Careers Advice in Schools

Tristram Hunt Excerpts

Monday 24th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Tristram Hunt (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab)]

We have had an interesting, if petite, debate. All Members present share a belief in the value of careers guidance, but that might not be shared by the Government Whips Office.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Burnley (Gordon Birtwistle) on securing this important debate. He spoke brilliantly and passionately about rebalancing the economy and how that might be undermined by skills shortages, with particular reference to the aerospace industry and the question of a gender divide and the number of young female engineers. I take on board, too, his point about the challenge of providing careers advice in schools. That is why the Opposition thought it was an error to take £200 million out of the previous career Connexions service, which did not serve to follow the policy through into schools.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) spoke brilliantly about patchy careers advice and the effect that can have. He rightly highlighted the critique provided by the Education Committee, which said it was regrettable that the careers advice function had been moved into schools. He spoke, too, of the axing of dedicated careers services. We have seen that right across the piece, which is why this debate is so important. The Government careers policy is directly opposed to everything the hon. Member for Burnley seeks to put in place to rebalance our economy. My hon. Friend also spoke very well about the mismatching of jobs to ambitions. We should also note the comments of the Government social mobility tsar, Alan Milburn, about young people not doing the right A-levels, and then seeking to go to university with very good grades only to find that they have been poorly advised as to what degree to pursue.

The hon. Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley) drew on his career in business to argue strongly for a more business-focused careers guidance, and for getting business advocates into schools. Like us, he is hopeful that the destination measures will provide some degree of clarity. He contrasted the business GCSE with the drama GCSE, but that was a little unfair, I think, as one of the great business strengths of modern Britain is our drama industry—our cinematic and theatrical industries. He was right, however, to urge that business advocacy in schools.

The Labour party agrees with the Education Committee that independent careers advice and guidance has never been as important for young people as it is today. We also start from the point that this is a question both of social justice and of rebalancing the economy.

It could be argued that bringing careers guidance into schools has crippled potential pathways to technical and vocational education for many students. While the academic route of following GCSE, A-level and then maybe a degree is clearly understood by many teachers, providing more specific advice about vocational qualifications, traineeships and apprenticeships, and how to marry that with a level 3 qualification, takes real knowledge and understanding of the system, which those who are asked to advise in schools might not possess. If we want greater achievement in our technical and vocational sector, we need to get talent into those quarters. Moreover, it is simply not in the interests of schools to outline alternative routes, and for a Conservative-led Government usually so attuned to the threat of producer interest, the allocation of careers advice to schools has been an own goal. Very few schools have the bravery to explain to their pupils the full diversity of further education and vocational pathways while the loss of their pupils’ funding stream is at stake. We recently heard evidence from an excellent teacher from one of the Harris academies, who said, “We bring in outside external guidance and we tell them to tell our pupils that they cannot go to the college up the road. We have no interest in losing those funding streams.” What we then lose as a country is the capacity to go down vocational and technical routes that are more complicated to pursue.

We are troubled not only by the impartiality aspect, but by issues of funding, insufficient practical guidance, a poorly defined approach to how we share best practice, a capabilities deficit and an accountability regime that is nowhere near robust enough. We look forward to the Ofsted thematic review, which I understand has now been pushed back to September, clarifying some of these issues.

On funding, the Labour party acknowledges that in the current fiscal climate it is not appropriate to provide additional funding, but the Government should not present the withdrawal of the £200 million that used to fund careers advice as consequence-free. Schools have each faced a £25,000 stealth cut as a result of this money not being transferred along with the statutory duty. As my hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde suggested, we need to know what actions the Minister is taking to provide guidance and support, and to disseminate best practice. As I understand it, head teachers have to know the names and addresses of CORGI-registered boiler technicians for their schools, but they have no guidance about or lists of qualified careers advisers. Head teachers can fix the boiler but when it comes to their pupils’ careers they are not necessarily given the right amount of information.

Let me end by returning to the Government’s social mobility adviser, Mr Alan Milburn. He wrote:

“High-quality information, advice and guidance”—

on careers—

“is crucial in helping young people to develop ambitious but achievable plans, which are more likely to lead to positive outcomes.”

He dedicated his career to improving careers services, raising aspiration and increasing social mobility, yet only this weekend he criticised the Government’s “half-hearted” and incoherent approach in this area. He said:

“I don’t get the sense that this is sufficiently part of the DNA of what this government is about”.

I very much hope that the Minister can convince us otherwise, or else we are facing exactly the kind of skills shortage and unbalanced economy that the hon. Member for Burnley so wisely warned us of this evening.