Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Tuesday 18th December 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

8. What steps the Government are taking to improve offenders’ access to education and employment.

[The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Mr David Gauke)]

In May, we published the education and employment strategy to create a system where each prisoner is set on a path to employment, with prison education work geared from the outset towards employment on release. We have launched the New Futures Network and appointed a CEO to drive its roll-out. The NFN identifies where skill gaps exist and works with employers to fill them. We are also empowering governors to commission education provision that leads to work. Activity to appoint the new education suppliers who will deliver the curricula that governors have designed is almost complete.

[Mr Gauke]

The New Futures Network brokers partnerships between prisons and employers in England and Wales, which help businesses to fill skills gaps and prisoners to find employment on release. The NFN has a central team based in London that works with large national employers. We are also placing employment brokers across England and Wales to work with small and medium-sized enterprises and regional businesses. I am pleased to say that since the publication of the strategy in May, more than 100 new organisations have registered an interest in working with offenders.

[Mark Pawsey]

I have been working with a constituent who has recently completed a nine-and-a-half-year prison sentence. He has reminded me that in that time, a great deal has moved online—the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, the hon. and learned Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer), referred to initiating legal proceedings online. My constituent says that that places him at a disadvantage when it comes to accessing services and applying for jobs, so what steps are the Department taking to ensure that offenders gain digital skills and retain them?

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Digital skills are already taught in many prisons. We are empowering governors to have more control over the curriculum, but we are also determined to ensure that there is some consistency, so from next April our core common curriculum will include ICT, which must be taught in every prison.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Tuesday 5th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

That is a matter for the Home Office, but I am assured that the Home Office believes that the system can deliver what we need for the country.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

Futures Unlocked is a Warwickshire charity with a community café called Moriarty’s in Rugby, providing work experience and job opportunities for those who have just completed a prison term. Does the Minister agree that locally managed schemes such as that are valuable in reducing reoffending rates?

[Mr Gauke]

Very much so, and I want to pay tribute to the employers, businesses and charities that do so much in this space. I am pleased that there is a consensus in the House that we need to focus on rehabilitation and reoffending, and one of the best ways of doing that is focusing on employment.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Monday 18th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

First, I should like to associate myself with the hon. Gentleman’s remarks about the Deputy Speaker, who has the thoughts of the whole House with him at this time.

In respect of the hon. Gentleman’s question, however, I disagree with him. The point that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was seeking to make is that we have made great progress in recent years on increasing the level of disabled people in work. That is a good thing to do, and he made it clear that he considered it to be a good thing. That is what the whole Government want to achieve.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

The small employment adviser at Rugby jobcentre has just signed up 15 new employers to become Disability Confident. Does the Secretary of State agree that the role of those officers in building links with small employers in local areas is crucial to ensuring that more disabled people get access to the workplace?

[Mr Gauke]

Yes, I do. My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. It is really important that that engagement happens up and down the country, and I am pleased that we are making progress. As I have said, we have over 5,000 Disability Confident employers, and I hope that we will continue to increase that number. My Department will certainly be doing everything it can to achieve that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Monday 13th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

We hear a lot from Opposition Members about universal credit, but we have to remember that it is a much more effective system at getting people into work. Nationally, 113 people move into work under universal credit for every 100 under the previous system. My constituency, which was a pathfinder for universal credit, is seeing very substantial falls in the number of people claiming. Is it not a better system all together?

[Mr Gauke]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Universal credit is helping people to get into work and to progress in work. It is also clear that people on universal credit are spending more time looking for work than those on legacy benefits. It is really important that we all work to ensure the success of universal credit. We believe it will result in 250,000 more jobs—something worth achieving.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Monday 9th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

What I would say—this is exactly the point I made earlier—is that I do not believe that anybody should be left without any support for six weeks when they do not have savings or an alternative source of income, which is why it is important that advances are available within the system. The majority of claimants now make use of advances. We need to ensure that that is properly communicated to claimants. I will certainly do that, as I am sure will all Members of this House.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

My constituency was one of the first to introduce universal credit, and it went on to full service in 2016. Staff in my constituency tell me that they are very familiar with the new system. Does the Secretary of State agree that we need to ensure that what we have learnt from the pathfinder jobcentres is quickly rolled out to those now taking up the new system?

[Mr Gauke]

We must constantly learn from experience—this is about testing, learning and improving. We must ensure that awareness of the advances system is high, and clearly that has increased in recent months. My hon. Friend makes a point about jobcentre staff, and my experience of meeting such people up and down the country is that they are enthused by what universal credit can do for claimants to help them to get into work.

UK Economy: Post-Referendum Assessment

Debate between Mark Pawsey and David Gauke

Monday 23rd May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Gauke]

Actually, I think I have seen it—the right hon. Gentleman reminds me.

There is an overwhelming consensus on the economic benefits of membership of the EU, and I hope that the British people, when they make their assessment, be it with their hearts or their heads, carefully consider the economic consequences of their decision. It is a very important decision that will have an impact not just for a year or two—the focus of this report—but for many years ahead.

[Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)]

Is not the simple fact that countries trade with one another to increase their mutual prosperity and that trade with our principal trading partners is easier as a member of the EU?

[Mr Gauke]

Yes, that is absolutely right. Access to the single market reduces trade barriers to a level simply impossible to find outside the single market.