Yasmin Qureshi
Main Page: Yasmin Qureshi (Labour - Bolton South and Walkden)Westminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
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Hazel Blears
My hon. Friend is right. In her relatively short time in the House she has made a tremendous contribution to highlighting those issues. She understands that in many cases business works on the basis of relationships, and that some long-established relationships are in danger of fracturing and disappearing in the interim. We need to get on with whatever is going to be done, and make sure that it is properly established.
It is important, too, as we proceed with the local economic partnerships, that when investment is drawn in local people should have the opportunity to get the jobs that are on offer. I urge the Minister to talk to his colleagues in the Department for Education. For those of us who were lucky enough to get Building Schools for the Future programmes in our constituencies—many of us did not, and are rightly angry about it—I want the contracts for those major public building projects to include apprenticeships and construction job opportunities for local people. My hon. Friend the Member for Stalybridge and Hyde (Jonathan Reynolds) is right to say that 40 per cent. of the construction sector’s business depends on public sector projects. Many BSF programmes would have employed bricklayers, joiners and plasterers and those jobs are now lost to our economy.
Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)
I congratulate my right hon. Friend on the fact that her constituency has BSF programme funding. My constituency, of course, has missed the opportunity. We are talking about job creation. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it would have been an excellent opportunity for apprenticeships? In my constituency 25,000 weeks of apprenticeship would have been created, and many jobs, on which we are now missing out.
Hazel Blears
My hon. Friend is right. The decision has completely wasted an opportunity to create for her constituency’s young people access to high-quality training, proper qualifications, and work experience on the job in a building environment. This country needs those skills, so the decision is particularly short-sighted.