Government Employment Strategy

I wholeheartedly endorse everything that the Chairman of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North (Mr. Rooney), said. We engaged in the report because the subject is at the centre of the Government’s welfare to work programme and because getting employment strategies right is vital for so many people. We started off by acknowledging that the Government have got a lot right—I reassure my hon. Friend the Minister that we know that. The 2.5 million extra people in work and the amount of job creation in the past 10 years are signs of a successful economy and that the Government’s employment strategies have been working. Over the years, the introduction of various new deal programmes has been successful in targeting particular groups. To achieve the 80 per cent. target that the Government are now talking about, we need to consider what has been working best, what is no longer appropriate in the labour market and how we can particularly help the groups that are the most disadvantaged in going back to work. That is why we examined certain groups in particular in our inquiry, and my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, North outlined those groups. I wish to cover two or three of the issues that we raised. I mention again to the Minister the issue of definitions and what we mean by the 80 per cent. target. Our report starts with an analysis of the extreme ends of the spectrum—the 16 to 18-year-olds and the 65-plus-year-olds. The Government are actually more sympathetic to us when we talk about the 65-plus-year-olds, because there are an increasing number of them in the labour market. To exclude them from the 16 to 65-year-old group that forms the target for the statistics will become increasingly bizarre, particularly as the Government are actively encouraging people to continue working beyond 65 through changes to pension legislation. We need to examine the basis of the statistics. At the other end of the spectrum, the 16 to 18-year-olds, we currently have an analysis through the Department for Education and Skills of the NEET—not in education, employment or training—group. However, we are also getting messages from the DFES that the Government are considering encouraging the overwhelming majority of young people to be in education or training until they are 18. It therefore seems illogical to count the ones who are in education and training as being unemployed for the purpose of the statistics. I accept the Government’s response to our report. In it we say that they should leave the situation as it is but monitor it. If they come up with definitive proposals to require young people to remain in education until they are 18, it will be a nonsense to include them in unemployment statistics. Equally, if the Government are encouraging over-65s to remain in employment, it is bizarre not to include them. For the time being I accept the Government’s response that they will monitor the situation, but it is important that they examine what will happen in the future. Their response that the suggestions would make international comparisons difficult will not be sustainable in the long term. Other countries are doing exactly what we are doing—encouraging older people to remain in work and younger people to remain in education.