Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (First sitting)

Toby Perkins Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 30th November 2021 Public Bill Committees

We will set out further details in statutory guidance, which will be informed by our ongoing engagement with MCAs, the GLA, other key stakeholders and evidence from our trailblazers. This amendment, in addition to the statutory guidance, will ensure that MCAs and the GLA play a meaningful role in supporting the success of local skills improvement plans.

[Mr Toby Perkins (Chesterfield) (Lab)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. I would like to take a moment at the start of these proceedings to talk about the importance of the Bill and the approach that the Labour party will be taking to it, alongside Government amendments 4 and 5.

The skills Bill is of tremendous importance. We recognise that there has been, for a significant time, too little investment in skills and in the next generation. In particular, the drastic funding cuts during the past 11 years have had a dramatic impact on our further education sector and on the skills of the nation. It is recognised by many businesses, employers and players in the further education sector that we have fallen behind.

The Bill represents the Government’s approach to addressing the backlog, and they tell us that this approach places employers at the heart of the skills strategy and skills agenda. When I first heard that, it sounded familiar to me, having been a Member of Parliament for the past 11 years. I thought, “Where have I heard it said before that employers will be at the heart of the skills strategy?” I believed that I had heard that from a previous skills Minister, so we did a bit of research in my office, and it turns out that we have heard it from almost all of them.

Back in January 2011, the then skills Minister, the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes), said of the Government’s approach to skills and apprenticeships:

“The entire focus of our Skills Strategy is in building a training system that is employer led…Indeed helping meet those skills needs, in businesses across the country, will make a major contribution to economic growth.”

In 2015, the apprenticeship levy was introduced, and the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, told us that we now had a system in the hands of an employer-led institute for apprenticeships, and that his levy would be a

“radical, long overdue” new approach to apprenticeship funding. He said in this place that it was

“to raise the skills of the nation and address one of the enduring weaknesses of the British economy.”—[Official Report, 25 November 2015; Vol. 602, c. 1370.]

His skills Minister at the time, former Tory MP Nick Boles, said:

“At the heart of the apprenticeship drive is the principle that no one better understands the skills employers need than employers themselves.”

By 2017, the Government were telling us this:

“The Apprenticeship Levy is a cornerstone of the government’s skills agenda, creating a system which puts employers at the heart of designing and funding apprenticeships to support productivity and growth.”

In 2018, the then Education Secretary, now the Minister for Security and Borders, told us that local enterprise partnerships were

“business-led partnerships…at the heart of responding to skills needs and building local industrial strategies that will help individuals and businesses gain the skills they need to grow.”

The rhetoric behind this Bill is exactly the rhetoric that we have been listening to for the past 11 years. Indeed, if the approaches of the past 11 years, which we were told placed employers at the heart of skills policy, had worked, we would not need this Bill. The Government are once again returning with the same prescription for the same ailment. They are once again failing to meet the size of the challenge, and in some cases are heading in the wrong direction altogether.

We have a new Secretary of State in post, of course. He is at great pains to tell people that there will be a change of tone and approach. The Bill was the brainchild of the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Gavin Williamson), if that is not an oxymoron, who was his predecessor—a man who believed in seizing as much power for himself as possible. Since the appointment of the new Secretary of State, we have been told there will be a change of tone and approach, but the Government’s approach to the cross-party amendments brought by their Lordships is not promising.

We entirely support the amendments in this group, which are about the mayoral combined authorities, but it is remarkable that the Government needed to introduce them; that demonstrates that the Government produced the skills Bill without any recognition of the issue.

[Tom Hunt (Ipswich) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has identified a key challenge that the Government are looking to tackle. It will clearly be difficult, but we hope that they will be successful. Does he agree that part of the reason why the challenge is so significant is that the previous Labour Government almost entirely ignored technical education and skills, with their obsession with universities and a 50% target?

[Mr Perkins]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman raised that question. That has long been the lament. I speak to my colleagues who were involved in skills policy under the Labour Government, and their retort is that the investment in skills under the Labour Government was far greater than what we have seen in the 11 years that followed. There is nothing contradictory in wanting a strategy that allows as many people who want a university education and who are capable of it to have one, and that also has a real commitment to investment in skills.

Over the 11 years of this Government, we have seen the trashing of the idea that universities should be an aspiration for everyone. Alongside that rhetoric—an example of which we have just heard from the hon. Gentleman—we have seen a massive reduction in the investment in skills, and we have seen policies that do not work. The apprenticeship levy led to a massive reduction in the number of apprenticeships. What is said is one thing; what is done is quite another.

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

Back in the mid-2000s, did not the Labour Government, who predated my time here, introduce national skills academies? The whole point of them was to develop skills across the piece and drive the development of courses that could run in colleges across the UK.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We feel very strongly that we need investment in skills, but we also need a strategic approach that brings in different Government Departments and recognises that skills are the responsibility of not just the Department for Education, but of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Treasury. There has to be recognition that this is about the kind of economy, as well as the kind of skills system, that we are looking to build. My hon. Friend makes a powerful point on the Labour Government’s approach, and the investments they made.

[Lia Nici (Great Grimsby) (Con)]

I was a college lecturer in the era that the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington mentioned. Curriculum 2000 was an absolute, unmitigated disaster. AVCEs—advanced vocational certificates of education—were withdrawn very quickly. The money that was pumped in was pumped into all the wrong places, and we ended up in a situation where people went to university because there were no proper options for BTECs at level 4 or level 5, or Cambridge technicals or City and Guilds, or anything else. It is not just BTECs but the Pearson monolith we are talking about here.

[Mr Perkins]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. I accept that she has a long track record in this sector, and that is an important contribution to this debate. The investment in skills then was on a different level from the investment that has taken place since. I am very happy to spend the entire debate talking about the previous 20 years; it would be interesting but not entirely fruitful. I accept that she feels, as she said on Second Reading, that changes to higher national diplomas were damaging; she was negative about the drive towards university education. Like the Labour Government, I believe that we should recognise that it is a brutal world for those who do not have skill. A drive towards university education should not be at the expense of college education; they should be two hands working closely together.

[Lia Nici]

The reality is that university education is not skills education. That is the problem. We have people doing lots of different types of degrees, and they are leaving, as graduates, with no skills, and are not employable in the majority of places.

[The Chair]

Order. You cannot intervene on an intervention. I will allow Mr Perkins to respond.

[Mr Perkins]

It was such a controversial intervention that people wanted to intervene on it. I do not entirely accept what the hon. Member for Great Grimsby says—that a university degree is not a contribution to the skills of the nation. She hits on a view that is at the heart of much of this Government’s approach, which is that education has value only in so far as it is used in the work that someone goes on to do, and that there is a very narrow distinction between skills or vocational education, which is useful, and university education, which is theoretical, abstract, and of little value. I do not recognise that distinction at all.

[The Chair]

May I gently remind people that, while I think it is appropriate to have a broader debate at the beginning, we are talking about amendments 4 and 5?

[Mr Perkins]

Sure. I take your point, Mrs Miller. However, the intervention from the hon. Member for Great Grimsby highlights an important broader issue: of course skills and vocational education will always need to lead people being able to find work, but constantly decrying university education, on the basis that it is somehow not delivering that, is mistaken. There has been a real drive by this Government to frame the further education and higher education sectors as enemies that must be pitted against each other. Our approach recognises them as two important, powerful strongholds in supporting this nation to be the kind of nation that it wants to be.

[Andrew Gwynne (Denton and Reddish) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Perkins]

I will give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish; then, if my hon. Friend the Member for Luton South wishes to come in, I will take her intervention.

[Andrew Gwynne]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I think he is absolutely right: we are heading into that age-old trap of not only dividing the academic from the vocational in further education, but implying that higher education is solely an academic route. There are many vocational higher education qualifications out there, and we must not ignore that. On Government amendment 5, the exact point that Andy Burnham—the Mayor of Greater Manchester—and the Greater Manchester Combined Authority have been making for years is that for the Greater Manchester city region to succeed, we must ensure that its skills agenda embraces not only the academic but the vocational, so that we have the skills for the jobs of tomorrow.

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[Mr Perkins]

I encourage my hon. Friend to expand on that point, because he is absolutely right. It is remarkable that the Government have been forced to introduce Government amendment 5, because it means that they brought the Bill forward without recognising any role for authorities that already have this funding devolved to them in the first place. It is a fairly dramatic change. The approach that Labour would take to local skills improvement plans is fundamentally different from that of the Government.

The Government are taking the approach that these are employer-led documents—that phrase again. They are documents of tremendous importance, so presumably the chambers of commerce will be holding the pen on them and will now, as a result of Government amendment 5, be forced to convince the Secretary of State that they have properly taken on board the views of those democratically elected to lead on skills policy in their areas. So many other important contributors are left on the side lines.

Labour’s approach would be to say that we need to recognise the importance of local skills improvement plans that will dictate the direction of skills policy. What we need is a local skills improvement plan that brings together the role of public and private sector employers; that brings in further education colleges; that brings in significant independent training providers within an area; and that is held together by those with democratic accountability, such as metro Mayors and local authorities. That holistic approach would deliver a skills policy that everyone would be able to get behind and recognise as representative.

The Government’s approach is very much about placing the chambers of commerce at the heart of this, but in fact they have had to bring forward an amendment to even put the metro Mayors and combined authorities back into that role. We support Government amendment 5, but it is remarkable that it was necessary at all.

I would like the Minister to expand on whether Government amendment 4 impacts clause 6 in terms of the duty placed on local skills improvement plans for compliance with section 1 of the Climate Change Act 2008. It is crucial that skills policy drives us towards a net zero future, so it is important to understand whether the intention is to undermine that commitment when it comes to Government amendment 4.

Again, we support Government amendment 5, although we are confused about why it is needed and why it was not central to the approach. As my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish mentioned, it is important that we recognise that mayoral combined authorities and the Greater London Authority already have responsibilities in terms of policy and funding for further education and skills, and that they both have good professional relationships with employers, colleges and training providers in their areas. I have been along to meet them in Manchester and have seen their excellent work on careers guidance and their constructive approach to independent providers and the FE sector. That is a great example of how devolved decision makers are better in touch with the needs of their communities than a centralised approach.

It is a shame that the Bill, the brainchild of the former Secretary of State, is a return to the centralisation agenda that has too often bedevilled Whitehall thinking. It was clearly a driving force in the legislation. It is inconceivable that local skills improvement plans could have flown in the face of decisions made locally. It is therefore important to understand what protections there will be for existing funding arrangements with regard to those put in place by metro Mayors. Will they be transferred to employer representative bodies or will there be a dual system?

The Government propose that employer representative bodies consider the views of mayoral combined authorities or the Greater London Authority but, as was said by the hon. Member for Ipswich on Second Reading, what does that say about those communities that are not within metro Mayor areas? The majority of my colleagues on the Labour Benches are in metro Mayor areas—I am one of the relatively few who are not—but many colleagues on the Conservative Benches are in areas that have local enterprise partnerships, which were originally meant to bring together many of the different power brokers. It seems that democratic accountability is missing entirely in areas outside the metro Mayor areas.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

This is a crucial point, which I hope we will come to as our consideration of the Bill develops: how do we define regions and regional consultation? The hon. Member for Great Grimsby might have an idea completely different from mine about what constitutes the best region when looking at skills and skills development. I hope that the Minister will take that point away and look to define that later as we go through the Bill.

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[Mr Perkins]

Absolutely. To return to the subject of the amendment concerning mayoral combined authorities, the phrase “due consideration” is noticeably vague. The kind of due consideration that the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire might have given to the views of the Mayor of Manchester would have left me—and, no doubt, the Mayor of Manchester—with sleepless nights. We hope that a more thoughtful approach is now in place and we welcome the change of tone, but we are not seeing a change in policy.

[Emma Hardy]

On that issue of “due consideration” and its vagueness, will the Minister agree to look at producing some guidance on what constitutes due consideration? Is that a consultation that has happened on one occasion, or on a number of occasions? How do we define “due consideration” to ensure that the democratic accountability to which my hon. Friend is referring is put at the heart of the Bill?

[Mr Perkins]

I agree with that absolutely. The next part of that—to extend what my hon. Friend is saying—is to ask whether there is a right of appeal for a combined authority or metro Mayor in the event that they do not consider that due consideration has been given to their views. If they think that the employer representative body has put together a local skills improvement plan that has not taken into account the representations made on one or more areas, will there be a right of appeal? Will the fact that the metro Mayor considers that due consideration was not given be able to pause the local skills improvement plan and bring people together?

What role does the Secretary of State consider that he will have? As I said, the previous Secretary of State was very much a centraliser—he wanted his hands on every single decision—and that clearly runs through the Bill. He had all these frustrations with the fact that individual organisations were not doing exactly what he wanted, so he wanted the power to tell them that they had to. Is that the sort of approach that this Secretary of State will take? Having appointed the chambers of commerce to make decisions before those who are democratically elected to do so, he appears to be positioning himself as the arbiter in a whole variety of local decisions. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Emma Hardy]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Miller. Looking at the room, I see that people on both sides are genuinely interested in education matters. I hope that this will be a good Committee that really scrutinises the legislation before us in a shared ambition to make the Bill the best that it can be.

I will be brief. I have already made an intervention about guidance on what constitutes due consideration and about the arbitration processes for conflict over whether someone believes they have been duly considered. Will there be a timeframe for that due consideration? Local engagement and agreement for the skills plans is absolutely crucial, so having that clearly laid out is fundamental.

I hope the Minister will clarify something. I may be misreading the Bill, but am I right in thinking that further education colleges have been removed from consultation, or is that part of a later amendment? The Lords tabled an amendment to ensure that local school improvement plans are co-developed with colleges, local government, elected Mayors, employers and so on. Am I right in thinking that colleges are no longer listed as part of the consultation process, or will that be addressed in another amendment? I may have made a mistake, in which case the Minister will correct me.

We are basing everything on employers and the jobs available now, but has the Minister thought about future-proofing the local skills development plans to include industries that will be developed in future, especially in relation to climate, green changes and so on? We might create the best possible plan for jobs that exist now, but that might not be the plan that we want in five years’ time, so will such future-proofing be included?

[Tom Hunt]

I will make just a few very brief comments. I think that the local skills improvement plans are a huge step in the right direction. It is clearly crucial that local businesses should play a role in shaping the curriculum of further education colleges. We need to have far more of an ecosystem approach when it comes to the role of employers, schools, FE colleges and further education. Too often, it seems as if they are kind of on the sides.

[Mr Perkins]

What does the hon. Gentleman say to my earlier point, which was that what he is saying is exactly what has been said about every single Conservative skills reform in the last 11 years? They always claim that they are putting employers at the heart of the measures. Why does he think those previous approaches have failed?

[Tom Hunt]

To be honest, we are dealing with the Government we have today. I can say, as somebody with an interest in further education and skills, that this Bill is actually the most significant and potentially game-changing piece of Government legislation. My job is to look at the Bill before us today, and I think it is hugely in the right place. That is not to say that improvements cannot be made at this stage, and we will engage in doing that.

There is one quick point that I would like to make. When we talk about the local skills improvement plans and local employers playing a greater role in shaping the curriculum of further education colleges, I think it is important that we consider what might happen. I imagine that the vast majority of education providers will play ball and welcome that input from local business, but on occasions where there may be some resistance and that does not quite work, is there something that could be done to ensure that they come to the table to accept the advice and a steer from local business?

On my comments on Second Reading, which the hon. Member for Chesterfield has often mentioned, I recognise that there is a significant difference between mayoral combined authorities and regular upper-tier local authorities. Certain powers and funding have been devolved to mayoral combined authorities, and we do not have them in every area. I accept that, and I accept why the Government are treating mayoral combined authorities slightly differently from regular upper-tier authorities such as Suffolk County Council. I guess my view would be that the solution is to have more devolution. As somebody who recently, with other Suffolk colleagues, supported a bid for One Suffolk, I would be very happy if there were positive movements so that Suffolk was in a place to have the powers for its principal authority to play a role in local improvement plans.

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[Andrew Gwynne]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention—probably almost as grateful as she is to have had the chance to make that press release—and she is absolutely right.

I firmly believe that the skills agenda is linked to the industrial strategy agenda, not just for individual city regions, towns and counties, but for the country. If we want Britain to succeed, we must think not just about the here and now, but about the future. That involves bringing together skills and industrial strategy. In a small way, that is what we are doing in Greater Manchester through the devolution agenda.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend is making an incredibly important point, which is at the heart of the difference between Labour and Conservative approaches. This Government’s approach is about moving towards a German-style skills system, but the Treasury and Business teams do not want a German-style economy. I very much welcome a step towards the German-style approach, but the Government are trying to impose a model on top of our economy, and that cannot be done without the drive towards an industrial strategy.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend must have eyes in the back of his head, because that was pretty much the next point that I wanted to make. It all hinges on the term “due consideration”. We are doing this in city regions such as Greater Manchester, and we are getting there. We have the skills, and we have good collaboration with local businesses to shape the agenda. We have a shared vision. I accept that that might not be the case in other devolved areas—there might be a degree of friction between the business community and the combined authority—but in Greater Manchester, it is genuinely a partnership. The skills programmes, strategies and priorities are genuinely developed in partnership.

The Minister talks about “due consideration” in relation to the amendment, but I want assurances from him that Ministers will take a genuinely collaborative approach and we will not end up with some monolithic, top-down and Whitehall-knows-best approach being imposed on city regions that are already starting to develop the very skills strategies that are envisaged in the Bill. I will be grateful if the Minister can address my concerns.

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[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend is making an incredibly important point. We have a couple of enthusiasts for devolution of power on the Government side of the Committee, but I fear they may be disappointed because the Government’s approach to devolution is very much less enthusiastic than that of the previous Conservative Governments in 2015 and 2017. The Bill, which seeks to bring a lot of power back to the centre, seems to prove that.

[Matt Western]

I agree with my hon. Friend, and I think many hon. Members, including the hon. Member for Mansfield, will be disappointed about that. It is really important that the Government send clear messages about devolution and what they want to see, but in many facets of Government business there seems to be a greater concentration of powers coming into Whitehall and Ministers’ offices than devolution to the likes of Mansfield, Manchester, Liverpool the north-east and so on.

As I said, one of the great learnings of the last 20 months is just how brilliantly our local services and authorities can deliver things. That is because they understand their geography, their communities and their populations. I am concerned about how due consideration, a much-vented issue in the last half hour, might work, particularly given the reliance on the personality of the individual who happens to be in the seat at the time. I will not go into any further detail on that because it has already been much explored.

Will the Minister provide a bit more information on what factors will be considered in the designation of an LSIP? The Local Government Association has stated:

“the reforms need to be implemented as part of an integrated, place-based approach. Without a meaningful role for local authorities, the reforms risk creating an even more fragmented skills system, with different providers subject to different skills plans”

I urge the Government and the Minister to listen and respond to the experience of the Local Government Association.

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[Alex Burghart]

That point is well made, and I very much hope to visit Warrington in the near future and see that good work.

[Mr Perkins]

The Minister may have received guidance that might help him, but as I understood it, paragraphs (a), (b) and (c) of subsection (6) all remain in the Bill; he is simply adding proposed new subsection (6A), which we have just been debating. The amendment does not take out any of the paragraphs in subsection (6), unless I have misunderstood it.

[Alex Burghart]

To bring a bit of clarification to proceedings, the hon. Gentleman is quite right. Contrary to some of the messages that Opposition Members gave earlier, we are keeping all of clause 1(6)—that means paragraphs (a), (b) and (c).

Amendment 4 agreed to.

Amendment made: 5, in clause 1, page 2, line 32, at end insert—

‘(6A) Where a specified area covers any of the area of a relevant authority, the Secretary of State may approve and publish a local skills improvement plan for the specified area only if satisfied that in the development of the plan due consideration was given to the views of the relevant authority.

For this purpose “relevant authority” means—

(a) a mayoral combined authority within the meaning of Part 6 of the Local Democracy, Economic Development and Construction Act 2009 (see section 107A(8) of that Act), or

(b) the Greater London Authority.’—(Alex Burghart.)

The effect of this amendment is that the Secretary of State must be satisfied that due consideration has been given to the views of a mayoral combined authority or the Greater London Authority before approving a local skills improvement plan for an area that covers any of their area.

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[Alex Burghart]

The amendments strip back some of the detail in clause 1(7), which can be better dealt with in statutory guidance. As well as engaging a wide range of employers, a designated employer representative body should work closely with all relevant providers, local authorities and other key local stakeholders to develop its plan. Without such widespread engagement, the resulting plan is not likely to be very effective. Key stakeholders with valuable local intelligence include, but are not limited to, the Careers and Enterprise Company, local careers hubs, National Careers Service area-based contractors and Jobcentre Plus. Our expectations on local stakeholder engagement will be set out clearly within the statutory guidance. The guidance can be updated regularly to reflect evolving needs and priorities, as well as best practice. It also enables the required level of detail to be captured.

Clause 1 already places duties on relevant providers to co-operate with employer representative bodies to ensure that their valuable knowledge and experience directly inform the development of the plans, so that they are evidence-based, credible and actionable. Clause 4 makes it clear that relevant providers include independent training providers and universities. I therefore do not believe that the Lords amendment is needed, particularly given the MCA and GLA amendment that we have just discussed.

[Mr Perkins]

These are four significant amendments. Notwithstanding the assurances that we have just received from the Minister, they specifically take out what I think was a very strong amendment, supported by Members across the House of Lords, that added the importance of a collaborative approach to the Bill. For all the Minister said in that contribution, and the one before, about the importance of these partnership arrangements, it is not really a partnership arrangement. It is clear that all those consultees are subservient to the chamber of commerce which, ultimately, holds the pen and makes the decision. That report will then have to meet with the approval of the Secretary of State. The hon. Member for Mansfield raised in a previous debate the question of what happens, given the huge variety in the strength of different chambers of commerce, different local enterprise partnerships and so on, in the event that a local skills improvement plan goes to the Secretary of State and is considered not be adequate? Obviously, we can only assume that the Secretary of State would send it back.

Chambers of commerce are very varied organisations; I think everyone would recognise that there are some excellent ones—I count those in Derbyshire and the east midlands as an example of that. However, there are others that are much smaller and have very different areas of responsibility. Chambers of commerce are membership organisations that represent some of the businesses in their community; that is unlike chambers of commerce in Germany, which are compulsory for businesses to join, and therefore are representative, quasi-governmental organisations. In this country, chambers of commerce are one of many different business organisations that businesses might choose to join. Different chambers have different areas of priority and expertise and different industries that are particularly important to them. Even among their memberships they have, in my experience, a small number of members who are very active within them, and large numbers of members who take a much less active role.

What we have in the context of many of the consultees that the Minister referred to going into the guidance notes, are a number of organisations that are in some ways more consistent, and will definitely offer a breadth of approach. Therefore, the fundamental difference of the approach that Labour would take in the Bill, compared with the Government, is around whether it is a true partnership. The difference is whether it is a partnership that recognises the voices of public and private sector employers and of further education colleges, that recognises the power of those independent training providers that do such great work across the country, and that recognises statutory organisations such as jobcentres, all of which have a role in this, or whether, as the Bill says, they are all consultees, but the chamber of commerce ultimately writes this plan. We would like to see far greater parity in that power; we think it is a local skills improvement plan that would have more buy-in and more belief in the local community, and would be much more respected on that basis.

[Emma Hardy]

I am sure that my hon. Friend shares my concern, given amendment 6, that the specific reference to further education providers is removed from the Bill. Any local skills plan needs to be done in conjunction with further education providers; there is no point writing a Bill that does not have the capacity to deliver in that local area. It seems slightly odd that a specific reference to further education has been taken out of the Bill.

[Mr Perkins]

I agree with my hon. Friend. She is right that Government amendment 6 removes the words,

“in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers for the specified area”.

The Minister says that we should not worry, it will be in the guidance. However, the different approach by the Lords recognised that it was a genuine partnership. These organisations are now consultees that will make their representations to the chamber of commerce, and hope that the chamber of commerce smiles on the view they put forward. It is a totally different type of relationship. The relationship is either one of partnership or of subservience; the approach the Government choose to take is one of subservience.

[Matt Western]

My hon. Friend is making some very important points. On the face of it, it would seem that the Government seek to make local employers’ organisations ultimately responsible for the direction and control of our colleges, and potentially our universities as well.

[Mr Perkins]

In terms of areas that are not already devolved, that is absolutely right, and adult education budgets will be very relevant.

Hon. Members will be pleased to know that I will not dwell on the subsequent amendments, because we will have an opportunity to debate them, but I will touch on some of our concerns about the way in which the needs of learners might not necessarily be at the forefront of people’s minds in chambers of commerce. For example, to what extent will chambers of commerce be aware of the specific needs of people with education and healthcare plans or other disabilities? The amendments seek to reduce the extent to which it is partnership working and move to a hierarchy, with the chamber of commerce holding the pen and driving the bus, and others making suggestions about the route.

[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right as to whether it is a true partnership relationship or a relationship of subservience. I draw hon. Members’ attention to amendment 7. Not only does amendment 6 leave out specific reference to further education providers; amendment 7 leaves out specific reference to community learning providers, designated institutions and universities. Again, it is no longer a partnership, as was written in the Lords amendment. It becomes a situation in which central Government make the decisions and education providers are in a subservient relationship with them. My hon. Friend is absolutely right.

[Mr Perkins]

I thank my hon. Friend for saying that, and I agree. Government amendment 7 is consequential to Government amendment 6, and she is right about what that means. We have real concerns about how employer-representative bodies and LSIPs will fit within sectoral expertise in sectors such as construction and manufacturing, which transcend local areas but are incredibly important, particularly where our economy is hugely lacking in the development of the next generation.

It is really important to recognise that we have huge skills shortages in the public sector as well as the private sector. Health and social care is a classic example, but there are many others. The voice of the public sector must be heard, and we must ensure that it is able to support people who aim to get from unemployment into a trained-up place in the workplace, because they are also central to this sort of approach. I am interested to hear from the Minister what framework he envisages for LSIPs aligning with sectoral programmes and a national industrial strategy.

Government amendment 8 removes the words, “by people resident”, from the sentence about the skills required in a local area. The purpose of the Lords amendment was important: it was to ensure that LSIPs focused not just on the needs of employers but on the people resident in a community. What would happen in a situation whereby employers were satisfied with the extent to which they were able to access the skills that they needed, but a large number of people were employed and unable to get into the labour market? Ultimately, it is not the responsibility of chambers of commerce to address youth unemployment; it is the Government’s responsibility. If businesses consider that they are able to access the skills that they need, but there is still a large number of people who are unemployed, who takes responsibility for that? The Lords amendment ensured that the people who were resident in a local area were considered in the local skills improvement plan. The Government are taking those words out, which means that it goes back to being a plan put together by businesses to solve the needs of businesses, regardless of whether that addresses the problems of people struggling to access the labour market.

[Emma Hardy]

My other concern with the amendments, which I hope the Minister will address, is about areas with many small and medium-sized enterprises. Areas with large numbers of big employers can obviously exercise that strong voice, for example through chambers of commerce, but I am worried that in areas such as Hull, with predominantly SMEs, as I am sure Government Members will recognise, that voice will not come through as strongly.

[Mr Perkins]

My hon. Friend worries with due cause. Since the introduction of the apprenticeship levy, small businesses have found it incredibly difficult to access apprenticeships. There has been a huge driving down in the number of people getting apprenticeships within small businesses. In areas such as Chesterfield, where smaller employers make up the majority of the economy, the apprenticeship opportunities are much lower than they were a few years before. Ensuring that the voice of small business is heard within this is incredibly important.

The Minister did not really talk about this amendment at all, but the Government might say that the skills plan also needs to have a focus on those relevant to a local employer who are not currently resident—we might call it the “on your bike” amendment, with the Government saying, “We want an approach that identifies skills needs of people who are not currently here.” If that was their intention, then it could have been worded to ensure that there was a strategy for attracting new workers. Simply taking those words out means that this is a plan for the employer community that does not have to consider those questions around the learners who are excluded from the labour market if those employers consider that they are relatively satisfied with what they are able to attract.

There is an important point here. At the moment, shortly after Brexit, there is a lot of focus is on skills shortages and staff shortages, and the sense, which I totally agree with, that we need to make more of the people we have. However, there may be other times when there is a real surplus of unemployed people, and we need a strategic approach that, in those times, supports those people into work, even if there are not a huge number of vacancies in the labour market. I think that those words are important.

Government amendment 9 removes the words “and other local bodies” from the clause concerning post-16 technical education, which was an amendment that the much-respected Lord Baker of Dorking added to the Bill. The Lords amendment that this Government amendment seeks to undo was drafted to avoid being too prescriptive, but it would have allowed LSIPs to work closely with other agencies, including Jobcentre Plus and careers advisory services, in providing careers information, advice and guidance.

All those organisations are important to ensuring that they are able to get into schools and support young people to get representation and ideas from both the business community and environments that they have not been familiar with. I would have thought that an amendment recognising that the careers responsibility is not just a responsibility of schools, but something that should be open to businesses, would have very much fitted with the spirit of the Bill. It was an opportunity for the Government to enable other bodies to play an important role in that post-16 technical education and careers guidance, and it is therefore disappointing that it was taken out.

We agree with their lordships on the introduction of these amendments, and we are disappointed that the Government are seeking to remove them. On that basis, we will look to support the amendments brought in by their lordships and disagree with these Government amendments.

[Rachel Hopkins]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Miller. It is appropriate that I declare an interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and as a governor of the fantastic Luton Sixth Form College. I support the speech given by my hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield, the shadow Minister; I was also very disappointed.

The irony is not lost on me that a slightly less democratic place wanted to put more democracy into this Bill, which I was very pleased to see. The Government amendments take out democracy by removing the references to local authorities and mayoral combined authorities. I heard the Minister’s comments about expecting it to be collaborative and wanting good will between the different organisations. In order to ensure that all parts—the legs of the chair, so to speak—are in the Bill, the amendments made in the House of Lords should stay there.

I have a great passion for local authorities and the role they play in adult education. They have already been doing great work, understanding their own areas. In the general debate the point was raised about the role that locally elected leaders, local authorities and combined authorities play in place making, and the skills agenda is key to that. One of the points that has not been referred to specifically comes under amendment 7, which would take out the reference to the “long-term national skills” strategies. That is wholly important and not just secured through local businesses thinking about the skills they need roughly now. Retaining that reference to the long term and the statutory responsibilities of local authorities and combined authorities in the Bill would create a much firmer and stronger situation in our local areas. I speak as a former councillor on Luton Council. Great work is done at local grassroots levels.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Gwynne]

It not only feels unfair; it is unfair. I get that mayoral combined authorities have specific skills responsibilities devolved to them, so clearly the level of input from a mayoral combined authority is greater than that of a county council or a unitary authority that does not have those specific responsibilities devolved to them, but the council’s strategy for that area will involve education, skills and economic development. Those are important elements for county and unitary authorities.

[Mr Perkins]

I fear it is actually worse. The Government amendment agreed by the Committee a moment ago did give a role to mayoral combined authorities, but that role was that the Secretary of State had to satisfy himself that they had been consulted. The pen is still held by the chamber of commerce. The Lords amendment that the Government amendments in this group get rid of are about genuine partnership. The Bill, as brought from the Lords, states that it will include

“an employer representative body in partnership with local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities and further education providers for the specified area”.

That partnership is being entirely removed. Metro Mayors are being left as a statutory consultee, which the Secretary of State must satisfy himself are being consulted. The other partners will have no role whatsoever, except for in guidance, which will say, “Make sure you talk to them.” This change is about moving from a partnership approach to a consultee, subservient approach.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend the shadow Minister is absolutely right. When we look at what else is being deleted from clause 1, subsection (7)(b)(ii) talks about

“regional and local authorities, including the Mayoral Combined Authorities, within the specified area with specific reference to published plans and strategies which have been developed by these authorities”.

All those authorities have plans and strategies; I listed a number of them in relation to Greater Manchester. If the mayoral combined authorities are going to be involved in this, why take out a specific reference to the plans that have been developed by them? As I said previously, unitary authorities and county authorities have those strategies too, yet they have no say whatsoever.

--- Later in debate ---

Amendment 7 agreed to.

[Mr Perkins]

On a point of order, Mrs Miller. Do we not decide on the other Government amendments? Are we doing those later?

[The Chair]

No, this is one of the wonderful complications of the Committee system. We do that later.

[Mr Perkins]

I beg to move amendment 27, in clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert—

“(iv) groups representing the interests of people with disabilities,”

This amendment intends to ensure that Local Skills Improvement Plans draw on the views of groups representing the interests of people with disabilities.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:

Amendment 1, in clause 1, page 3, line 6, after “evidence” insert

“, including the views of relevant community groups including those representing the interests of disabled people,”.

This amendment intends to ensure that the evidence informing LSIP development includes information directly relevant to improving the employment prospects of disabled people.

Amendment 2, in clause 1, page 3, line 12, at end insert—

“(d) identifies actions to be taken to reduce the disability employment gap within the specified area.”

This amendment intends to ensure that the LSIP is used as a vehicle for improving the employment prospects of disabled people.

Amendment 28, in clause 1, page 3, line 12, at end insert—

“(d) identifies positive actions to reduce the disability employment gap within the specified area.”

This amendment intends to ensure that Local Skills Improvement Plans identify positive actions to reduce the disability employment gap within the specified area covered by the Plans.

Amendment 34, in clause 1, page 3, line 12, at end insert—

“(d) lists specific strategies to support learners who have or have previously had, a statement of Special Educational Need or an Education and Health Care Plan into employment, including but not limited to provision for supported internships.”

This amendment would require that local skills improvement plans list specific strategies to support learners who have or have previously had, a statement of Special Educational Need or an Education and Health Care Plan into employment, including but not limited to provision for supported internships.

Amendment 3, in clause 2, page 3, line 23, at end insert—

“(iii) the body is composed of employers who demonstrate reputable practice in relation to equality and diversity in employment, including in relation to disability, and”.

This amendment intends to ensure that members of the body with primary responsibility for creating the LSIP have sufficient understanding of and commitment to equality and diversity, including in relation to disability, to enable them to create an inclusive plan.

[Mr Perkins]

Amendment 27 was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle. Amendment 27 and amendment 1 would add the words

“groups representing the interests of people with disabilities”

and

“relevant community groups including those representing the interests of disabled people”

to clause 1, on local skills improvement plans. Given the discussion that we have just had, it is incredibly important that the consultees include those who represent people with learning disabilities and those who might be furthest from the labour market for a variety of reasons. Given the votes that have just taken place and are scheduled to take place, we are particularly concerned that there is a possibility that people furthest from the labour market, who will take the most work in order to contribute in meaningful employment, will be excluded. There is a disturbing lack of attention paid in the Bill to people with special needs or disabilities.

Amendment 1, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Sarah Champion), would enshrine a role for representative bodies to devise specific plans of support for people with disabilities in local skills improvement plans. That is of tremendous importance. One of the things that is most important for the FE sector, and one of the greatest contributions it makes, is to support those people who are furthest from the labour market to get the skills that they need, through such things as supported internships and other innovative ideas that many of us have seen in action in our local colleges. Those programmes often take a considerable amount of work, but they make a life-changing difference to those people. A skills Bill that genuinely represents everyone must be mindful of the need for the local skills improvement plan to ensure that no one is left behind.

Amendment 2, which also appears in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham, is the same as amendment 28, and adds the need for an LSIP to identify positive—