Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 16th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I would expect all multi-academy trusts to do everything possible to ensure that the local community and those involved in the delivery of services were appropriately consulted. I look forward to chatting to the hon. Gentleman when the Education Committee next meets so that he can expand on that point.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

The number of apprentices in Harlow has increased by more than 80% during the past year. Will the Minister look to increase the prestige of apprentices and create a royal society of apprentices, which would improve their status and encourage more people to do apprenticeships?

[Matthew Hancock]

I am delighted that, like many other places in the country, the number of apprentices in Harlow is increasing, and the number of employers taking on apprentices is increasing. During the last year, the increase in those applying for apprenticeships through the apprenticeship vacancy website rose by 50% to 1.5 million, not all of them in Harlow, but many. The culture of apprenticeships is on the rise again in Britain.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 24th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Ofsted already inspects academy chains. It has inspected both E-ACT and AET.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

T9. Is my right hon. Friend aware that a very important event will take place in September 2014, namely the opening of Harlow’s Sir Charles Kao university technical college following millions of pounds of Government investment? Is he aware that the UTC is proving to be incredibly popular among pupils and their parents, and that it will increase the choice that is available to many people in Harlow? Will he come to Harlow to visit it, and to see for himself how it will improve the quality of education?

School Funding

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 13th March 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Laws]

There is a long list to go down and Lincolnshire is certainly on it. Its per pupil funding will rise to £4,370. I will write to my hon. Friend about both authorities.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

This announcement, along with the pupil premium and free school meals for poor pupils, shows that the Government have a relentless focus on the poor. When the Minister says that funding will be based on the actual characteristics of pupils and schools, does that relate to areas within counties and not just to counties? Will he set out how the proposals will help my constituency of Harlow?

[Mr Laws]

I should explain that what the Government will do under these proposals is to ensure that each local authority area is funded fairly. There will still be flexibility for individual local authorities to take decisions about how they allocate that money to their schools.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

Of course, Crossrail, which is the biggest public construction project in Europe, has in it exactly what the hon. Gentleman describes. He will have seen last week that we announced 2,000 new apprentices as part of High Speed 2. I entirely agree about the need to drive up the number of apprentices. We introduced a rule that every apprenticeship had to be a minimum of a year, and the number of apprenticeships for those aged between 16 to 19 lasting a year or more has gone up sharply. We must be careful to consider the reason for the numbers. Apprenticeships of under a year, in many cases without a job attached, are not really apprenticeships at all.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the best ways of increasing the skills of apprenticeships is the creation of pre-apprenticeship schools, otherwise known as university technical colleges? Will he look at expanding the Government’s programme of 24 UTCs, one of which will be in Harlow, so that there is one in every town across the country?

[Matthew Hancock]

I absolutely support my hon. Friend in his enthusiasm for UTCs, not only the one in Harlow, for which, I know, he is a great campaigner, but those across the country.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Monday 6th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

Of course role models can be of either gender, and I am sure that many men can think of women who would be role models for themselves. Under this Government, the number and proportion of applications for apprenticeships in engineering are up, and the number of applications to study engineering at university is up. There is much more to do, but we are moving in the right direction.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that university technical colleges will make a huge difference to apprenticeships? May we have a commitment from the Government that we will have one in every town after the next election?

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 5th December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Jo Swinson]

The hon. Gentleman raises an issue that the Government are concerned about and are acting on. From 1 July, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs has prioritised complaints about the apprenticeship minimum wage to ensure that it brings proper enforcement against employers who are not paying it. Further, we have made it much easier to name and shame employers who do not pay the minimum wage. We have also announced that we will increase the maximum penalty fine to £20,000. That tough programme of enforcement action should help to ensure that businesses pay their workers properly. That is what the public expect and it is what most responsible businesses already do.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that the number of apprenticeships in my constituency of Harlow has increased by more than 80% in the past year? Will she congratulate the Harlow and district chamber of commerce and the businesses who are hiring apprentices and paying them proper apprenticeship wages? Will she also welcome the new university technical school, which is, in essence, a pre-apprentice school that will provide young people with skills?

[Jo Swinson]

I happily offer those congratulations, and I add to them my congratulations to my hon. Friend for the unfailing way in which he has championed apprenticeships, not just in his constituency, but in this House by encouraging many Members to take on apprentices in their offices. It is important to ensure that young people have such opportunities. That is why the Government have invested significantly in expanding apprenticeships so much.

PISA Results

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd December 2013 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Wales acts almost as a controlled sample. Welsh children are as intelligent and motivated as children in England, but unfortunately in Wales there are no academies, no free schools, no league tables, no chief inspector such as Sir Michael Wilshaw and no determination to reform like this coalition Government. It is an object lesson in what happens when people abandon reform and succumb to the NUT orthodoxy, which I am afraid has suffocated aspiration for far too many children in the Principality.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

University technical schools have huge potential to transform education through their emphasis on technical education, vocation and science and mathematics. Such a school will open in Harlow next year. Will my right hon. Friend expand the university technical school programme even further in order that young people may gain the vocational and technical expertise from which they will benefit?

[Michael Gove]

University technical colleges are an excellent innovation and we want to make sure that there are more high-performing UTCs.

Start-up Loans

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Wednesday 20th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Hancock]

I encourage links between colleges and local enterprise partnerships, which can be strengthened a great deal by their governors and board members sitting on each other’s boards. There are schools around the country that bring in businesses and entrepreneurs, not only to talk to students, for example through the brilliant Speakers for Schools programme, but to help design the curriculum and motivate children to improve their performance in academic subjects. That is a great success when it is done well and I encourage more schools to do it.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that Harlow has had the highest business growth in the United Kingdom according to a BBC and Experian survey? Will he congratulate Danielle Field, a young mother who from nothing set up an apprentice hairdressing academy with her partner thanks to a James Caan loan? That has been a tremendous success. Is this scheme not an example of the Government helping the lowest-paid to get back into work?

[Matthew Hancock]

I pay tribute to Danielle Field. I also pay tribute to my hon. Friend. I did not know that Harlow was the best place in the UK to start a business according to the statistics. That shows just how brilliant Harlow is, almost all of which is down to its brilliant MP.

Oral Answers to Questions

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 24th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Vince Cable]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his positive comments. He is absolutely right: for every £1 the UK Green Investment Bank puts in, something in the order of £4 of private funding goes in parallel with it. I agree that if we are going to get long-term investment in renewable energy there has to be stability in policy.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

7. What changes he is planning to make to the national minimum wage.

[The Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills (Vince Cable)]

I am asking the Low Pay Commission to consider what conditions would be needed to allow the minimum wage to rise in the future by more than current conditions allow and without damaging employment.

[Robert Halfon]

As the Government are supporting hard-working people, does my right hon. Friend agree that we should help lower earners more by raising the minimum wage—by adding regional minimum wage top-ups, increasing the threshold for national insurance or taking people who get the minimum wage out of tax altogether?

[Vince Cable]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for the work he has done on low pay. Indeed, I think he is a member of the Prospect union and has campaigned for the work force in his constituency. I think that the best way forward is the one that we have chosen: lifting the personal allowance, which has so far taken 2.7 million people out of tax. As a consequence, almost 40% of adult minimum wage workers have seen real increases in their take-home pay since 2010.

Al-Madinah Free School

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Laws]

My hon. Friend makes a telling point about the educational challenges for this country and about the need to focus on educational failure from wherever it comes. It speaks volumes about the Labour party that it should choose to have an urgent question on this one individual school while across the country there are hundreds of other schools facing similar challenges in which it seems to have no equivalent interest.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that, despite the failings of this particular school, free schools, university technical schools and the pupil premium are transforming education in our country and that we should not use the failure of one school to become the enemy of choice for parents who want to set up their own schools?

[Mr Laws]

My hon. Friend is exactly right. The Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss), will publish information showing the progress made across the country in last year’s exam results—progress that, thanks to our reforms and to Ofqual, we can be assured is real progress and not simply inflated progress.