Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 4th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

18. What progress he has made on implementation of the recommendations of the Munro review of social work.

[The Secretary of State for Education (Michael Gove)]

We are making a number of changes to the child protection system. “Working Together to Safeguard Children”, the guidance that provides support and advice to those who look after children potentially subject to abuse, risk or neglect, will be republished shortly in a tighter and more focused way.

[Meg Munn]

We are two years on from the original work, whose aim was to reduce the amount of bureaucracy and the time that social workers were spending on form filling. Many social workers are reporting that the situation has not changed at all and that they are still in a system that does not give them sufficient time to work directly with children. Where have things gone wrong and what is the Secretary of State going to do about it?

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady is right to emphasise how difficult life is for many social workers at the front line. Part of the problem rests with the complicated process that we inherited, which the revision of “Working Together” attempts to address. The space or gap between the initial and subsequent assessments that children at risk of abuse or neglect have to face is one of the changes addressed through the Munro recommendations. However, we also need to change how local safeguarding children boards operate and to make sure that the capacity of the social work profession to cope with the challenges thrown at it is greater. That is being addressed through the College of Social Work and the additional support that we hope to give through the launch of the Frontline programme.

Engineering Careers

Meg Munn Excerpts

Wednesday 13th February 2013 Westminster Hall

[Nadine Dorries]

I was coming to that point. Engineering was a career choice for boys when I was at school. It was not one that girls were ever interested in, but when I was at Autotech, I realised that such a high-tech form of engineering could be quite attractive to girls. There are so many more opportunities open to both genders now. I know that some girls are involved, but I cannot imagine that we would see many girls wanting to get involved—I do not know what form of engineering the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah) did—in mechanical engineering. We just do not go into garages and see girls with oily rags.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

rose—

[Nadine Dorries]

The hon. Lady has something to say about that, but I am sure that the figures would bear it out.

[Meg Munn]

The figures do indeed bear it out. This is a very important issue, and I am glad that the hon. Lady has raised it. However, I am doing a lot of work in and around south Yorkshire focused particularly on getting more girls and women into engineering. Perhaps I can share at a later date some information with the hon. Lady, but it is generally about both sensitising the girls and getting the companies to look at what they are doing that in the past has put girls off.

[Nadine Dorries]

That is a very good point.

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[Nadine Dorries]

I take that on board, Mr Bayley.

When the Division took place, I was speaking not so much about the reforms introduced by the Secretary of State for Education, as his rhetoric and dialogue about the need for courses to be more robust and for students to become more engaged in the core subjects of maths, science and English.

[Meg Munn]

Does the hon. Lady agree that design and technology is one of the subjects at the core of this issue, because without it many students are not prepared for what they face in engineering?

[Nadine Dorries]

I agree with the hon. Lady that design and technology is an important core subject in the overall context of engineering. As I have said, however, one problem is that, on leaving school, pupils lack the basic skills of numeracy and English that would enable them to achieve in design and technology and other subjects or give them the confidence they require to go into an engineering apprenticeship. They lack the basic core skills that would give them the confidence they need to move into that field. Although I recognise that design and technology is an important subject—one of my daughters did it—others take greater precedence because they are absolutely essential, core key subjects that every student needs to move on to whatever they want to do in life.

Gender Balance on Corporate Boards

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 7th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

May I make a little progress? I shall come to some of these points in detail.

The Government are committed to increasing the number of women on boards. In the coalition agreement we pledged to promote gender equality on the boards of listed companies, and we did so for a good reason. Historically, the proportion of women on boards has been too low. In 1999 women made up just 6.2% of the boards of FTSE 100 companies. By 2004, that was 9.4% and in 2010 it was 12.5%. In 2010 there were only five female chief executive officers of FTSE 100 companies.

As the House will know, we published the review by Lord Davies of Abersoch in 2011 and have been working to implement the recommendations. The Davies review identified several barriers preventing women from reaching senior roles in business. The research shows that people have an unconscious bias to reward and promote people who are like themselves. Davies found that informal networks are highly influential in determining board selections and that a lack of transparency over selection criteria continues to be an obstacle to progress. Davies also suggests that differences in the way men and women are mentored could be giving men the edge over their female peers, for the clear reason that there are fewer women in senior roles to act as mentors and role models for female colleagues.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I very much welcome what the Minister is saying and the issues he is describing. Will he say something about the differences between non-executive, as opposed to executive, women board members? We know that significant progress has been made in respect of non-executive roles, but executive positions are enormously important because they are about the day-to-day running of businesses and what is happening within businesses.

[Matthew Hancock]

It is true that progress has been slower in executive appointments, but it is also true that where legislation has been passed to increase the number of women on boards—for example, in Norway—the increase has come almost entirely in non-executive roles, which shows that legislation is not a panacea. The Davies review recommended a business-led strategy to bring about the necessary change, and we have been working with business to implement the strategy.

I pay tribute to the 30% Club and Helena Morrissey. They are both pragmatic and passionate about reaching their target of 30% representation on boards. Their approach is one of persuasion and moral suasion to change the culture of business from business, and so far it has been highly effective. The figures clearly show that we are moving in the right direction.

Since Lord Davies’s work was started, we have had a near 50% increase in the number of female non-executives in the FTSE 350. Now, 17.3% of FTSE 100 board directors are female and, importantly, 38% of newly appointed FTSE 100 directors and 36% of newly appointed FTSE 250 directors since March last year have been women. Research by Cranfield School of Management shows that should the current pace of change be maintained, we are on a trajectory to reach 37% of women on FTSE 100 boards by 2020, just shy of the 40% proposed by the commission. We think that that business-led voluntary approach is the right one for the UK and that it is making progress. Central to it is a change in culture at the heart of business, and that is the only way in which progress will be sustainable and long term.

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[Matthew Hancock]

I will come to the point that, under the principles of subsidiarity in the Lisbon treaty, should there be enough motions in national Parliaments across the Union, that is enough to ensure that the Commission cannot introduce the current draft proposals.

We want a business environment in which woman can and do take their seats at the boardroom table on merit and in which businesses can respond to the varying needs of their sector, size and type of business. We need to tackle those problems without unduly burdening business. That is the substance of the challenge of getting more women on boards. It is clear that the Government have taken a lead on that and things are moving in the right direction, and the current strategy is leading us towards the target that the EU has proposed.

I will now move on to the argument about whether this should be an EU competence at all. The Government’s position is clear: we believe that member states must retain the flexibility to respond to their own individual circumstances. Today’s debate is about allowing Parliament, as distinct from the Government, to express its view on whether this should be an EU competence. The Government are strongly of the view that the principle of subsidiarity should be respected and adhered to. The principle of subsidiarity rests on two tests that a Commission proposal must pass: the necessity test, which is that the objectives of the proposed action cannot be sufficiently achieved by member states acting alone; and the EU added value test, which is that the objectives can be better achieved by action at EU level. Under protocol 2 of the Lisbon treaty, national Parliaments may raise an objection, referred to as a “reasoned opinion”, if they do not believe that a draft proposal is compliant with the principle of subsidiarity.

The Government’s explanatory memorandum, which was sent to the European Scrutiny Committee by the Under-Secretary of State for Women and Equalities, sets out the Government’s assessment of whether the Commission’s proposals meet the principle of subsidiarity. We find that they do not. There is no reason why member states cannot achieve the objectives by acting alone and there is no evidence that value would be added through EU involvement. Indeed, the Commission’s own impact assessment found that the evidence base for demonstrating the need for, and proportionality of, binding EU action was “very weak”, stating that members states had a

“proven ability to act in this area”

and that

“a number of Member States had taken measures which appeared to have achieved significant progress”.

I hope that list includes us.

[Meg Munn]

One way of making progress on this is through the voluntary approach, but Lord Davies has made it clear in speeches I have heard him make that he feels that there must be progress and that, if progress is not made, we should look at a non-voluntary approach. Is the Minister arguing that the Government would be willing to look at that as something the UK would do, rather than something the EU would do?

[Matthew Hancock]

For the purposes of today’s debate, the Government are arguing that this does not pass the EU’s subsidiarity test. For those purposes, the Government’s position is clear: we think that the voluntary approach is best. Before becoming a Minister, I wrote a book in which I stated that that needs to happen and that we should hold open the possibility of having legislation, but the Government’s position is clear: we should approach this on a voluntary basis.

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[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Before I move on to my substantive point, which will be brief, I have to correct the statement of the hon. Member for Esher and Walton (Mr Raab) that the last Government did nothing on child care. I have to tell the hon. Gentleman that when we took office there was no child care in many parts of the country and there were no options for parents who wanted to work. I know that from my work in the social services sector. I welcome, however, the Minister’s words about the importance of this issue and the fact that companies are hampering themselves by not having diversity, as this means not doing all they can in the achievement of economic output.

My main point is that the issue is not about imposing quotas. I do not want to see the European Union imposing quotas, but neither do I want to see this country or this Government being complacent about how to move towards gender equality—not just in the one area of women on boards, but across our whole culture as well as across our businesses as a whole. We know that substantive and sustained progress has been made more recently in the appointment of non-executive directors, and we should all welcome it. We saw it previously, but there has been an increase in the number. We also know—here we can learn from the experience of Norway—that it is easier to achieve appointments of non-executive directors. Focusing just on that, however, will not help the vast majority of companies, and it will not help us see greater gender equality.

This weekend, The Observer told us about its research on the 100 top private companies, of which only 64 currently publish their board composition. Of those, 73% have all-male executive directors, and we know, too, that 51% have all-male non-executive directors. If we look at the FTSE 250, we find that 71% of companies have all-male executive directors. This relates not just to who is sitting around the board table, but to what is happening within companies. We need a culture that, right from the time a woman first enters a company, promotes those who have talents and supports them whatever their circumstances.

The hon. Member for Esher and Walton made some important points about both parents being able to work, but we know that all too often it is women who take on the majority of the responsibility for child care. We know from all the statistics on the gender pay gap about the disadvantage that comes from spending time away from work, whether it be working part-time or taking a career break, which impacts for ever on the woman’s earning capacity. We must look much more broadly at the general culture of work. The hon. Gentleman was right to say that the Government had given the issue a profile, but the discussion in Europe has done so as well, and has enabled people to understand the need for progress. The Government have a much bigger job to do in the world of work overall.

As I said in an intervention, the Government should think seriously about what they, and Parliament as a whole, would want to happen if the progress that is currently being made in relation to non-executive directors did not continue. It is all very well to say that we believe in voluntary arrangements, but if more progress is not made in the future, will the Government opt for more prescriptive measures? If so, what will those measures be?

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Thursday 6th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Michael Fallon]

I will certainly do what my hon. Friend suggests. I met some of the key players in the industry yesterday. The Government provide significant support for research and development, training, and improving the UK’s sourcing of the supply chain in this important industry. I announced a further £9 million yesterday for a research and development centre for energy storage to capitalise on the growing electric and hybrid vehicle battery market. The Secretary of State will today visit Honda to welcome the 500 new jobs that it is creating in Swindon. I hope that the Labour party will welcome that vote of confidence in what the Government are doing.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

21. Automotive companies and many other companies rely on skilled engineers. Whenever I raise the issue, the Government talk a great deal about the importance of getting women engineers into such companies. However, they have entirely cut the grant to the UK Resource Centre for Women in Science, Engineering and Technology, which was ensuring that good engineers got into jobs, and have given a minuscule amount of their budget to the royal societies and the Royal Academy of Engineering. I welcome the Minister and the rest of the team to their posts. Will he ensure that this matter is looked at again so that some of the jobs in these companies go to women engineers?

[Michael Fallon]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for what she says, and I am happy to look again at the matter. The Government are working with the Royal Society to see what can be done to encourage more women into engineering, and specific help is available from Government to help with engineering training, particularly for the automotive industry.

Safeguarding Children

Meg Munn Excerpts

Wednesday 13th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Twigg]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that contribution. He has a long-standing record on these matters and is respected in all parts of the House for his work in this area. I will touch on some of those issues later in my speech.

The first of the five areas involves ensuring that we have a child-centred system, and that the needs of the child are the first consideration of the many professionals who are involved in child protection and safeguarding. This was at the heart of the Children Act 2004, and of other reforms brought in by the previous Labour Government. They include the establishment of the Office of the Children’s Commissioner and the focus on five clear outcomes through Every Child Matters, which helped to deliver some of the previous Government’s most successful policies, including the reduction in child poverty. Yesterday’s report from the Child Poverty Action Group reminded us of that achievement, and of the real danger that that progress could be reversed by the present Government.

Let me place on record our support for the work of Professor Eileen Munro, who has done a service to the Government and to the country in promoting this child-centred approach. She is absolutely right to focus on the journey of the child through the system. Any shift from a process that is focused excessively on compliance to one that better values the expertise of professionals is one that will have my support. However, we need to strike a balance between allowing professionals the flexibility to make a judgment on a child’s needs and the need for clear rules and principles. There is clearly a danger that a big reduction in the amount of guidance could take us from one undesirable state to another.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does my hon. Friend share my concern that child protection is no longer specifically included in the Ofsted framework, although I am told that it is implicit? Does he also share my concern that the Education Act 2011 puts more power into teachers’ hands and puts children at risk by allowing a teacher of the opposite gender to search a child without another adult being present? Does he agree that we should look into those issues more carefully?

[Stephen Twigg]

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s current and previous work in this area, including her chairing of the all-party parliamentary group on child protection. She has raised a number of proper concerns about the changes that have been made, and I will return later in my speech to some of them—including the involvement of Ofsted and the well-being of children.

As I was saying, there is a balance to be struck between professional flexibility and clear rules and principles. The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children has warned that

“the Government should not move too quickly to rapid deregulation. It needs to invest heavily in building the skills, confidence and experience of all professionals working with children.”

In its response, published today, to yesterday’s announcement, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health says that it supports the slimlining of guidance, but it is worried that the downsizing might have gone too far so that vital information is no longer included. It provided the examples of training, lessons from research and, in particular, the safeguarding needs of particularly vulnerable groups, mentioning forced marriages, female genital mutilation and victims of trafficking.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 16th April 2012 Commons Chamber

[Tim Loughton]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point, which was covered slightly in my earlier answer. I am concerned about getting good pre-adoption support, peri-adoption support and post-adoption support, because the worst thing that can happen is a breakdown in adoption. There is scant evidence about breakdown in adoptions, but some of the highest-performing adoption agencies in the country, be they local authority or independent, are those that invest in adoption support, which means that adoptions do not break down. That results in not only a financial saving for that authority, but, more importantly, a social gain for the child, who gets a safe, stable and loving home—permanently.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I was recently contacted by some adoptive parents in my constituency who unfortunately are experiencing a breakdown with one of their adopted children, many years after the child was adopted. They felt that they were not given enough information before the adoption, particularly about attachment issues. In the push to increase the speed of adoption, what will the Minister do to ensure that the preparation for adoptive parents is not too fast and that the right information is given to enable them to deal with the issues when children are placed?

[Tim Loughton]

The hon. Lady, too, is an expert on this subject. In trying to provide better timeliness, rather than leaving a child in limbo in care when there is no safe way back to their birth family, we will not sacrifice quality. We will beef up the assessment process so that prospective adopters are given a clear insight into what becoming an adoptive parent is all about. If they are up for it, they should be helped and supported through the process as quickly as possible. It is necessary to ensure that a suitable match is provided, which they are capable of taking on, along with all the support that needs to go with it. It is a false economy—financially and, more importantly for the child, socially—not to do that.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 27th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

Engineering and technology have some of the lowest levels of participation among women of all the professions. Given that university technical colleges are new institutions that have the opportunity to ensure that more girls take part in these subjects, will the Secretary of State set them the aim of ensuring that 50% of their entrants are girls?

[Michael Gove]

I am always wary of targets and quotas that have 50% at their heart. However, the broader point that the hon. Lady makes about the need for all of us to encourage more girls to contemplate a career in design, technology or engineering is very strong. She authored a report last year that was welcomed by the Minister for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning, which made a series of recommendations that university technical colleges and, indeed, the whole school and college sector should take to heart.

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[Mr Hayes]

The answer is simple: we must evangelise the case for apprenticeships with all our might and power. It is about numbers but it is about standards too. I draw my hon. Friend’s attention to our actions to raise standards, get small businesses involved and let people know that all this is good for apprentices, good for businesses and good for Britain.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I have been contacted by one of my constituents who adopted a child from care. She faces losing the only support she gets from the state—her child benefit. Given that the Secretary of State wants more people to adopt children from care and that they often have many needs that are ongoing for X number of years, will he put aside more money to support such children and their families in the years ahead?

[Michael Gove]

That is a very good point. One thing we are looking at is how we can improve support for parents who do the right thing and adopt. We are looking at a range of ways of doing that. We are also looking at ways in which everything from the schools admissions system to the training of social workers can help to support those parents who are doing such a fantastic job by adopting children.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Consider it chased.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

14. What progress has been made by the Munro review implementation working group.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (Tim Loughton)]

The Government’s response to the Munro review was informed by an implementation working group convened for that purpose. We continue to work with a range of partners to take forward these important reforms. We will consult early next year on the revision of statutory guidance. More flexible assessment processes are being trialled in eight local authorities. Ofsted has consulted on new inspection arrangements and we have published a work programme on safeguarding children in the NHS.

[Meg Munn]

The Minister started off well, publishing the minutes of the implementation working group on the website. Unless the working group has not met since, the last minutes are for May 2011. Will he give me an update on the report that he asked for on the funding implications of the Munro review?

[Tim Loughton]

I set up the implementation working group specifically to translate the Munro review recommendations into practical things that we could implement before we published the Government’s response, so they informed the Government’s response which we published before the summer. We have used members of that implementation group to inform the work that we are doing on all those aspects that I mentioned and others. My intention is to reconvene the implementation working group early in the new year to monitor the progress that we have made and see what more we need to do.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

When it comes to dealing with bureaucracy and red tape, the officials in my Department are allies. They are terrible, swift swords cutting through the bureaucracy that has so far held this country back.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

This country is desperately short of skills in science, engineering and technology and far too few girls and women study those subjects. What will the Secretary of State do to ensure that at least 50% of the pupils who will go to UTCs are female?

[Michael Gove]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady and know that she has recently completed a report on some of the barriers to young women taking advantage of the opportunities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. A new UTC is opening in Sheffield and I hope to be able to work with her to ensure that it generates enthusiasm among boys and girls in Sheffield and across South Yorkshire for the superb education it will offer.

Oral Answers to Questions

Meg Munn Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

That was a very effective pitch from a very effective Back Bencher.

[Meg Munn (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab/Co-op)]

I agree with the Secretary of State’s aim to raise standards in primary schools. Will he therefore meet me to discuss why he is seeking to remove the outstanding leadership of a primary school in my constituency that has been praised by his permanent secretary and has this year taken children above floor standards, and where his proposals threaten to make the situation much worse?

[Michael Gove]

I will be delighted to meet the hon. Lady.