Labour Market Activity

Matt Western Excerpts

Tuesday 28th February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

I will start by putting my remarks in the context of our economic situation. We are predicted to have the worst growth of any G20 nation bar Russia, which is, of course, heavily sanctioned. We have flatlining productivity, which is not down to the unions, as was perhaps being suggested by the hon. Member for Broadland (Jerome Mayhew)—far from it. If we compare the UK with France, for example, France has much stricter employment legislation but 20% higher productivity. We need to look more closely at the sort of legislation that we have.

Before the pandemic, millions of people were missing from the labour market, particularly the over-50s. Some 8.9 million are now economically inactive, which is more than half a million more than pre-pandemic levels. Of those, 3.5 million are 50 to 64-year-olds, which is more than 300,000 more than before the pandemic. It is a real shame that we have that huge untapped potential, as many of those people—1.7 million economically inactive people—want a job.

We have heard from many Opposition Members about the challenges that, sadly, women in particular face as a result of not having childcare. My hon. Friend the Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson), the shadow Secretary of State for Education, has outlined what we would do in power to introduce a much more modern approach to childcare. Without that system, we will not be able to bring more women into the workplace. We need parental leave; we need to introduce support from early years to the end of primary school; and we need to see the introduction of breakfast clubs. Many of the wider carer responsibilities of family members also, all too often, fall to women. They need to be brought back into the workplace.

On health, we have heard about the stress, anxiety and depression that many people face. They also need to be helped back into work. We also have issues with the disincentives for people who have left the labour market to get back into work. Medical professionals, teachers and many others across society felt devalued and disincentivised to work, so they left their workplace and took early retirement. We need to bring those people back into the workplace.

One reason for those issues is the Government’s dismal record on education, retraining and lifelong learning. We had the Second Reading of the Lifelong Learning (Higher Education Fee Limits) Bill yesterday, which will finally seek to implement lifelong learning, but that should be seen in the context of a decade of failure in that area.

We have lost so much of adult learning since 2010. Only one in three adults report any participation in learning, which is the lowest level in 22 years. Indeed, Government spending on adult education—retraining and so on—has fallen by 47% over the past 10 years, and the IFS reports that apprenticeships will be 25% lower in 2024-25 than in the corresponding period in 2020-11.

Many people feel locked out of the system, which has an impact on not just individual families, but society. Such inactivity is costing our wider economy so dearly. The Learning and Work Institute says that increasing employment to the highest level in the G7 would boost the economy by £23 billion, improve the public finances by £8 billion, and raise household finances by an average of £830 per year. That is why, as part of Labour’s mission to secure the highest sustained growth in the G7, we are intent on getting Britain back to work. We have plans to fix the Access to Work scheme through improved targets for assessment waiting times and providing more indicative awards for those looking for work.

I will briefly illustrate my speech with an example of one individual who has to apply for Access to Work funding every year. If you met him, Madam Deputy Speaker, you would realise that that is quite ridiculous. The people of Warwick and Leamington have the potential, and many have the skills. They are people who want to work, but they need a Labour Government, and they want a general election now.