Debate on the Address

My hon. Friend makes a good point, and it adds insult to injury that those in London must deal with that issue, on top of paying a levy for the privilege of holding the Olympics. In my area, pensioners are particularly exercised about the subject, and I share their view that London should not be penalised with an Olympic levy. I should like to highlight the importance of regeneration in London, but the majority of the regeneration that will result from the Olympics will take place north of the Thames. Worth while as that may be, it means that the people of Bexley will pay for the Olympics and get precious little for their money, because neither events nor regeneration will take place in Bexley. There is real concern about that, but the Government do not seem terribly fussed or concerned about the issue, either in the Queen’s Speech or elsewhere, although they ought to be. My third point is on education. We all remember the Prime Minister saying that education would be all-important to his Government when he came into power in 1997, yet there are still tremendous problems to do with education and its provision, as well as skills shortages. Bexley has very good education provision, because we have diversity. There are church schools, grammar schools, technical schools and some excellent comprehensive schools. However, across the country, and even in Bexley, there is still a shortage of skilled labour. The number of pupils leaving school with few qualifications and poor basic skills is quite alarming given that the Government, over the years, have said that education was their top priority. Behaviour, discipline and truancy are all issues that still need to be addressed, and the suggestion made in the Queen’s Speech that the Government"““will continue to raise standards””" has rather a hollow ring to those of us who were teachers, and to parents, people working with businesses, and school governors, such as me. We are concerned about what is happening. Employers who speak to me feel that in general qualifications are easier to obtain than they were in the past and that there are far too many top grades at GCSE and A-level. That is a concern. Although we welcome the contributions of our tremendous teachers and schools, something is going wrong and the Queen’s Speech does not address the underlying problems in our education system. Of course, we need more emphasis on training, skills and job-related opportunities. It is a tremendous problem for our society that we do not have enough plumbers, carpenters and skilled tradespeople. I look with interest to the further education Bill highlighted in the Queen’s Speech to show us how exactly the Government plan to overcome the skills shortage. My constituents will be extremely disappointed with most of the Queen’s Speech. More power for the London Mayor, the failure to address the Olympic levy and the costs of the Olympics to London council tax payers, the failure to come to grips with health service cuts and the problems of antisocial behaviour are real issues confronted daily by my constituents and in London. The generalities of the Queen’s Speech will not do. My constituents think that after nine years the Government should have done better. We all feel that the speech goes only a limited way towards improving the quality of life of our constituents, so we are rather sceptical that it will actually achieve what we think needs to be done. The Queen’s Speech contains a few good points but a lot is not being said or dealt with, so the Opposition are extremely concerned about how the real problems will be addressed. Many of us feel that it will certainly not be under this Government or their successor; it will be only when we have had a general election that we will actually get down to dealing with the problems that concern the vast majority of our constituents. The Government keep talking about the problems but they do not succeed in solving them.