PARLIAMENTARY DEBATE
Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (First sitting) - 30 November 2021 (Commons/Public Bill Committees)

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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—