability. These amendments would mean that, first, a duty would be placed on the NCS Trust to ensure that funding was available to cover the cost of additional support required by an individual and, secondly, an annual report to the Secretary of the State would address the extent to which disabled young people have participated in the scheme. I hope the Minister will be willing to look at these issues carefully. If the Minister feels a meeting might be helpful, I would be happy to take part in that, but I hope that there will be a response by the time the Bill reaches Report.

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[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

Soft-hearted to the end—it is wonderful. I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in support of my amendments and for making additional points which extend the case that is being made here. Those concerning young carers and rurality were particularly good and need to be thought about. I think the Minister is right: you cannot list every area where you would like action, but this group of amendments, and indeed the whole tenor of this debate, is about the need for signals that send the secure message to people that this is something that they could and should enjoy and from which they would benefit.

There also needs to be a message that there will be sanctions if, for some reason, the outturns are not as good as they should be. I felt that the noble Lord’s figures—although they obviously need to be thought about in the round and are a trajectory, not a fixed point—were a bit disappointing in what one might hope to see in a fully-fledged NCS. I know that we are not at that level; nevertheless, it is beginning to acquire scale, and it would be nice to think that the issues signalled in this debate were being picked up. The underlying feeling that I have is that the sanctions are probably in the Equality Act 2010 but that the signals are not yet sufficiently embedded. There may be a case for looking at either the royal charter or the statute, or both, to make sure that the best possible attempt at including them has been made.

The worst thing that could happen in the rush to scale up would be that the target was insufficient. That would happen in particular if there were a drive towards a numeric target, which I think we have talked about before. A target of 300,000 is not sufficient. It may be necessary to scale up, but that will not be achieved if the 300,000 people are all able-bodied, white and from well-established educational institutions. We are not saying that that will be the case, but there is an issue here that needs a more felicitous approach.

I hope that the Government will reflect on this issue; the Minister seemed to say that he would. This seems a sensible addition to the Bill, even if the wording is not right, and another meeting about it might be the appropriate way forward. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 3 withdrawn.

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[The Earl of Listowel (CB)]

My Lords, I too support the amendment in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. Recent research published by the University of Edinburgh highlights that members of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides have been demonstrated to have significantly better mental health in adulthood than a very similar group of non-members. Whatever happens with the Bill and this very important work, it should not undermine in any way the good work of the Girl Guides and the Scouts. There is a 15% improvement in mental health for those who have experienced the Girl Guides or Boy Scouts.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I will comment briefly on a couple of points that have been made. It is worth recording that this was another area where a lot of submissions were received by those of us involved in the Bill. I hope this is not misunderstood, but I thought there were two significant things about those submissions.

First, the NCS itself was very respectful of this point and understood the destabilisation effect that could occur if its work was somehow just inserted into other work and no account was taken of that. I know we are not supposed to refer to anybody other those present in the Room, but it is good to see the chair of the NCS present in the audience to listen to the debate in the raw.

Secondly, those who might well have had a feeling at the beginning of this process that they had done something wrong, as they were not similarly blessed with significant support from government and the offer of a charter and statutory backing, also welcomed the NCS coming in, seeing it as an addition. My noble friend Lady Royall got it right: the intention is, surely, to make sure that all boats rise in this tide. The underlying worry is that somehow that cannot happen unless we ensure, at the level of drafting, that this is part of the Bill.

My noble friend Lady Royall has been a very successful and long-standing campaigner on how volunteers are treated in our system. There is definitely a problem here. It is not just the issue of whether they should be classified as NEETs—not in employment, education or training—but also questions about how universal credit operates, how tax systems take account of time taken volunteering and whether there is going to be a read-across to students and higher or further education fees. These are all important issues and cannot be dealt with easily. They will certainly be interesting for anybody who might take this on when they have to confront the demons in the Treasury on how they are going to relinquish any control of this area. But it is time that this was reviewed, and I hope when he comes to respond that the Minister can make some comment about the timing of that proposed commission.

[The Earl of Courtown (Con)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their very well-reasoned arguments and their considered amendments, which I will treat in numerical order.

My noble friend Lord Lucas made the interesting point that young people who take part in the NCS should be provided with accredited online evidence of the NCS programme to help them demonstrate their impact as citizens when applying for jobs, educational courses or further volunteering.

My noble friend’s amendment takes its cue from the digital passport, an online record of young people’s learning and work experience and an accessible way for their activity to be validated and recorded. I am pleased to inform my noble friend that the NCS Trust and the Careers & Enterprise Company have launched a partnership to further develop the company’s digital passport concept. NCS teaches young people from all backgrounds the lessons they cannot learn in class, and this passport will help to ensure that their contribution is recognised by employers and universities. There is great potential for the passport to encourage NCS graduates to do even more after the programme. Given the trust’s clear commitment to the digital passport, I hope that my noble friend will feel able not to press his amendment.

The noble Baronesses, Lady Royall and Lady Scott, have similarly sought to extend the trust’s functions. Their amendment would extend its purview to all five to 25 year-olds by requiring it to ensure that it is supporting and not “undermining” other opportunities for people in that age range that contribute to the stated objectives in the first part of Clause 1.

This amendment raises an important point. The NCS Trust does—and must continue to—work in a collaborative way with other providers of youth programmes, as the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, and the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, asked. As I have said before, a strength of NCS is that it encourages young people to take up other opportunities. NCS is very deliberately a short programme, designed to complement and drive demand for other social action programmes.

However, at the same time, it is important that we are clear about what sort of organisation the trust is and will continue to be. The trust is a commissioning body for the NCS programme. Its primary functions, as laid out in both the royal charter and the Bill, are to provide, or arrange for, the delivery of NCS, and to promote it on a national level. We need it to focus on doing this well if we are to maintain the quality of the programme.

The amendment, if added to the primary functions of the trust, would change its remit significantly. It would take it beyond a pure NCS commissioning body towards something that more resembles an infrastructure organisation for the whole youth sector. This would fundamentally change the trust’s purpose. That being said, the trust would not be able to meet its primary functions without supporting and working with a wide range of organisations across the youth sector. The Government are absolutely clear on that, and we expect the trust to report back on it in due course. We can also consider further how we provide assurances that the NCS Trust will work collaboratively.

The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, also mentioned a review of the legal status of full-time volunteers. Long-term volunteering programmes provide many benefits not only to those whose lives are being helped but to those who take part in them. I confirm that the Government are committed to supporting social action, including long-term volunteering. We are looking at existing barriers to long-term volunteering and the appropriate way in which they can be addressed.

I think I have covered most of the points raised. I will of course read carefully what has been said by noble Lords and, if I can add anything, I will write to noble Lords, but I hope that the noble Baroness will feel able to withdraw her amendment.

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[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, until recently, I was a governor of a special school in the Chilterns, near where I live. On one of my regular walk rounds, I happened to chance on a citizenship class and was immediately seized upon as an exhibit, because they happened to be talking about the House of Lords at the time. I had the embarrassing experience of trying to persuade a group of rather terrifying young men, who were trying to make sense of what on earth democracy was and how it worked in their circumstances, which were not particularly good, why I would have anything to say that meant anything to them. I think I was successful—but then I would say that, wouldn’t I? However, it was good to see the lesson. I thought it was well-planned and well-exercised. The kids got something out of it and, at the end, I sent them away to think about what they would like me to do if I were ever lucky enough to get high enough in the Private Members’ Bills ballot to put in a Bill of my own. I will not share in this august company what they wanted but it got them talking, which was great.

Is not the problem here that this is one of the wicked issues? In all my time looking at, studying and working in government, I do not think we have ever come up with a solution to the problem in which a strong departmental wish for movement in another department has provided the necessary edge or leverage for that to happen. Here we are saying that a well-funded and thought-through programme depends to a greater or lesser extent—I would say greater—on there being a solid foundation of knowledge and understanding about citizenship, but we lack the ability in the system to impress that wish on the department that is responsible for school education, maintained and otherwise, and therefore it will not happen. I am sad about that because all the arguments being made today are absolutely right.

If the prospect facing Ministers is that a member of their own side who normally can get excited only about cathedrals and church choirs is saying that he is determined not to give up on this point, then I wish them luck. An irresistible force is coming your way, but I am afraid it will meet an immovable object in the form of the new Secretary of State. Indeed, although I know his heart is in the right place, the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, gave the game away when he said that the current work on citizenship and service more generally had gone into a hiatus because of the change of Secretary of State. There we are, you see: it will not work.

Why will it not work? It is a classic example of the sort of joined-up government that we all go on about, but we simply cannot do it. I wish there was a way of doing it. Although the noble Lord, Lord O’Shaughnessy, said that this is not the right Bill, maybe it is. The noble Lord is shaking his head. I was nodding earlier and now he is shaking his head. Tut-tut: he has not learned the lesson.

[Lord O’Shaughnessy]

I am shaking my head because I disagree.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

That was my point earlier, but I nodded—such stupidity.

We have to give some indication. It may be that there are other ways. I like the suggestion from my noble friend Lady Royall for a Select Committee, which of course we cannot order but on which we can certainly make recommendations. Something needs to be started here today by those of us who care enough about this to make it part of what we want to do with the Bill. If it flows in different ways, all the better, because we certainly are not in a good place, and we know now that is the case. I look forward to hearing what the Minister will say.

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, I agree with my noble friend Lady Byford that this has been rather a wander as opposed to a highly focused debate on these amendments, but it has also been very useful. I thank noble Lords for highlighting so articulately and passionately the ongoing importance that citizenship and citizenship education must play in our country. We agree with my noble friend Lord Cormack that NCS must be, as it says in his amendment, “for all young people”, no matter what their background. As we have discussed, the functions set out in full in the royal charter attempt to capture, in the most appropriate form, what the NCS is and should always be. They include an objective to seek to expand the number of participants.

We know that volunteering can promote a sense of citizenship, and social engagement is one of the NCS programme’s core elements. The latest independent Ipsos MORI evaluation showed that NCS graduates give back to their communities an extra six hours per month. They feel more able to have an impact on the world around them and say that they are more likely to vote, so there are elements of citizenship there. But the NCS is not designed to establish a national citizenship scheme. It is not equipped or funded to do so.

The Government wish to put the NCS Trust on a stable and assured footing so that it may promote the NCS programme across the country to young people, parents, carers, schools and local authorities, to become a scheme that can deliver these outcomes, as my noble friend was intimating, for every young person on the cusp of adulthood who wants a place. Our manifesto commitment is clear on that, so I hope my noble friend Lord Cormack can be assured of the Bill’s aspiration. But as we expand the scheme to allow more young people to benefit, we must concentrate on our primary goals to maintain the success and quality we have had so far, to which my noble friend referred. He also mentioned an obligation to do NCS, but the NCS must remain voluntary to retain its ethos. It will fail if young people feel it is compulsory for them to do it.

The second amendment in this group, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, would require the trust to set out in its annual business plan the ways in which the NCS contributes to citizenship education more broadly. I fear I must repeat the point that the NCS Trust must be allowed to focus its resources and reporting on its primary functions, namely to enable participants from different backgrounds to work together in local communities to participate in projects to benefit society, and to enhance the skills of those participants. Although the links to citizenship are clear, it would not be practical for the trust to report more widely on citizenship education.

Citizenship education is mandatory in state-maintained schools, as part of the national curriculum. The citizenship curriculum aims to equip young people with knowledge, skills and understanding to prepare them to play a full and active part in modern Britain. The NCS is part of the citizenship landscape of this country, as are many organisations working with young people and helping them to become more resilient and informed members of society, but asking the trust to report on work wider than its core mission risks distracting it from delivering a quality programme. I hope that noble Lords can take assurance that the NCS complements an ongoing commitment to the importance of citizenship education in schools.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for making the point that the NCS has the potential to encourage democratic engagement and participation among young people. We are in full agreement. The draft charter requires that the trust must have regard to,

“encouraging participants to take an interest in debate on matters of local or national political interest, and promoting their understanding of how to participate in national and local elections”.

This will ensure that the NCS Trust keeps these considerations at the front of its mind whenever it makes decisions about how to deliver its core mission. In short, the aim here was to capture, as concisely as possible, the very point the noble Lord makes. The NCS Trust is working jointly with the democratic engagement team in the Cabinet Office to explore the possibilities for the NCS to contribute to this agenda. I ask the noble Lord, Lord Bird, not to press his amendment.

Without making any commitment, I should say that my noble friend the Minister is only too happy to hold meetings with as many Peers as he can. I have always wanted to say that. None the less my noble friend Lord Ashton of Hyde is happy to meet noble Lords before the next stage of the Bill. I also make a commitment to the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, that we will write to her on the issue that she raised.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I find myself in complete agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Cope, which I am sure is nothing to do with our politics as we are completely diametric on just about everything I can think of. It must be because we are both accountants. He is absolutely right as I, too, alighted on this point and thought that it would be a good issue to raise.

It is a bit odd to read in Clause 1(2)(a) that,

‘“young people” means 16 and 17 year olds, but may also include other persons who are 15 years old or have attained the age of 18 but are under the age of 25”.

There are probably reasons for it, and I am sure the Minister will be able to explain them. I think I get what that means but if we look at the royal charter, its description of exactly the same area is completely different. It says:

“For the purposes of paragraph 1—a. “young people in England” means 16 and 17 year olds”,

which is clear, but that,

“b. the NCS Trust may, from time to time, determine that “young people” also includes one or more of the following … 15 year olds … any person who has attained the age of 18 and is under the age of 25 … any person of a particular age falling within the range described in sub-paragraph ii”.

We could try to get the same wording into the different parts of the Bill. On the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cope, that there is a different definition for the section dealing with HMRC functions, that is probably explicable in terms of what records it has and can therefore rely on. Again, however, it is confusing if we are to get this sorted out.

That is the issue which I wanted to raise. My Amendment 13 also bears on this point. If we are to muck around with the ages, that is something which Parliament ought to be involved in. The current arrangements would be that if the Bill is true, it must be something set in statute but if the charter is true, it can be changed by the NCS Trust. If either of those is wrong—I do not agree with them—I would rather see that Parliament had affirmative regulations.

To be serious about this, we hope that who qualifies for the service will be quite a hot ticket. It is important that we know from the start whether 15 year-olds qualify, whether over 18 year-olds qualify, whether the upward age of 25 is fixed and what exactly the rationales are for having different ranges and the flexibility that goes with them. It may be to do with getting to hard- to-reach families and individuals. To pick up my noble friend Lady Royall’s earlier point, that would be a good thing. However, it may just be an aspiration to do something on a much wider scale that we do not know about. If we are sticking to the arrangements in the current Bill, Parliament needs a better handle on that.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Cope and to the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson. They both rightly observe that Clause 1, in defining the NCS Trust’s functions, defines young people as 16 and 17 year-olds, but says it may also include other persons who are 15 years old or have attained the age of 18 but are under the age of 25. Clause 9, which confers a power on HMRC to write to young people, then sets an age range of 15 to 17. The amendments would make the age range in Clause 1 apply to Clause 9. I can assure the Committee that the difference in age ranges between the two clauses is deliberate.

Clause 1 makes a distinction: first, it defines young people as 16 and 17 year-olds but allows a degree of flexibility, both for 15 year-olds and those up to the age of 25. NCS should be focused on 16 and 17 year-olds. The majority of participants now are of those ages. Most do NCS in the summer after their GCSEs; some do it earlier in spring and others in the autumn of the following academic year. People with summer birthdays can conceivably do NCS after their GCSEs when they are still 15, so the Bill allows for that.

The upward age range to 25 is to allow flexibility for those with additional needs or in particular circumstances. Someone might miss out for a particular reason or it might be more appropriate for someone with a learning disability, for example, to do the programme a little later. Those older than 17 can therefore take part if the trust agrees but the programme is not openly advertised to older age ranges. For NCS to have its rite-of-passage feel, we want to keep it focused on a tight age range. Those doing NCS outside that age range would be the exception rather than the rule. The focus of marketing the scheme must therefore be on 16 to 17 year-olds, or those approaching that age.

The definition in Clause 9 has therefore been set more narrowly so that HMRC letters go out at a time that targets the core age group. If a young person is unable to go on the programme at that age, and might need to wait until they are older for practical reasons, this can be agreed with the NCS Trust. They will none the less have had the letter already, so the clause is not restricting anyone from hearing about NCS. They will all hear at the same time and can decide when to do the programme later if necessary. Therefore, I hope that my noble friend will see that the difference in the specified age ranges serves an important purpose and will feel able to withdraw his amendment. We want the programme to be flexible but the marketing needs to be focused so that no one is misled.

Amendment 13 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, would require the Government to make a statutory instrument which received the express approval of both Houses before amending the age ranges outlined in Clause 1. The noble Lord is absolutely right that the age range is critical to the definition of NCS and must not be allowed to change lightly. NCS should take place at a formative period between childhood and adulthood—the juncture between compulsory education and the freedom to make life choices.

That is why we have explicitly stipulated the age range of participants in the Bill, while allowing flexibility for those with additional needs. I can confirm that primary legislation would be required to amend the age range. This is important, and we would want to do so only for the very best of reasons: that a future Government deemed it necessary to change the core NCS demographic. Such a change could alter the fundamental character of NCS and therefore should require the full scrutiny of Parliament.

I hope that the noble Lords can take confidence in the Bill’s current drafting and will not press their amendments.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I do not think that the Minister answered my point about the wider drafting of the royal charter. Of course, we have no locus in the royal charter, but can he commit to looking at the wording on page 7 of the draft charter and commit to making the wording of the two documents the same?

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I will certainly commit to looking at it but it is important to note that a Bill in Parliament always trumps a royal charter. There is no doubt about what the age ranges are; they are as set out in the Bill. As I said, I will commit to looking at the two documents to see what can be done, but there is no doubt about what the age ranges are—they are as set out in the Bill.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I must be going crackers. The Bill says that,

“‘young people’ means 16 and 17 year olds”,

and that is followed by a variation. The charter says,

“‘young people …’ means 16 and 17 year olds, but … the NCS Trust may, from time to time, determine that”,

it includes others. I do not think that you can have it both ways. If the statute trumps the charter, which is what I think the Minister is saying, then the statute must stand and the charter is wrong. I am asking him to look at the wording of the charter and to try to align it more with the statute. I hope that that is not too great an ask, even at this late hour.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

It certainly is not and I have already said that I will do that.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 22nd November 2016 Grand Committee

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

I have no amendments in this group, so I hope that noble Lords will forgive me for speaking briefly. It is unarguable that we should have the maximum transparency for the new body and sensible measures of comparability. We should be able to take account of value for money and impact, although those are two separate things: value for money is crucial in the wise use of public expenditure, whereas impact—this is why the longitudinal study is so important —is what happens down the line. I just caution the voluntary sector to be careful what it wishes for in terms of other organisations receiving varying amounts of public funding while requiring for others what they might find difficult for themselves.

To put that in context, in the last Parliament I was asked and was happy to be the transitional first chair of Youth United, which sought to bring together the uniformed organisations to increase impact in areas of deprivation. The need to do that, pressed by His Royal Highness Prince Charles, was that, on the whole, those areas of great deprivation were not covered in the same way and the impact was not as great as would be expected or desired. Some of the money that went in came from the LIBOR fines. When those fines are levied, they become public expenditure, albeit, as we might describe it, as “the Chancellor’s slush fund”, where there is as little transparency and openness as I have ever come across, in bidding processes or in acknowledgement of what has happened to the money down the line.

I just counsel that we build in the necessary requirements to ensure that money is used extremely wisely and we do not, to use the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, go down the road of Kids Company. We need to be clear what we expect of the outcomes. As I tried to say on Second Reading, that is not just about numerical targets; it is about outcome measures as to how the impact is held on to, in terms of those young people—where they have come from, where they go to and their participation post the NCS experience. I just repeat: for big and small organisations alike, be careful what you wish for.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, those are wise words and they will ring in the ear long after my noble friend Lord Blunkett has uttered them. We should bear them in mind throughout this debate.

I do not want to say much about this, because the purpose of these probing amendments is to invite the Minister to reflect on how he wishes to take this forward and we should listen to him carefully. I will make two points. First, what is decided about the reporting functions must be the corollary of what we have decided about the structure. Rather than repeating the debate on the first amendment last week, I think that it is obvious that, if the structure adopted is the royal charter body, for example, it will bring with it the implications of a non-departmental public body. Therefore, the auditing by the NAO will be brought to the Public Accounts Committee and there will be a virtuous cycle of accounting and reporting, which we are well used to and will probably cover one aspect of this.

On the points that have been made more generally, this organisation will serve a much wider public purpose than simply to operate a number of courses or to commission those courses. The report is to Parliament, which raises much wider questions about what you would need to do. As has rightly been said, many of these measures are not numerical, so it would be interesting and challenging to see how one could frame that in a way that would both be a formal account—a measure of the consumption of resources and the impact of those resources in terms of diversity and reach—and provide information that will allow those who have to engage with this body to anticipate and work closely together with it. I echo the wise words of the noble Lord, Lord Hodgson, about the need for a broader cut through this—not just an annual report, but a commissioned report looking at some of the wider indices. That might be annual, but I agree that it perhaps needs to happen a bit later. That might be a way of framing this. I look forward to hearing what the Minister has to say on the matter.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)]

I am grateful to all noble Lords for their contributions. A large number of amendments in this group are to do with reporting requirements or the business plan. In the interests of time, I will be brief in my response. I hope I do not come across as negative, because I do not mean to be. We are grateful for suggestions of improvement to the Bill, which has received almost unanimous support, and I realise that these are meant to be constructive. We are listening and will take careful note of all the points raised. As I agreed last week, there are some areas which we can explore further, such as reporting on disabled participants.

There was a recurring theme in many noble Lords’ contributions: there are many other things they would like the NCS to do. I want to make the point at the outset—because it goes through the whole of Committee stage—that we are very keen that the NCS concentrates on what it is meant to do and is doing well and we do not want it distracted. From my experience, this is a fatal temptation in business and in government programmes. As I said at the beginning of Second Reading, we want the Bill to set up the NCS in perpetuity so that it is able to do, and to continue to do, what it has been doing well.

Nearly 20 amendments have been tabled specifying additional reporting requirements for the trust, in addition to the seven requirements already in the Bill. I hope that the Committee sees that this risks being excessive, bearing in mind that some noble Lords have argued cogently that we must not stifle this enterprising and growing organisation. There must be a balance between the reporting essential to maintain public confidence in the NCS and allowing the trust space to focus on quality delivery. While we think that we should keep the mandatory reporting requirements in the Bill at a high level, I propose that the Government write to the trust to seek its assurances that its reporting will be thorough and will take into account the views of this House, as expressed in the various amendments. I am happy to commit to doing that.

Amendments 19 and 23, in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Finn, and the noble Lords, Lord Maude and Lord O’Shaughnessy, would restrict the NCS Trust’s annual report and business plan to refer only to its primary functions. On the one hand, for understandable reasons, the noble Lords want to minimise reporting requirements; on the other, it is clear from many other noble Lords, who would like to add reporting requirements, that they feel that the report and business plan should refer to the full breadth of functions as set out in the royal charter. These are the tools through which Parliament and the public can hold the NCS to account. I hope noble Lords will see that we have tried to strike a reasonable balance with the reporting requirements in the Bill.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, for their amendments. Amendments 21, 28 and 39 relate to how the trust consults and collaborates with the voluntary sector. The noble Baroness, Lady Barker, asked about the cost. In 2014, the average cost per participant was just over £1,500. This does not include overheads and we do not have a combined figure for those. Of course, value for money is one reason why the NAO is involved under the Bill. The NCS does not, and should not, exist in isolation. NCS graduates already have access to an online opportunities hub, which promotes volunteering opportunities. The trust’s primary functions require it to ensure that the NCS is accessible to all. If it is to do this, it will have to collaborate with other organisations with the right reach.

That being said, the NCS Trust is being established to arrange for the delivery of the NCS programme—to commission services. It is not being established as an infrastructure body, or representative body for the voluntary sector. Therefore, it would not be right to mandate the trust to report on how it has resourced the voluntary sector, as Amendment 28 would prescribe. The trust works with more than 200 providers, over 80% of which are public or voluntary sector organisations. They are resourced by the trust by entering into a contract with it, but the trust’s purpose is not specifically to resource the voluntary sector. Asking the trust to report on this, therefore, is not appropriate.

We agree that the trust’s relationship with the voluntary sector is vital, but we believe it is the trust’s job to report on its performance to Parliament. Other organisations would have a perception of the trust’s performance based only on their interactions with the trust or the programme. That will, in every case, be limited in some way. We do not believe Amendment 39 to be an appropriate ask of the trust as it is not necessary to require it to consult with the sector before completing an annual report. Furthermore, the trust does not contract with voluntary sector organisations alone; it oversees many relationships across the private, public and voluntary sectors to achieve its core aim: the provision of the NCS in England.

Amendments 29 and 33, as well as Amendment 30 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, consider how the NCS sits alongside other programmes. The NCS has a specific structure. It is two or four weeks long and while different providers bring different approaches, all of them have to deliver the core components of the NCS as co-ordinated by the trust. Whether or not it is unique—I realise that there are different interpretations of that word in relation to the NCS—it is a short programme, designed to be accessible to all young people. It cannot be compared with much longer or part-time programmes.

Having said that, the trust must always look to learn from the youth sector, in this country and abroad. Where there are programmes that deliver outcomes similar to those of the NCS—social cohesion, social engagement and social mobility—it is the trust’s job to draw on best practice and shared learning. This year has been a case in point. The trust is co-ordinating an autumn pathfinders project, working with 18 organisations that are trialling innovative methods of delivering the NCS to help extend its reach into local communities.

Amendments 29 and 30 would require the trust to compare its value for money with that of relevant programmes. We have to be careful that anything we ask of the trust in statute is a duty it can reasonably be expected to fulfil. It would not be practical to mandate the trust to compare its outcomes with the value for money of other programmes. It would need to have significant amounts of information about other schemes to accurately compare value for money. This is not information that the trust can or should be expected to gather.

Amendment 31 would require the trust to report on its efficiency and effectiveness. I will respond also to Amendment 36 from the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, which would require the trust to report on how it has met its targets. I can be clear on both points. While the trust will report on its performance with rigour, the National Audit Office will become its auditor. The Bill will ensure that the NAO has the power not merely to audit the trust but to conduct reviews into its efficiency and effectiveness. This will include the extent to which it has achieved its targets. The NAO will undertake these reviews robustly. Therefore, we do not think it necessary to require the trust to report on this as well. Its accounts will be open to sufficient scrutiny by the NAO and Parliament.

Amendments 32 and 34 concern reporting on the trust’s board. The Government agree that the make-up of the board is very important, but the trust does not entirely control board appointments. It is the monarch, acting on the Prime Minister’s advice, who makes the final appointments, following a competition run by the chair. It would therefore not be reasonable to expect the trust to report on something over which the Government have the final say. The Government will, of course, have to comply with the public sector equalities duty when making these appointments, so they will need to take the considerations raised here firmly into account. Independence and integrity are requirements under the public appointments code. Appointments will be made after competitions that are fair, open and merit-based. The royal charter provisions will ensure that the Government have sufficient oversight of the trust’s members, meaning that they will not have to rely on the trust’s self-reporting each year. They will, on a continual basis, be able to ensure the diversity, independence and integrity of the board.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, for her contribution. Her Amendment 25 raises a useful point of clarification. It asks that the reporting on the number of participants includes those who have completed the programme. The Bill specifies that the trust will have to report on the number of participants for each year and I assure the noble Baroness that this will include the number of young people who graduate from the NCS.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

22: Clause 5, page 2, line 27, at end insert “preceding the year”

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, we have just had classic probing amendment debate which is being replaced by the debate on my group which is, of course, a series of laser-like pounces on the drafting of the Bill. I apologise for dealing with such nitty-gritty, but they reveal one or two other things behind them. I will make the points very quickly and look forward to the response.

My first point is on the timing of the business plan. Business plans are business plans and they will change and vary as we go forward, but as the business plan is in the Bill, attention is drawn to it. The Bill currently states:

“The Secretary of State must lay a copy of the published business plan before each House of Parliament”.

That is presumably because it is the intention of the Secretary of State to get the views of Parliament, if any, on the business plan.

That sets up my next point, which is that the business plan has to be published before 1 June in the financial year concerned, which seems slightly odd. First, why June? The peak of the activity of the NCS will usually be over the summer period, which gives rather a short period to allow anyone to comment on the content of the business plan. Secondly, most people would want to comment on a business plan before the year in which it takes place, so to do it in the June of the financial year of the programme suggests that two months will have already elapsed and the money will already have been spent, so it limits the effectiveness of the comments. I suggest to the Minister that there is a problem here, in which case the dates might be changed, but if that is the intention, then a slight change in the phrasing to suggest that the business plan must be published no later than 1 June of the year in question might give us a better chance of making sure it is available in time to have some serious comments available to the organisation.

We are now all too well aware of how easy it is for royal charters to be changed by Ministers. Amendment 48 would restore balance to the process. The Bill would state that the charter may be amended provided that no amendment contradicts the NCS Bill once it has gained Royal Assent. I understand that the Bill is meant to be superior to the royal charter, but it would surely be bad practice to have a Bill that says one thing and a royal charter that says another, although I have discovered one mistake to that effect. I therefore suggest that a change should be made so that an amendment can be made to the charter only if it does not contradict the NCS Bill. I look forward to support for that idea.

I am concerned about the transfer scheme in the schedule but not because there is anything wrong with it. It is good that the schedule provides the proper requirement that good consultation takes place, but it goes on to state in paragraph 5(3),

“it does not matter whether consultation takes place before or after the passing of this Act”.

That seems a little cavalier to the staff interests which might be involved. I know it is a small organisation and it may be that there are other procedures that I am not aware of, but in this case I wonder whether the Minister might take this back and consider again whether the consultation should be completed before the Act is concreted, because it will set out the arrangements under which the staff are to be employed. In a parallel way, Amendment 54 asks that the unions, should there be any involved in this, and I hope there are, should also be involved in that process. I beg to move.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for raising those points. To take them in order, on Amendment 22, the fact that the business plan is being published before June in the financial year with which the plan is concerned is intentional. The business plan needs to cover the forthcoming work. I agree that ideally we would want it as early in the financial year as possible. We have allowed the NCS Trust a reasonable period of time to produce the plan, but the requirement to publish it before June will ensure that it will precede the bulk of the year, to include the trust’s busiest time, as the noble Lord mentioned, which is overseeing the programme during the summer holidays. I will think about the noble Lord’s suggestion of “no later than June” as opposed to “before June”. I cannot see that it makes a huge amount of difference, but I will certainly think about it, without any guarantee of doing anything about it.

The noble Lord’s Amendment 48 mirrors what is in Article 15.1 of the charter by making it explicit that amendments to the charter must not contradict the provisions of the Bill. The noble Lord could not resist mentioning that he had found a difference between the Bill and the charter, but I acknowledge it. It is perfectly reasonable for him to mention it yet again. I assure the noble Lord that the Bill, when enacted, will have primacy in law over the royal charter, as he said, which is an essential legal principle. However, given that the charter governs how amendments to its own contents can be made, I argue that the requirement need sit only there.

Amendments 53 and 54 concern Schedule 1, which outlines the transfer scheme for the trust. The Government and the current NCS Trust agree that conducting a proper consultation prior to Royal Assent, which we hope will be early next year, would not be practical. We would want to make sure that it is exactly that: an open consultation, which gives all relevant stakeholders the time to give their considered views. Other noble Lords, including the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, have been clear that the transition between old and new bodies will need time. The Government agree. I agree to write to the noble Lord about transition arrangements. We expect this to take between 12 and 18 months. The staff consultation is a critical element of this. We should not be rushing into it now before the rest of the transition has begun.

We agree with the noble Lord’s point on Amendment 54. Schedule 1 requires the Secretary of State to consult with those persons considered likely to be affected and those that appear to them to represent their interests. I can clarify for the noble Lord that the existing clause is designed to capture, in the usual way, staff and unions as appropriate. I hope I have laid out the Government’s ambition clearly and that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I thank the Minister for his consideration. I am sorry that there was a 0-4 scoreline, but these things happen. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 22 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, since this is HMRC and it refuses to use email, presumably this is printed material. If it is sending it out to this group of kids, that is a couple of million kids a year and their parents, at £1 a time when you include the postage and the printing. This is not cheap stuff. I read the wording of this clause to allow the National Citizen Service to include anything in here. It says what is in here. It can include advertisements for other charitable services or perhaps for a bank to raise a bit of money for itself. This seems a very widely drafted clause, and I am not at all sure that it achieves the purposes that have been set out for it.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I have an amendment in this group. This is one of my favourite topics. I have raised it in every Bill I have worked on, with no success at all, usually to substitute “must” for “may”. On this occasion, I noticed rather late in the day that there are two “mays” in this clause, and I have to be careful that it is not the first one, because that would play directly into the hands of the noble Lord, Lord Cope, who has made quite clear his reservations about this arrangement, which is going to provide the necessary oxygen to try to fuel the excitement that will be felt right across the country when letters drop into the houses of those who might be eligible to join. He might want to hold his choler a little longer because the Digital Economy Bill, which is coming down the track very shortly, contains swathes of permissions for data to be shared, not only within Whitehall, which is perfectly understandable, but wider, to local authorities and others. The noble Lord ain’t seen nothing yet. It is going to be quite interesting to see how that plays here.

I am sorry to have taken up the Committee’s time. My amendment deals with Clause 9(3) in the context of communicating information. I think it has probably come from the draftsman’s pen because “may” and “must” are drafted as “may” throughout. There is probably a word processor instruction to make sure that no “musts” ever appear. But surely on this occasion we are talking about information that has to be derived by the NCS from its own resources, and it must be that information that goes out. Therefore, it is right on this occasion that it should be “must”.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for bringing us to Clause 9 and the new power for HMRC, which has caused a lot of comment in the course of the Bill. I reiterate that this is not the only marketing measure the NCS Trust will use. Your Lordships need only to look at its Twitter account to see its social media presence. However, this power is a means of ensuring, as far as government can, that as many young people as possible have the opportunity to hear about the NCS. HMRC will send on the information but it will not feel or look like an HMRC communication. My speaking notes say it will be colourful and exciting—I am sure it will—and it will be written by those at the trust who know how to communicate with young people effectively.

Amendment 42 in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lord, Lord Wallace, alludes to the importance of ensuring that the cost of HMRC writing to young people is value for money. The charter specifies that in all it does the trust must have regard to value for money and I think this is a principle that we all agree on. HMRC will recover the costs it incurs from the use of its staff, time and resources. These costs will therefore be met from the budget allocated to the NCS rather than from HMRC’s own budget. It is HMRC policy to do so and therefore, as an operational matter, it will need to inform the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The expenditure will therefore be included in the NCS expenditure listed in DCMS’s accounts.

The noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, raised the subject of who will be the author of the information HMRC sends out to young people or their parents or carers. I made the point that HMRC will act almost as a delivery service for the NCS Trust—a post person, if you like. The noble Lord’s amendment is in keeping with that in changing the ability for the trust to determine the content of the communication into an obligation to do so. Although “may” is one of my favourite words, we agree with him. This is something I intend to return to on Report.

On my noble friend Lord Cope’s wish to omit the whole clause, I understand his point. As a humble Treasury Whip, I too stood at the Dispatch Box and argued for the need for confidentiality of HMRC information, because it has been shown to aid taxpayer confidence and therefore increase the tax take. However, I respectfully disagree with the argument that this will open the floodgates. HMRC is using the data—only names and addresses—on the NCS’s behalf specifically to prevent it leaving HMRC custody and to keep it confidential. It will maintain its centuries-old commitment to keep confidential all information about individual taxpayers. In fact, this is about not taxpayers, but child benefit recipients. HMRC suits this purpose because it has central government’s best data on young people because of child benefit data. At the age of 16, young people receive their national insurance number from HMRC, which marks the transition to adulthood. At the same time, they become eligible for the NCS, an experience we want to become a rite of passage. The same is not true of road safety or flu jabs, which are ongoing concerns and have a closer affinity with other parts of the public sector, such as the NHS and the DVLA.

With those explanations, I hope noble Lords will feel able not to press their amendments.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 7th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blunkett (Lab)]

My Lords, I will not detain the House for very long. In moving the amendment in my name and those of my noble friend Lord Stevenson and the noble Lord, Lord Maude, I want to put on record my appreciation and thanks to the Minister for his considerable courtesy and his preparedness to listen and have a dialogue with his own ministerial colleagues in relation to this and other amendments today. In passing, although this is not a gripe against the Minister in any way, it is unfortunate that his noble friends who are responsible for business have not heard of something called the “dinner break”, which neither is a dinner break nor allows people to have dinner.

I shall try to set an example and be brief because we debated this at Second Reading and we debated the issues at length in Committee. There was considerable consensus that it would be right to allow the Government to have a nominee, which would fulfil the objectives that the Government laid out in relation to the remuneration to be offered to staff working on the National Citizen Service and, subsequently—I agree with this—on the audit and risk committee in relation to avoiding the misuse of substantial sums of public money. It is in that spirit that I move the amendment. Again, I recognise the care with which the Government, in the form of the Minister, have been prepared to respond to this and to my noble friends on other amendments on the Marshalled List today. This would mean a fair, open and merit-based competition for non-executives and the ability of the Government to get their own way in terms of having a nominee on the committees of the NCS, but would not place the National Citizen Service in the erroneous position of being seen by families, young people and providers as presenting a government scheme determined, directed and therefore shaped by the Government, rather than the actual position of the NCS.

In the debate on Monday on the size, shape and nature of this House the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, said that it was at its best when dealing with—I paraphrase—non-controversial legislation. I hope that I will be able to say on Third Reading that the House has been at its best in shaping this non-controversial legislation in the interests not of the Government or Opposition, but of young people. I beg to move.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak very briefly in support of the amendment, to which I have added my name. Its purpose is to encourage the Government to bring forward some firm plans on how to address some of the points raised in Committee by the noble Lords, Lord Blunkett and Lord Maude, and others, who were firmly of the view that the Government had got it slightly wrong in terms of its overall structure—so much so that it would put people off from joining the NCS, which would be a bad thing. I hope to hear proposals from the Minister that might resolve that problem.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Lord Ashton of Hyde) (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the kind words of the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, for his brief remarks. I am thankful to both of them for making themselves available for meetings to discuss this, and I think we can agree a way forward.

We must, I believe, strike a balance. On the one hand we agree that we must give the organisation all the independence we can. It needs freedom to innovate, maintain its strong brand among young people and forge its own path. Young people must not feel the NCS is something that government does to them; they must want to go on it. At the same time, the Government have a duty to protect public money. Unsatisfactory or wasteful use of public money could kill the programme as surely as too close an association with the Government.

The noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, made a helpful suggestion in Committee for how we might strike this balance. He suggests that we do not have a government representative on the board but that a government representative is involved where appropriate and necessary for the Government to exercise oversight.

The provisions on the government representative are in the charter, so I can commit to amending article 5 to remove the requirement for a government representative on the board. All board members will be appointed through a transparent and open process in line with OCPA procedures. Article 8 of the charter will retain the existing provision for a government representative on the remuneration committee of the organisation. As article 5 will no longer include the government representative, article 8 will be amended to state that the government representative is to be appointed by the Secretary of State in consultation with the chair. The government representative will have to approve the pay policy—not individual awards—of the trust, as included in the current draft. A sponsoring department always needs to have the ability to approve pay policy, in accordance with Managing Public Money.

We will also add an additional article to the charter. This will specify that there must be an audit and risk committee and that there must be a government representative on that committee. We want to be ambitious for the NCS and this necessarily means that the trust will handle a significant amount of public money. To fulfil its responsibilities towards public money, the Government need to be satisfied that the right procedures to manage that money are in place. We must also ensure that all board appointments meet the high standards expected of public appointees. The Prime Minister is responsible for recommending appointments to the Queen, and the Secretary of State will ensure an appropriate level of government involvement in the recruitment process, including government representation on recruitment panels for board members, in line with the code of practice for ministerial appointments to public bodies.

Together these measures will ensure sufficient government oversight, while allowing the NCS the freedom to have an independent board to lead the organisation. I hope that, with these commitments to amend the royal charter, the noble Lord will withdraw the amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

On that subject, I remind the House of what I said on the previous occasion. We will write to the NCS Trust with the suggestions that noble Lords have made—for example, in relation to reporting—so that it is fully aware of the issues that have exercised your Lordships.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

I appreciate that this is not Committee and that we should not engage in over-extensive dialogue but the exchange on the question of the Royal Charter raises a substantial issue and I wish to intervene briefly on that. There was an engagement in Committee on the question of whether the Royal Charter should have a clause inserted into it to prevent changes being made to it which were not in accordance with the statute, so as to mirror the Bill’s provisions on the charter arrangements. The Minister is talking about adding to and changing the draft charter, which we have had an opportunity to look at—we are grateful for that—and it would be helpful if we could track it a little more closely so that, as well as receiving reports as and when and knowing that a letter will be sent to the NCS trust invoking the spirit of the charter, we can see what the wording is before we get to Third Reading. Can the Minister arrange for a further draft to be made available to us, so we are fully informed at that point?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, I support the spirit of both these amendments. Like the noble Lord, Lord Bird, I think that character building and civic responsibility go together and that both are essential for democracy. I deeply regret that the teaching of citizenship, which was introduced by my noble friend Lord Blunkett in the early 2000s, is not taken as seriously as it might be. A lot of schools fail their pupils because it is not taken seriously, but I well understand that this is the responsibility of the Department for Education and it might not want the DCMS to try to push this through the back door. Yet it is a hugely important issue that we should progress.

I am very pleased that the charter says that the NCS should be,

“encouraging participants to take an interest in debate on matters of local or national political interest, and promoting their understanding of how to participate in national and local elections”.

When the noble Lord writes to the NCS, he might suggest that when participants do this specific part of their learning, not only are they encouraged to register to vote but forms for them to register—they can register well before they are 17—are made available by the NCS. This is not political in any way. This is empowering young people to ensure that they are able to use their vote because they registered.

I rather like a lot of things said by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, about civic engagement. The department she referred to could do a lot more on that. I found the proposal from the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, about the pilot programme quite attractive. It is certainly a lot less than he asked for last time. I do not know what the Minister’s views are but if it is not accepted in this Bill, we should continue to discuss it. The NCS will be a national scheme but it would be excellent if all young people had to do something. I support the spirit of Amendment 3 and the amendment of my noble friend Lord Blunkett and the noble Lord, Lord Bird, although I can see that they perhaps do not quite fit into the Bill.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, I confess that I have not been very good at getting to grips with the NCS as an activity until recently. We in the rather sheltered DCMS team did not have much responsibility for civic affairs until quite recently, when it was suddenly, and very welcomely, transferred into our brief. Like the noble Lord opposite, we had a bit of a learning curve to understand where this all came from and where it might end up, but we are there, I think.

To cut a very long story short, I invited myself to the autumn programme, which is a shortened version of the summer programme, as it was operating in Croydon College. I discovered I was there not just to observe but to participate. I was a “dragon”—well, I am a dragon, really, in private life, so it was quite appropriate—in a test for six groups of young people; it was originally three but by the time we got there it had got to six. They had to appear in front of three dragons who had to investigate their work on preparing themselves to go out and do social action—this week, I think. They had been brought together as a result of the NCS. They were working together for the first time. They were drawn from very wide groups, although admittedly they were all from the Croydon area. They had to pitch to us a proposal for how they might spend the princely sum of £50 should we dragons be prepared to award it to them. It was great fun, particularly when they got the chair of the NCS up and blindfolded him and made him throw tennis balls into a bucket, advised by another dragon, which he was particularly bad at but blamed everybody else except himself for his inability to make it work. But it showed that the adults were just as bad as the children we were trying to impress with our various processes. Sorry, I ramble on.

My point is that I used the opportunity to find out a bit more about the scheme. One thing I asked, which bears on these amendments, was whether Croydon College had within its academic courses any engagement with the citizenship programme mentioned by my noble friend Lady Royall and whether or not it had any play-across. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that everyone I spoke to—I spoke to about half a dozen individuals involved in the trust—said yes, they had been taught this; it was part of what they were doing. The teachers said that they had had some difficulty programming it in but they wanted to do so. Therefore, as well as the practical aspects of the social action programme that they were doing, there was an understanding of the theoretical basis. This was actually an NCS programme delivered by The Challenge and therefore it was an example of co-operative working across different organisations. Everybody involved was enthusiastic and committed, the kids were wonderful, and it was a really effective and most interesting day.

That is a long way in to saying that I support the amendments in this group. I feel sad that the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has had to move away from his original ambition, which was to tie this more securely to the existing programmes, but I can understand why he feels that a little progress might be better than none at all. Of course, we are all impressed by the way in which the noble Lord, Lord Bird, has embraced this issue and is passionate and committed to how it could help in a wider sense than just the NCS; it would also have a place within the NCS. I am sorry that my noble friend Lord Blunkett has had to leave before contributing because he is the granddaddy of this whole area.

We have been throwing the royal charter around again. My noble friend Lady Royall arrived at the same point I do: there is an opportunity in the charter to take this a bit further. If it is not possible to amend the Bill—and these are probably not the right words to go into the Bill at this stage—surely it is possible to think about expanding paragraph 5.b.iv on page 8 of the charter, quoted by my noble friend Lady Royall, which could bear a bit more of the direct wording from some of the amendments we have here. If that were the case, it would have a bit of a bite on the NCS. I recommend that to the Minister, if that is possible.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Cormack and I acknowledge that this amendment is less far-reaching that the one in Committee. I fear, though, that I will be able to offer him only a small crumb of comfort, if at all, but I will try. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bird, for his amendment on citizenship.

The arguments today follow on from the lengthy debate about citizenship in Committee. I take on board the views on this topic but I am afraid I am unable to change my basic response. I mentioned previously the role of volunteering in promoting citizenship and the role of NCS in promoting a sense of it among participants, as outlined in Article 3 of the charter, so I will not rehearse those points again today. However, I have to come back to the central point that the NCS Trust is here to deliver NCS. Though it can achieve some of the same outcomes as citizenship education—a sense of community and a desire to serve—it is not a citizenship scheme. NCS primarily exists to help improve social mobility and promote personal development. NCS and citizenship overlap but are not the same thing. The NCS Trust is not therefore funded, resourced or equipped with the specific expertise to provide a pilot national citizenship scheme.

--- Later in debate ---

Moved by

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

10: Clause 9, page 4, line 12, leave out “may” and insert “must”

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

My Lords, this is an amendment I tabled in Committee and which received a very positive response. I am hoping to cap the “egg” with perhaps a “double egg” after the Minister’s response.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

I think I am a curate’s egg, good in parts, and I hope this will be a good part. I am grateful to the noble Lord for his amendment. It asks the key question, “Who will be the author of the information that HMRC sends out to young people, parents and carers?”. I have made the point a few times about how HMRC will act as a delivery service for the NCS Trust, and this amendment is in keeping with that. As drafted, the Bill provides that the trust may determine the contents of the communication being sent out. The Government intend that this always be the case. HMRC’s power should be only to deliver the communication using its contact data. The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, would oblige the trust always to determine the content of the communication, clarifying beyond doubt that it must be authored by the trust. I am therefore pleased to say that the Government accept the amendment, and I am grateful to the noble Lord for highlighting this issue.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 14th December 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Barker (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the way he introduced this amendment. When the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, spoke to this matter in Committee and on Report, he was clear that his primary concern was not financial misconduct but that wider behaviour was at the heart of this. Charity legislation has had to grapple with this very difficult matter in the past. The Minister may know that during the passage of the draft Protection of Charities Bill we had a lengthy discussion about how one puts this concern into law. I note that this amendment still sits within a clause headed “Notification of financial difficulties”. Will the purport of this measure be made clear in guidance—that is, that it is not about financial matters but about safeguarding and wider issues of that nature?

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I just want to pick up on the point that has just been made—the unfortunate elision of financial difficulties with the broader issue raised by the amendment. I am sure that it is not something that we need to trouble with today. The Minister and I discovered that the wording in bold black type in Bills of this nature is not subject to amendment but it can be changed by the Government simply issuing instructions to the draftsman. Perhaps that can be arranged at some point in the magic that goes on behind the scenes, as I think that would remove the difficulty here.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am glad to be able to leave this Bill by agreeing with the noble Lord and the noble Baroness. Two things are happening in this clause: one is financial and the other is criminal conduct, introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell. When the Bill is reprinted and goes to the House of Commons—assuming that it passes today—the new title of Clause 7 will be “Notification of financial issues and criminal conduct”.

I am afraid I shall be less specific with my noble friend Lord Cormack. I know he has long had an interest in citizenship as a concept and in setting up a citizenship programme, culminating in a citizenship ceremony. I am not sure that that comes within the remit of this social action review, which is principally about volunteering, as opposed to citizenship. Therefore, I am afraid I cannot give him that guarantee, but I will take it back to the department and ask the Minister for Civil Society about it, and, if necessary, he can write to my noble friend.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, in moving this Motion, I express my grateful thanks to all noble Lords who have contributed to the Bill’s passage. I especially thank the noble Lords, Lord Stevenson and Lord Blunkett, and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, from the Labour Benches, and the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, and the noble Lords, Lord Wallace and Lord Shipley, from the Liberal Democrat Benches. They all made themselves available for meetings in addition to the debates at the various stages of the Bill. Last, and certainly not least, I thank my private office and all the Bill team, especially Kate Brittain and Tom Blackburn. They are showing devotion to duty to the last by being here instead of going to the office Christmas party. They have made my job very easy. I beg to move.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara]

It is conventional to respond to the Minister’s thanks, and I should like to do so very briefly. I also thank the Bill team—I am sorry they are not wearing their party hats. It was a privilege to work with them; they were very open and very good at giving us the information we needed. This was a complex enough Bill on its own, and to add to that the complications of a royal charter must have been slightly mad, but that has also happened. We are still waiting for the final draft but I am sure it will come. In addition, the Minister was able to operate the wheels of government machinery to the point that, within about a minute of his standing at the Dispatch Box, he received notification to be able to announce the volunteering review. We had been waiting for that and we are very pleased to see it.

The Minister very kindly mentioned my noble friends Lady Royall and Lord Blunkett. I have to pass on a message from my noble friend Lord Blunkett. Because of the changes to the timings in the House today, he is not able to be present, but he wished me to make it clear that he joins me in thanking the Minister and the team for making the Bill work in the way that it has. He is very pleased with the result.

Bill passed and sent to the Commons.

National Citizen Service Bill [HL]

Lord Stevenson of Balmacara Excerpts

Ping Pong (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 4th April 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I will not detain the House for long at all. I declare my interest as a serving councillor and as an honorary vice-president of the Local Government Association. I rise simply to ask for some reassurance—it may have been given, but I have not seen it—that the new duties comprised in Amendment 1, which is a perfectly sensible amendment that I support, will be regarded as falling within the new burdens doctrine so that, if local authorities are required to expend more on providing the services identified here, they will be reimbursed by government in accordance with that doctrine.

[Lord Stevenson of Balmacara (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his introduction of the amendments. We gave the Bill considerable scrutiny when it was in your Lordships’ House, and I am only sorry that we did not pick up the drafting points that he has had to bring back after consideration in the Commons. We have taken the view that the National Citizen Service Bill has a very narrow purpose, intended to secure the future of the NCS and to make the NCS Trust more accountable to Parliament and the public. This is what it does and we support the amendments.

[Lord Ashton of Hyde]

My Lords, I am grateful for those comments. I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Barker, who has been if not a lone voice then a voice that has addressed the scrutiny of the Bill the whole way through. Where I take issue with her is whether this is the correct place to do it. This Bill has been passed by both Houses of Parliament, with the exception of these drafting amendments. Both Houses have agreed it after scrutiny at all the different stages, and I would dispute whether this is her only chance to raise her points about the NAO and the Public Accounts Committee. There are many other avenues, but within the scope of Bill procedure, this is not one of them. I am certainly happy to meet her at any time she wants, along with my officials from the department, to talk about the issues that she has. I am reasonably confident that I can expect further scrutiny in this House on the National Citizen Service from her—I do not want to invite it, but I think that I may have it. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Blunkett, who answered many of the points better than I can, so I will not repeat them now.

As far as the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, is concerned, I am not fully sure whether I understood his question. However, the NCS is a commissioning body, so any provider that does the work and provides the courses, be they local authorities or charities, will be paid by the National Citizen Service. It is not a question of extra duties being placed on other people. The money is there and that commissioning body will commission it from suitable avenues, some of which were mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Barker.

I hope that I explained in my opening remarks the technical reasons for these amendments and I therefore commend the Motion.