Oral Answers to Questions
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(6 months, 1 week ago)
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David Johnston
I did not know the hon. Gentleman’s constituency was so close to Bournemouth. As he suggests, I do not have the precise answer to that question; I will write to him.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education (David Johnston)
Early language skills are vital for children to thrive. That is why we carried out landmark early education reforms, investing up to £180 million in training, qualifications and support and providing a range of evidence-based interventions, from home learning to working with local health services.
Wera Hobhouse
There is growing evidence of how important it is to provide support for speech and language development in nurseries and for preschool-aged children. Programmes such as Language for Life, which is supported by St John’s Foundation in Bath, underpin the work that schools are doing. To demonstrate how well they are doing it, the percentage of children needing additional language support in schools that participated reduced from 84% to 29%. I am sure the Minister will want to congratulate the schools and St John’s Foundation on the work they are doing, but will the Government prioritise speech and language programmes such as Language for Life?
David Johnston
What the hon. Lady sets out sounds very encouraging and I look forward to hearing more about the Language for Life programme. We have been very pleased with the findings of the Government-funded Nuffield Early Language Intervention, which is different, but has also focused on language development. The NELI has been found to help children to make four months’ additional development in their oral language skills, and disadvantaged children to make seven months’ additional progress.
Nursery Provision: South-west England
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(9 months ago)
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Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the chair, Mr Sharma. I congratulate the hon. Member for Plymouth, Sutton and Devonport (Luke Pollard) on his expert introduction to the debate. He has covered many points, but it is always good to reiterate them. The debate gives me the opportunity to thank all the childcare providers, the early years providers and the nurseries in Bath. They are doing a fabulous job. We have already heard today how very important it is for a child’s, and, later, a grown-up’s, life that we get early years right. I add my voice to what has already been said, but it cannot be said often enough.
Nurseries are not just somewhere for children to go while their parents work—they are a child’s first education. The first 1,001 days are the most important for children’s development. I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group for childhood trauma, and we talk again and again about how important early years development is and how the brain starts to develop. Therefore, a safe, fun early educational environment is one of the most important things we can give to a person. Early years spaces allow children to grow and have fun in safe and supportive environments. Getting this right gives children the greatest chance of reaching their full potential in later life.
Early years settings also provide long-term benefits for our economy, as we have heard. They remove barriers to employment and training, particularly for women, and close the attainment gap between children from low-income families and their more advantaged peers. Research shows that 40% of the gap in attainment outcomes is evident by the age of five. But the sector is in crisis. The UK has one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world, and costs continue to rise. We need childcare that is properly funded and genuinely free—not cross-financed by those who can afford to pay the fees or top-ups, because that in itself leads to massive inequalities. Yet the Government have failed to invest in it properly, and the cracks are showing.
My constituency of Bath saw two nursery closures last year alone. That left parents scrambling for alternatives. It is already incredibly difficult to get spaces. Some nurseries do not have spaces until September 2025. One early years practitioner told me that parents have already asked for a space to be saved for 2025 for a child who has not even been born, although they hope a child will be born by then. It is not a sustainable situation. Current levels of funding do not cover the full range of costs faced by nurseries, which include rent and staff salaries, so nurseries are continuing to cross-finance the free childcare spaces that the Government provide.
Even before the pandemic, the early years sector struggled to meet the gap between what the Government pay to cover free hours and their overheads. Fees have soared as a result, and nurseries struggle to continue to pay good wages. Another reason for closures, which is absolutely linked to that, is staff shortages. Another important point is to ensure that people looking at careers see early education as a proper career that is properly paid throughout their professional life. Nursery staff are paid professionals, but are often not treated as others in the education sector are. That is in spite of their role supporting children’s early development and their close relationships with parents and carers. It is an incredibly important relationship. I say that from my own experience 30 years ago. The nursery that my children attended in Liverpool was absolutely wonderful and has set them up for life. I will say that again and again. In fact, I will name-check it here: Monkton nursery in Liverpool, which is still going and still under the same family. However, I know that even they are struggling with all the increasing costs.
The work involves long hours and poor pay, and providers are struggling to find and recruit qualified candidates. To go back to my constituency, one provider in Bath said:
“All these things are linked. If we were funded properly we could pay our staff decent wages, and then they wouldn’t need to leave…and we wouldn’t have a recruitment crisis.”
Nursery provision is an equalities issue. It is dispro-portionately mothers who are forced to choose between caring for their child and their careers. That is an issue I have raised time and again, particularly when I was the Liberal Democrat spokesperson on equalities. It is an equalities matter. In the end, it is mostly the mothers, who then do not go back to work and cannot get on with their careers. That is a very important point that we should not forget. It affects their career trajectory, their confidence and their long-term earning potential.
At the same time, the achievement gap between the richer and poorer, which can best be tackled in early years, is rising. Just one in five families who earn less than £20,000 will have access to the planned expansion of funded places for one and two-year-olds, compared with 80% of households whose incomes are over £45,000. Funding given to early years settings to support disadvantaged children in their cohort is a quarter of the amount given as pupil premium funding to primary schools. That has come at a time when more than a quarter of parents have had to use credit cards and to borrow money and get into debt to afford increasing childcare costs. Nobody should be pushed into poverty for deciding to start a family.
Relaxing staff-to-child ratios is not the answer to any of those problems; nurseries have told me that many times. Many nurseries are worried about decreasing the child-to-staff ratio. The Government have decided to cut corners at the expense of children, rather than properly funding providers. Doing that will not bring down costs. Most nurseries, especially purpose-built nurseries, have been built to accommodate a ratio of 1:4. One nursery can still only take eight children and would need to have two members of staff. If the Government paid providers for the costs that they actually face, they would not need to consider compromising children’s safety in that way.
We need a fast, decisive response to secure the future of the nursery sector. Early years settings and their staff are vital parts of our national infrastructure. Many parents dread their nursery being the next that is forced to close.
I will mention a point that my hon. Friend the Member for Somerton and Frome (Sarah Dyke) raised, which is that, for us, it is very important to have proper provision for SEND children. I would like to hear a response to that. The Government must provide comprehensive support, starting with raising the rates paid to providers.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(9 months, 1 week ago)
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David Johnston
My hon. Friend is right to raise this issue. We are working with all local authorities, through our SEND and alternative provision improvement plan, to make sure that assessments happen a lot quicker, and that children get the support they need.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Damian Hinds
We want to see schools not excluding children where that is at all possible. There is no right number for exclusions; they have to be determined in the light of the circumstances at the school, but we expect people to look at the matter as a whole. I will, of course, be happy to talk to the hon. Lady.
Breaking Down Barriers to Opportunity
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(12 months ago)
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Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
The Government are out of ideas and without direction, either unwilling or unable to make the big decisions to give us a brighter future. What a wasted opportunity, especially when it comes to action to tackle the nature and climate crisis. What better opportunity was there to empower communities and businesses to break down barriers to tackle the biggest issue of our generation? I am pleased that the Government announced recently that they will introduce a nature GCSE, but considering the abysmal nature of what was in the King’s Speech on tackling the climate crisis, it seems to me that the Prime Minister should be the first person to take it.
Climate education should not stop with schools; local authorities could organise citizens’ assemblies, as we have proposed many times. There are so many opportunities to educate people about the dangers of our not getting this right and failing to reach our 1.5° target by 2050, but those on the Government Front Bench continue to ignore them. They continue, too, to ignore the opportunities that would arise from a green transition. A nature or climate GCSE could grow the careers and skills we need to tackle the climate emergency and get to net zero, but this Government’s attitude is that everyone except them must meet their commitments.
Rather than protecting our children’s future, the Government are protecting the interests of the fossil fuel giants. How can they seriously claim to be leaders on net zero action while introducing legislation to hold annual oil and gas licensing rounds? That is particularly shocking when compared with their unforgivable failure to allocate a single new contract for difference for onshore wind farms in the recent auction round. I would like to hear how the new legislation will bring down energy bills for a single one of my constituents. Research from Uplift confirms that most of the oil produced at Rosebank will be shipped abroad and sold on the global market to the highest bidder; it will secure the future of the oil and gas giants, but not the UK’s energy supply.
Not only does the new Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill fly in the face of our climate commitments, but it will have wide-ranging and long-term negative impacts on the sustainability of our oceans and marine life. As I say, we need education on this across the House and across the board in all our communities. Educating young children is a good start, but it seems to me that a lot more of the older generations need that education too.
When will this Tory Government embrace the clean, green energy of the future and stop delaying our path to net zero? We need more grid capacity and more Government action to capitalise on green jobs and technology. New green jobs do not fall out of the sky; they start with proper career options for young people that they can start now so that we can see the energy transformation we need.
We hear from Tory Ministers that they hope to attract more investment in renewables, but their words do not match their actions. We cannot afford for our Government to miss any more of their own targets. That, too, should be part of our education—that if we say we will do something, we should actually deliver. We must take people with us on the green transition, and education is the first step.
There are so many untapped opportunities. UK solar power deployment is already significantly behind target. The smart export guarantee should incentivise households to invest in solar panels by allowing them to sell the excess electricity they produce back to the grid at a better price and recover the cost of their investment much faster. Again, educating householders in how they can invest in the net zero transition is an important part of the puzzle. If we do not communicate properly with our citizens about what they can do to tackle the climate crisis, where will we be?
Under the current system, it takes decades for householders to break even. Householders are confused, and we need to ensure that there are trusted sources where they can obtain information about how to tackle the climate crisis and break down the barriers that we are discussing today. There must be that change to bring about the revolution in rooftop solar that carries so many benefits for people and the planet. The cheapest energy is the energy that we do not use, and reducing energy waste will lower bills and cut carbon emissions. We urgently need to upgrade our housing stock to guarantee warm and comfortable homes for everyone, long into the future.
One in four private renters live in fuel poverty, and 1.6 million children are living in privately rented cold, damp or mouldy homes. Landlords have contacted me saying that they cannot afford to upgrade their properties to energy-efficient standards. That, too, is just a bit of education, a bit of knowledge that we must share as a matter of urgency. I believe that local councils are best placed to be the trusted sources of that type of information, but the Government must see them as partners and people to engage with, and give them the opportunities and resources that they need in order to share the information that is so badly needed in our communities.
Some subsidy schemes are available to landlords, but they are not open to all landlords and they can be difficult to access. We Liberal Democrats propose that all landlords should be allowed to offset their spending on insulation and energy-saving improvements against their income tax. Only through well-targeted incentives for landlords will we make the difference for tenants who are struggling to pay their bills. If the Government disagree with our proposals, I ask them to suggest an alternative. All we have seen so far is that from 2025 landlords will no longer need to meet the energy performance certificate C standard.
There has been yet more delay. When will we see action to ensure that families do not live in poor-quality housing that is badly insulated, making their energy bills more expensive? We need the landlords on board. We need a Government who are prepared to use both a carrot and a stick, and we need a Government who are prepared to put out the necessary information and enable it to be pooled—and I would say, yet again, that councils are best placed to do that. E3G has found that raising the energy standard to C rating for privately rented homes would save bill payers about £570 a year. The Government should hold firm, and help landlords to meet these targets and keep homes warm this winter.
Since the last King’s Speech, we have not reduced our dependence on oil and gas, we have not allowed households to make more sustainable choices, we have not put out that important piece of education that people need, we have not organised the citizens’ assemblies for the sharing of information that we require so urgently, and we have not protected households from rising energy bills. Too many households face another difficult winter. The Government’s failure to deliver is becoming their trademark, and judging by the King’s speech that will not change any time soon, although I still hold out hope that it will. The Government should prove me wrong—or right.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Claire Coutinho
My right hon. Friend has consistently and passionately campaigned for the maintained nursery school sector. I agree that it is doing an excellent job, not only in supporting some of the most disadvantaged children, but in sharing expertise and knowledge with other providers.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Sadly, Midford Road Nursery in my constituency was forced to close its doors. Staff shortages were the major reason. Many nurseries in Bath face similar problems, and parents struggle to find alternatives. What advice would the Minister give to parents in Bath who are struggling to find a nursery?
Claire Coutinho
We have increased the funding set out for early years by about half a billion pounds since 2020-21. I agree that workforce is an issue; we are looking at recruitment and retention very carefully and will be setting out proposals as and when we can.
Independent Review of Children’s Social Care
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
It is a pleasure to follow the hon. and learned Member for Eddisbury (Edward Timpson) who, as a former Children’s Minister, speaks with great sincerity and expertise on the subject. I congratulate the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) on securing this important, timely debate.
Our children are falling through the cracks. The pandemic has left a lasting mark on children up and down the country. As such, the timing and outcomes of this debate could not be more important. I welcome the support for kinship carers in this report. We have already heard some support for the idea. Thousands of grandparents, aunts, uncles and siblings are stepping in to support children in crisis, yet the Government treat them as if they are invisible. These carers receive only a fraction of the financial support they need for the care they provide. I thank them for their incredible work. However, they need more than just a pat on the back; they need material support from our Government.
I hope that the Government will support the Kinship Care Bill in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson). The Bill would introduce weekly allowances for kinship carers, just as foster carers get. It would implement proper parental leave when kinship carers first welcome in a child and provide extra funding to help children in kinship care thrive in school. Unfortunately, kinship carers are just one group being overlooked by our Government. In 2019, it was estimated that 140,000 children on the fringes of social care in England were not receiving any support. The Local Government Association suggests that social workers are seeing record numbers of children with mental health problems. Social workers say they have no time to give the children on their case loads the support they need.
Social workers are the backbone of our society, helping future generations to thrive. Unfortunately, the Government have treated them with utter contempt, asking more and more of them. No wonder we are seeing staff shortages. Who would want to work in an industry where people feel overlooked and undervalued? The Government must make the social care profession attractive to enter and stay in, so that we have enough care workers with enough time to help the children under their care. One of the most important things that the Government must do is make it the valued profession it deserves to be.
Adverse childhood experiences, also known as ACEs, are the biggest drivers of poor mental health in children. They can be anything that threatens to overwhelm the child, including abuse and neglect. When a child is unable to process prolonged stress, it can alter normal brain function. This is what we call trauma. I know that the hon. and learned Member for Eddisbury is also working hard on childhood trauma, although he is not currently listening. A child’s brain helps them to survive in the moment, but assumes that that persistent stress or danger is normal. They adapt to constant adrenaline. Because of that, those who experience childhood trauma are twice as likely to develop depression and three times more likely to develop anxiety disorders.
Many children carry their traumatic experience into later life. Someone’s chances of dropping out of school, being obese and even developing diseases such as strokes and chronic bronchitis are higher the more ACEs they have experienced. Those with six or more ACEs have life expectancy 20 years lower than peers with none. There is no limit to the reach of ACEs. Unnoticed and unaddressed, adverse childhood experiences are a potential lifelong sentence. The Government must look at how they can prevent adverse childhood experiences from happening.
The number of ACEs a child suffers has a clear link to the likelihood of that child engaging in social care, as well. Meanwhile, research by the WAVE Trust suggests that the adverse childhood experiences of abuse and neglect alone cost the UK more than £15 billion a year. What a no-brainer it is to do something about it. It is clear that the cost of acting to prevent adverse childhood experiences is less than the cost of inaction. Just focusing on the fallout from trauma is not enough; we must prevent every form of adverse childhood experience.
One factor that helps to prevent childhood trauma is whether the child can feel capable and deserving. Supportive, reliable adult presences are key, and we have already heard quite a lot about that this afternoon. Trauma-informed services across the board would be transformative. They allow social workers to recognise the effect of ACEs early in children’s lives. Early years practitioners can spot signs of trauma at the age where they are most easily resolved.
I became a member of the all-party parliamentary group for the prevention of childhood trauma, and serving on that APPG was the most informative and transformative experience I have had. I am currently its chair. Preventing childhood trauma could be the foundation of how we transform our society, because childhood trauma does not end with the child; it gets transferred into the next generation. If childhood trauma is not addressed, those who become parents will carry their adverse childhood experiences into the next generation, and their children might suffer, too, so doing something about it should be at the heart of what Government are looking into.
When we look at how trauma affects minds, we gain an enriched understanding of behaviour. Better insights and changes in approach lead to better care for children. As it stands, the Government are failing to even consider many of the problems that cause childhood trauma, such as sibling sexual abuse. Shockingly, that is the most common form of child sexual abuse in our homes. Estimates suggest that a child is three to five times more likely to be abused by their sibling than by a parent or adult living in their home environment. Its impact on the entire family is lifelong and devastating. Parents are often faced with a double dilemma of supporting both children involved in dealing with the relevant authorities.
Local and national safeguarding policies and strategies do not name, measure or prioritise sibling sexual abuse. The Home Office’s “Tackling Child Sexual Abuse Strategy” does not even acknowledge the existence of sibling sexual abuse. Even the report we are discussing today does not mention it. I had a Westminster Hall debate on the subject, which is riddled with taboo. It is so shocking that we do not want to contemplate it, but it is widespread and it is important that we name it. It is a significant oversight that must be addressed. The Government must acknowledge the problem before it can be tackled. Their blindness to sibling sexual abuse means that social care professionals are not properly equipped to offer the support needed. I hope that, in future strategies, the Government can at least investigate this terrible problem, which is beset by taboo and silence.
The Government’s failure to support the social care system leaves children as the victims. We must safeguard children from adverse childhood experiences and support those who go through them. The solutions involve more Government spending, yes, but we need to acknowledge the problems that children are facing. Where would we be if we did not invest in children and future generations? We need to work for a better future for our children. It will be a better future for us.
Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)
It is a pleasure, as always, to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who has again shown the breadth and depth of his knowledge of all the issues we cover in this House. I thank the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) and my hon. Friend the Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton) for securing this debate.
I associate myself with the remarks of the hon. Member for York Central about acknowledging that there are very many families who do an absolutely fantastic job of caring for their children, without underestimating how difficult that is. We are talking in this Chamber about families who are struggling, and I do not by any means underestimate that. As someone who does not have children myself, I give words of advice with caution and I understand that the challenge is really enormous, but surely the size of that challenge puts a bigger onus on us to support people to do it effectively.
I thank Josh MacAlister and all of the team who helped him deliver such an authoritative and important report. In particular, I thank not just the people who wrote the report, but the very large number of people, including very many people in care or who have left care, who contributed to the report. I think that that is what has given it its strength and authority, because he has done such a good job of giving people who have experienced the system a voice.
For me, child welfare is or should be the biggest priority for everyone in society. It is a really good example of an issue where it is not just the state that has a role to play, but families, society and individuals. All of us have to do something to make sure that children in our country get a good start in life. One of the main reasons why I got involved in politics was that I want everyone to benefit from the secure, warm, loving environment that I experienced as a young person growing up. We know what an important foundation that is for young people because we understand the different outcomes that people get if they do not receive that warm, loving start in life. Poor attachment to care givers leads to higher rates of delinquency, crime, offending, poor mental health and wellbeing, and unemployment.
Similarly, if we look at not just attachment but adverse events, which the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) spoke about, from all those things early on in life we can predict someone’s future outcomes, and their outcomes are much worse than those of their peers. As we have heard, that is not just a moral failure but a financial failure for the state because all these things cost money across the breadth and depth of Government spending. Those costs skyrocket when young people cross the threshold to care involvement, where the gap in outcomes compared with peers gets even bigger. Sadly, their outcomes are still distant from those who have benefited from a loving start in life.
We have 80,000 children in care and many more subject to some kind of intervention. If we do not get better at supporting people, those markers and failures will get worse. The report talks about how we are heading towards 100,000 children being in care and, for each of those additional children in care, there will be an even bigger number unfortunately likely to be subject to some kind of proceedings or intervention and not getting the start in life that we would want for them.
The report lays out authoritatively what we can do. I pay tribute to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Eddisbury (Edward Timpson), who did a fantastic job of going through all the elements of the report, including what we could do better. I will not seek to replicate that as I am sure that I could not do as good a job. The report makes it clear that we need short-term funding to deliver the £2 billion that it identifies. The Minister will not need convincing that we cannot look at the costs in a narrow way—there is short-term additional spending on extra children we might see in care as well as spending across all areas of Government that pile up but which the Department itself does not see—but we must ensure that the Treasury understands the full breadth and depth of that expense when it comes to weighing up what we should be investing in children’s social care.
Wera Hobhouse
Does the hon. Member agree that this really affects everything—we have prisons full of people with mental health disorders, who often carry childhood traumas with them—so investing at the beginning will help us save so much money in the end?
Dr Mullan
I completely agree. It would probably be fair to say that there is not an area of Government spending in which we could not make a saving if we did better at getting children a warm, stable start in life. As I said, I hope that the Department is clear about the breadth in spending.
I turn to one short-term area. Again, I pay tribute to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Eddisbury and the work that his family did, as well as that done by many families who choose to be foster carers. Fostering and adopting are probably among the most powerful, special and important things that someone in our society can do for another person. Taking on that responsibility of caring for someone else’s children in the short term—not permanently—is the most noble thing that anybody can do, and I pay enormous tribute to every single person who does that.
Every child who ends up in a loving home instead of a care setting—of course, care settings can produce good outcomes—is being given the best shot at life. Again, that saves a financial cost, and the wellbeing of that young person is enormously improved. Sadly, we could do better. It is a good example of the fact that, no matter how good the Government get at doing things, individuals must step up and be willing to do it. It is not just about the state fixing the problem; we all have a role to play.
My understanding is that, of the 160,000 people who registered an interest in fostering last year, just 2,000 were registered to be foster carers. That is an absolute tragedy. Given the process of becoming a foster carer, we should expect a big drop-off once people come to realise everything involved, but that kind of drop-off is very sad. It says to me that at least tens of thousands of people who could and wanted to be foster carers did not become them. What does the Minister think we can do in the short term to get to the target of 3,000? Can we not be more ambitious than that, get to at least 10,000 and convert that huge moral willingness to help our fellow man in society and see the money that comes in savings from that?
Tim Loughton
My hon. and learned Friend is so right. The adoption support fund was such an important part of the complex programme of getting adoption back on the front foot again. Too often, where adoptive placement was deemed to be best for a child, I am afraid there was too much, “Here’s the child, dump them with the family,” and then the local authority disappeared in the dust. Children who are going into adoption, in many cases with complex and traumatic problems underlying that decision, need a lot of support in the early years.
If we are to make an adoption work and prevent an adoption disruption, we need to put in the groundwork and do the leg work right at the beginning, to make sure that child gets the extra professional therapeutic work that might be required to make sure that family placement can work. The adoption support fund was a really important way of ensuring the resources to provide that professional expertise, so that the adoption stood a better chance. It is a false economy not to do that, because the amount of money the local authority saves is considerable if we can make an adoption work, so why not put in the resource at the beginning to make sure that the adoption is likely to work and that child can stay in a stable, loving family environment?
Wera Hobhouse
I know that I am blowing the trumpet for trauma-informed services, but does the hon. Member not agree that they are at the bottom of understanding most traumatised and difficult young people?
Tim Loughton
Yes, and we must understand that, too often, we are too keen to show the statistics that prove the underachievement of children who have been in the care system, be that in education or other outcomes. Why should we expect somebody who has been taken from their birth family, who has been deprived of the loving care of their birth parents because they are not able to give them that loving care, who has been abused as a child—who has perhaps been sexually abused as a child, as so many children are—and who has gone through such a traumatic upbringing, to be able to achieve as much as other children without getting that extra support? Whatever form those trauma services take, it is a no-brainer that we should provide them if we are serious about wanting those placements to work, be that a long-term foster care placement, a long-term home placement or, ultimately, an adoptive placement if that is the right place to go. It has to be horses for courses.
What we also did those 10 or 12 years ago is reduce the bureaucracy in the children’s social care system. When I took over as Children’s Minister, the manual for children’s social care, “Working together”, consisted of 756 pages, or something of that order. For the previous 10 years or so, since the death of Victoria Climbié, every time a high-profile safeguarding scandal happened and another child lost his or her life—often at the hands of his or her parents or carers—the Government rushed to legislate. It was a Labour Government at the time, but frankly, we were all guilty of going along with it: “The solution must surely be more legislation and more rules.” Ten years later, we had reached a stage where social workers were so saddled with regulations and rules that they were constantly looking over their shoulder, constantly referring to page 642 in the rulebook to see what they should be doing, rather than using the professional judgment and instincts that we train them for. Being a social worker is not an easy profession: one has to be a combination of a detective, a psychoanalyst, a forensic scientist and whatever else, because people who abuse their children are usually quite smart at covering it up.
The most important thing I said to social workers was, “I want to give you the confidence to make a mistake for genuine reasons”—hopefully not too often, but by using their professional judgment, rather than covering their back by saying, “Well, that’s how it said I was supposed to act in this case on page 602 of the manual.” That was the problem. We tore apart that manual—it was reduced to something like 70 pages—and said to social workers, “You’ve been trained as a social worker. We trust you: you have the nous. You need to go out and get the experience. You need to judge something on having face-to-face time with a vulnerable child or that child’s parents and to make a value judgment on whether you think that child needs to be taken into care, to have some support while staying with the birth family, or whatever. You make that judgment— occasionally, you will make it wrong, but you will make the wrong judgment for the right reasons. That will give you more experience to make sure you make it right the next time.”
Helen Hayes
We need to have a higher aspiration for children across the country to be supported by the best possible services. I welcome the Minister’s comments on the ongoing work to achieve that, but I believe much more can be done. That requires political will, and greater attention in this place, to drive improvements in performance.
Wera Hobhouse
Councils are struggling financially, although good and outstanding services are not all about finances. Does the hon. Lady agree that councils with the flexibility to spend a bit more money, such as Bath and North East Somerset Council, are in a much better position than those that are already in a difficult financial situation, usually in deprived areas?
Helen Hayes
It is indeed the case that local authorities with the flexibility to divert more resources into this area have that benefit, which can be significant.
The independent review of children’s social care was published six months ago. It called for a “total reset” of children’s social care and made a wide range of recommendations for reform. There is a high degree of consensus on many of those recommendations, such as the need to restore early help services, to provide better support for kinship carers, to end private profiteering in residential care and private foster care services, and to end the placement of children in unregulated settings. These things should be happening right now.
It is also essential that, as the reform of children’s social care is taken forward, the professionals working with children and families, care-experienced people, and the children and families themselves are placed at the heart of the process. None of this will happen unless and until the Government prioritise children and move this agenda forward. The previous Prime Minister, during her first Prime Minister’s questions, made a commitment in response to my question that the Government’s response to the independent review and an implementation plan will be published by the end of the year. There are just three full sitting weeks left before Christmas. I therefore ask the Minister to confirm the publication date of the Government’s response to the independent review, and to confirm that it will be before Christmas, as promised.
While Conservative Members have been arguing among themselves in recent months, taking an ideological sledgehammer to our economy and scrambling to reinvent themselves as a completely new Government with no connection to the last one, of which they were all a part, it is the most vulnerable children and young people, and those who care for them, who are being let down. Childhood is short, but its experiences last a lifetime. When will this Government stop letting children down?
BTEC Qualifications
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(2 years, 3 months ago)
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Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Mark. I congratulate the hon. Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) on opening this excellent debate.
Here we have another broken promise from the Conservative Government. For months, we Liberal Democrats have warned that the Government were planning to scrap BTECs, and our concerns were heightened during the passage of the Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022. We were given assurance after assurance, but here we are. It is interesting to see that as soon as some Conservative Members are free of the shackles of Government, they stand up and support BTECs—I wish there were more.
Rebecca Pow
Obviously I am speaking up for BTECs, but I also think the Government are going in absolutely the right direction in terms of skills and opportunities, recognising that they need to be aligned with business needs. I am sure the hon. Lady would agree with that.
Wera Hobhouse
I absolutely agree, but the Government are going to scrap BTECs, and the hon. Lady is opposing that. That is the only point I was making.
In July, the Department for Education introduced a twin-track system, for A-levels and T-levels, for young people at the age of 16, and the result is that funding for most BTEC qualifications will go. One hundred MPs and peers—including me—wrote to the Department for Education in support of the #ProtectStudentChoice campaign, a coalition of 21 organisations that represent students and staff in schools, colleges and universities, whose aim is to save BTECs. I thank the more than 100,000 petitioners, many of them from Bath College and Bath Spa University. We will continue to resist the move to defund BTECs.
It is the creative subjects in particular that will suffer. The Government intend to scrap those BTECs that they deem to overlap with A-levels and T-levels, but the process of assessing what is an overlap is not at all transparent. Who were the six assessors commissioned by the DFE to review the 2,000 or so qualifications? What were their backgrounds and experience? Where is the written evidence of their conclusions in order to defund 160 qualifications? Ofqual has quality-assured the qualifications for many years, and Ofsted, which oversees the quality of education, has at no point suggested that the qualifications lead to poor outcomes, so why will they go?
BTECs are invaluable in order to provide very different types of educational experiences. We have already heard a lot about that. They are popular with students and respected by employers and they provide a well-established route to higher education. They work, so what other than a narrow-minded ideological view has led the Government to scrap most of them and create less choice, especially for those learners who come from disadvantaged backgrounds? We Liberal Democrats acknowledge that from time to time, the range of qualifications needs to be reviewed, but not by closing viable educational pathways, especially for those students from poorer or minority backgrounds. Research from the Social Market Foundation found that 44% of white working-class students entered university with at least one BTEC, and so did 37% of black students.
Removing BTECs as an option risks students failing courses or picking courses that they are not engaged with. Students today need more, not less, support. They need more, not less, choice. They need choices and a Government who understand that by providing diverse pathways to qualifications, we will all end up with a much better, wider and diverse workforce. I hope the Government will think again.
Vicky Foxcroft
My hon. Friend makes a good and important point about everybody having access to the education at the points and times in life that they need it. This Government’s decision to hastily remove BTEC funding quite simply makes a mockery of their claims to be levelling up in education. That is made worse on examining impact assessments of the decision, which highlight that 27% of BTEC students are deemed the most disadvantaged.
I am wholeheartedly opposed to the changes. Scrapping BTEC funding is simply the wrong call for several reasons, but one of the main reasons has to do with my life story of a young kid who many thought was never going to go on to achieve anything. I went to Accrington and Rossendale College and studied my BTEC in performing arts. That led me to believe that I could go on to university. That led me to believe that I could stand here one day as an MP. They offer life-changing opportunities for people.
Wera Hobhouse
It is fascinating to hear the hon. Lady’s story. Given her experience, does she agree that it is important that we provide education that engages young people who otherwise find academic subjects very difficult to engage with at first? They need to be moved towards an educational route that engages and enthuses them.
Vicky Foxcroft
I absolutely agree. Studying performing arts taught me that I loved history and geography and taught me about team working. There are so many other skills that are important in life.
BTECs are engines of social mobility. Research from the Social Market Foundation found that 44% of white working-class students who enter university studied at least one BTEC, and 37% of black students enter with only BTEC qualifications. It has already been said that research from the Nuffield Foundation found that a quarter of students now enter university with BTEC qualifications, and are likelier to be from disadvantaged backgrounds. The vast majority of BTEC students complete their studies successfully, with 60% graduating with at least a 2:1. I must confess I only got a 2:2. My question is simple: why do Ministers want to take this second chance away from young people and others up and down the country, when it is evidence based?
To end, I state once again how strongly I oppose the defunding of BTECs. We all know that the scrapping of BTECs will be disastrous for social mobility and for the economy. The Government should rethink their plans to scrap those valuable qualifications and guarantee that funding will not be removed from any BTEC unless an impartial, evidence-based assessment has concluded that students, universities or employers do not value it; we know that at the moment they do.
Andrea Jenkyns
If the hon. Lady had let me finish rather than jumping in, she would have heard the full context. First, Oxford’s admissions office says that BTECs are unlikely to be suitable for the university’s courses unless taken with side A-levels, as it says on the website. Secondly, we are continuing to engage with Oxford and Cambridge on accepting T-levels, so watch this space.
There were some questions about different pathways and what sorts of qualifications young people will be able to take, other than T-levels and A-levels. On the academic route, students are able to take qualifications similar to the current applied generals in mixed-study programmes with A-levels where they complement the skills and knowledge in A-levels, and where they enhance students’ opportunities for progression to further study in related fields of HE. That could include areas with a practical or occupational focus, such as health and social care, STEM and subjects such as engineering, applied science and IT.
We will also fund large academic qualifications that would typically make up a student’s full programme of study in areas where there are no A-levels and no equivalent T-levels. That could include areas that are less well served by A-levels, such as performing arts, creative arts and sports science, for access to HE courses with higher levels of practical content. We will also continue to fund the international baccalaureate diploma and access to the HE diploma for adults.
Wera Hobhouse
I have spoken at length, and for a long time, to Bath Spa University, which teaches a lot of creative subjects. What reassurance can the Minister give my university, Bath Spa, about the creative BTECs that are going to be scrapped?
Andrea Jenkyns
As I have already said, where a course is not covered by a T-level or A-level—I mentioned performing arts, creative arts and sports science—the option is available.
We will fund two groups of technical qualifications alongside T-levels for 16 to 19-year-olds. The first will be qualifications in areas where there is no T-level. The second will be specialist qualifications that develop more specialist skills and knowledge than can be acquired through T-levels alone, helping to protect the skills supply in more specialist industries, and adding value to the T-level.
Adults will be able to study a broader range of technical qualifications than 16 to 19-year-olds, which takes account of prior learning experience. Those include technical qualifications that allow entry into occupations that are already served by T-levels, such as data technician or senior production chef.
On the pathway, we have made it clear that students will be able to take BTECs and applied general qualifications alongside A-levels as part of a mixed programme. Our impact assessment recognises that students who take qualifications that are more likely to be defunded have the most to gain from these changes.
There were questions about overlap, and about students who have already signed up for courses. All qualifications on the final overlap will be funded until the current students have completed their studies.
There was also a question about work placements, which is a valid one. We have put in place substantial support for schools, colleges and employers to help them deliver high-quality industry placements for all T-levels on a national scale. We are engaging directly with employers through the Department’s employer engagement team to develop a pipeline of industry placements, and we are providing an extensive programme of focused support to help ensure employers and providers are able to deliver placements.
We have a national campaign in place to raise the profile of T-levels to an employer audience, and we have established a network of T-level employer ambassadors to engage with others in their industries on T-levels and placements. We have also implemented different delivery models to ensure placements can be delivered by employers across all industries and all locations.
Making Britain the Best Place to Grow Up and Grow Old
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Sajid Javid)
It is an honour to close this debate on the Loyal Address. In this platinum jubilee year, let me extend my thanks to Her Majesty the Queen for her years of dedicated service.
I also thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have taken part, but, I have to say, I am disappointed in the shadow Health Secretary, the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting). He has taken this once again as an opportunity to talk down Britain, as he so often does, and has chosen to use this debate as a naked leadership pitch for his own party. He talked about leadership bids in his speech because he has no ideas at all about how to improve the society for British people. He knows that both of us had to fight to get our foot in the door. He knows that our chances to succeed come from this country’s world-class public services, yet he stands there and has the audacity to attack my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education, who came to this country as an 11-year-old immigrant and rose to the position that he has today—by the way, he could rise to that position only in the Conservative party.
I speak with feeling about this country. For my family, coming to Britain was a choice, too. They came here for freedom, security, opportunity and prosperity. They came here because they believed that Britain was the best place in the world in which to grow up and grow old. They were right then and they are right today. Public services have been a lifeline for me and my family—the teachers who made my career possible, the police officers who kept me and my family safe, and the NHS that cared for my father in his dying days. This Queen’s Speech backs our public services. It invests in them and it reforms them to secure the future of Britain. Unlike the shadow Secretary of State, I have always been an optimist about Britain’s future.
Sajid Javid
Of course it is not. I will come on to that in a moment. The hon. Lady knows full well why the NHS is facing its most challenging time in history.
Being the best place in which to grow up and grow old relies on keeping people safe, including from disease. We rose to the challenges of the pandemic. Brexit gave us the mindset to license and deploy a vaccine against covid-19 quicker than any other country. The phenomenal NHS got jabs into every part of the UK, and it is the wisdom of the British people that has meant that we have one of the highest vaccination rates anywhere in the world. We created a juggernaut of a testing and surveillance system. We bought more antivirals per head than any other country in Europe, and we got it right on omicron, with the most successful booster programme in Europe. As a result of all that, we were the first country in Europe to remove all restrictions. Had we listened to the Labour party, we would have been shackled to the EU on vaccines, and our schools would have been shuttered for even longer, contrary to what the hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) said. Instead, because this Government got the big calls right, we are leading the world when it comes to living with covid.
From clinics to classrooms, the pandemic showed the wealth of our skills. The skills mission is a job for the whole of Government. In his opening speech, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education outlined our ambitions for the new Schools Bill to deliver a stronger schools system that works for every child, as talked about today by my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds) when he spoke about academy trusts, and by my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory) when she talked about the importance of early years.
We are also delivering a Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Bill, which will reverse the chilling effect of no platforming in our world-class institutions, while our higher education reform Bill promises to bring about a fairer and more sustainable future. I listened carefully when my hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen) talked passionately about putting our children and our young people first.
A skills-rich economy is about more than just the elite institutions. I am the product of Filton Technical College. It ignited my desire to go to university and helped me get to where I am today. This is a Government who treat further education colleges with the seriousness that they deserve. When I was Chancellor I was proud to put an additional £400 million into further education in this country. This is a great country in which to grow up and grow old, and a great country in which to stay skilled, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Bexleyheath and Crayford (Sir David Evennett) said earlier in the debate.
On healthcare, this Government passionately believe in the NHS and its founding principles, in a world-class healthcare system that is free at the point of access for everyone. Funding from the levy, which the Labour party voted against, on top of the historic long-term NHS settlement that was announced in 2018, means that the NHS resource budget in England will increase to £162.6 billion by 2024-25. That is the highest budget that the NHS has ever had, and it includes an additional £8 billion over the next three years to tackle those covid backlogs. In a fast-changing world, with an ageing population, we need to embrace new ways of thinking. A number of my hon. Friends referred to the investment that we are making, including my hon. Friend the Member for Bosworth (Dr Evans). I also listened carefully, when my hon. Friend the Member for North West Norfolk (James Wild) was talking about NHS investment. He made a powerful case for it.
We have set out our plans to tackle the covid-19 backlogs, we have legislated for a new Health and Care Act, and we have published an integration White Paper. We have an upcoming digital and data strategy, and we are setting out a new 10-year cancer plan. I cannot see him in the Chamber now, but the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) talked about the importance of cancer care. We are also setting out a new 10-year plan to improve mental health.
A number of Members rightly spoke of the importance of mental health, including my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler), who speaks with passion on this subject, especially when it comes to the mental health of children. We will soon publish a health disparities White Paper, which I hope will be welcomed by the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson), who rightly spoke of the importance of levelling up, and we will also soon publish the outcome of the Messenger review of health and social care leadership. We are bringing the Mental Health Act 1983 into the 21st century—the Queen’s Speech referred to draft legislation for that purpose—ensuring that those experiencing a mental health crisis are treated as people, not patients.
As I have said, a number of Members spoke passionately about mental health—notably the hon. Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mrs Hamilton), whom I welcome to her place in the Chamber. I agreed with one thing that the hon. Member for Ilford North said earlier: all Members, on both sides of the House, miss her predecessor, Jack Dromey, very much, but I know that had he listened to the hon. Lady’s speech he would have been very proud of what she said. She spoke with passion and pride about her community, and I know that she served for many years—for over two decades—In the NHS. When she speaks about mental health, she speaks with experience, and I know that she will have much of value to say in the House in the years ahead.
Many other colleagues made important contributions about the NHS. My hon. Friend the Member for Sleaford and North Hykeham (Dr Johnson) talked about the investment in community diagnostic centres. The hon. Member for Bradford South (Judith Cummins) and my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) talked about the importance of dentistry and the need to maintain investment.
At the heart of our strategy for the NHS are prevention, personalisation, performance and people. Prevention means focusing much more on the biggest killers: tobacco, obesity and alcohol. My hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) spoke of the importance of continuing to tackle obesity. Personalisation means making use, where we can, of community services, something that I know my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) would welcome; and when it comes to people, there are more doctors and nurses working in the NHS today than ever before. We are on track to deliver 50,000 more nurses by the end of this Parliament, and we have a record number of medical students in England. The fact is that the Opposition have no plans for the NHS. They voted against our plan to secure resources for the NHS, and they have no idea how to meet the challenges of the future.
We are also transforming the provision of adult social care. We are investing an additional £5.4 billion over the next three years; we are introducing a more generous means-testing system by more than quadrupling the upper savings threshold to £100,000; we are protecting more people from the lottery of catastrophic care costs; and we are putting half a billion pounds behind our social care workforce. I hope the hon. Member for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer) will welcome that. She talked about adult social care, and I hope that she and others will recognise that this is record investment. These changes matter, because whether we are growing old or a working-age adult, social care is there for all of us. My hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Robert Largan) talked about that as well.
Higher Education Reform
Wera Hobhouse Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Nadhim Zahawi
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The work that MK:U is doing is exactly the sort of innovation that we need, in the same way that NMITE—the New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering—and others are doing as well. This is part of a long-term strategy. We began with the apprenticeship standards and reforms to ensure that businesses were embedded in the co-creation of our skills landscape. Skills are part of FE and HE, integrated together to deliver great careers and great outcomes for young people and the economy.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Today’s announcement could severely undermine the creative courses in higher education. The Government’s figures on this are always skewed, because they do not reflect graduates who become self-employed. We know that 47% of those who go into the creative industries are self-employed. What will the Secretary of State do to protect the creative courses that lead to high-value jobs in the creative industries? If he is in listening mode, will he listen to the vice-chancellor of Bath Spa University, who has been raising her concerns about this for a long time?
Nadhim Zahawi
As part of our £900 million investment, we will look at how we continue to support our brilliant creative industries, but it is not the only way to support them through our higher education reforms. I visited Pinewood Shepperton studios a few weeks ago, which is about to deliver 3.5 million square feet of studio and creative space to be used for many decades to come, and it has already been taken by the likes of Netflix, Amazon and Disney. They have been recruiting kickstarters and apprentices, and they are doing a brilliant job. I recommend that the hon. Lady visits to see the incredible enthusiasm of businesses and education institutions for working together.
Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [Lords]
Wera Hobhouse ExcerptsMonday 21st February 2022
(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Rachel Hopkins
My hon. Friend makes an important point with which I thoroughly agree.
Our creative sector is a key export to the world and is part of our global influence. Why should young people in Luton not have the ability to train in these areas? They will not necessarily be able to follow a T-level in this subject area, so I totally agree with my hon. Friend.
I hope the Minister will accept Opposition amendment 15 to prevent the defunding of many successful and much-needed level 3 BTECs.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
Further education should be about creating a workforce that meets the needs of our national and local economies. It should be about lifelong learning that gives everyone the power to follow the path that best suits them. It should especially be at the front and centre of our covid recovery and, last but not least, it should help us with the transition to net zero.
There was plenty of room to improve this Bill when it was introduced, and there still is. I regret that, so far, the Government seem to be missing this opportunity, but it is never too late. I favour new clause 4, which would require the Secretary of State to introduce a green skills strategy for higher, further and technical education. There is a key opportunity for further education in our effort to reach net zero, but less than 1% of college students are on a course with broad coverage of climate education. I commend the work of the excellent Bath College, which is already making strides to embed climate education in its curriculum, but the Government should step up, too.
We all know how important it is to manage the transition to net zero, which brings me to new clauses 14 and 15 and amendment 11 tabled by the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas). The offshore training regime is a barrier to offshore oil and gas workers transitioning their skills into the renewables sector. A new offshore training scheme is needed to facilitate cross-sector recognition of core skills and training in the offshore energy sector and to provide a retraining guarantee for oil and gas workers who wish to transition to careers in the green energy sector. What a missed opportunity it would be if we did not help people working in such industries, which will soon no longer be in place, to transition to a career in industries such as the renewables sector.
The Government say this Bill will transform opportunities for all, so why have they reversed changes that could significantly improve the accessibility and flexibility of qualifications—we have heard some powerful contributions on this—especially those aimed at learners with special educational needs and disabilities? Over a quarter of all 16 to 18-year-olds in further education have a learning difficulty or a disability, and I pay tribute to Project SEARCH, a partnership run by Bath and North East Somerset Council, Bath College and Virgin Care.
Nationally, too, many disabled people face huge difficulties in accessing employment after leaving school. Our disability employment gap stands at 30%.I therefore add my support to amendment 16, which would require local skills improvement plans to list specific strategies to help into employment those learners who have or have had an education, health and care plan. Again, this seems to be another missed opportunity to help those in society who face the biggest disadvantages to access employment, which is what they want. Whenever we talk to disability groups, what they want is employment; helping these groups into employment should be at the core of this Bill.
Although I will support the Bill on Third Reading, I am disappointed that the opportunity to transform further education has been so entirely missed.
Alex Burghart
With the leave of the House, I will speak to some of the amendments that have been discussed this evening. It has been a real pleasure to have been involved with this Bill on Second Reading, in Committee and on Report this evening. I feel the strength of feeling across the House for the skills agenda. This is an extraordinarily exciting time for skills, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) made clear. Never in my lifetime has there been such a hunger for skills in the economy, and that is a hunger that this Government will feed, because we are building a system in which qualifications, co-designed with employers, will give students the skills the economy needs. We will see good opportunities, allowing everyone to take a step forward in their life and career, and qualifications, backed by employers, that feed the needs of the economy.
In the time I have, I want to get through as many of the amendments as I can. First, I will address new clause 1, which stands in the name of my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow, the Chair of the Education Committee. I pay tribute to his fight for the cause of apprenticeships for prisoners; I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister and Lord Chancellor made an announcement to this effect on 11 January, and I am happy to put on record that my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow was instrumental in driving this forward. We do not need to accept this new clause because we have seen that this can be done in secondary legislation, and that changes to primary legislation are not needed.
I turn to new clause 2, also tabled my right hon. Friend, and to new clause 7, tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore), who did sterling work when he was on the Front Bench. Those provisions both seek to place a level 3 entitlement on a statutory footing. The Government are delighted by the enthusiasm of Members on both sides of the House and in both Chambers for our free courses for jobs offer and the lifetime skills guarantee that the Prime Minister announced last April. As the House will know, it gives adults who do not have a level 3 qualification the opportunity to get a qualification in high-value subjects for free, regardless of age. That major step forward will transform life chances. We do not think it is right to put this offer into legislation; that would constrain the Government in how they allocate resources and make it more difficult to adapt the policy to changing circumstances, including for adults most in need. For example, only last November, the Secretary of State announced that from this April, the offer will expand to include any adult in England who is unemployed or earns below the national living wage annually, regardless of their prior qualification level.
New clause 2 also includes a provision requiring any employer who receives apprenticeship funding to spend at least two thirds of that funding on people who begin apprenticeships at level 2 and 3 before the age of 25. We fully respect what the new clause is trying to do, but we point to the great progress we are already making on this score. In the first quarter of last year—the most recent one for which we have figures—62% of apprenticeship starts were for people under the age of 25, and level 2 and 3 apprenticeships accounted for 71% of all starts. That is wonderful stuff. Also, during the recent National Apprenticeship Week, I met a huge number of young and not-so-young people studying level 6 apprenticeships, which are making an enormous difference to their life, giving them huge opportunities in a way that is a greatly respected by employers. I do not wish to see arbitrary levels fixed in legislation.
Amendment 12, tabled by the hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr Perkins), seeks to require a review of the operation of the apprenticeship levy, particularly at level 3 and below. We discussed this issue at some length in Committee. I reiterate that the Government have already radically reformed apprenticeships to put employers at their heart, increasing investment and improving quality. As I just said, we are starting to see major improvements at levels 2 and 3.