Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

My Lords, Clause 86 refers back to the provisions in Schedule 5. I want to move the debate on from the issue of adult apprenticeships to the specific area of paragraph 1(2) of the Schedule, which provides for the very basic qualifications: basic literacy, basic numeracy, level 2 qualifications and A-levels. These are the fundamentals. As the Minister has just said, these are the gateway to employment and a decent adult life. We know from the statistics that, sadly, a lot of our adult population is not literate, and an even larger proportion is not numerate. I know well the arguments against any kind of commitment to increased expenditure, but it is not necessarily increased expenditure to provide free basic education in literacy and numeracy. I would have liked to have put down an amendment saying the limit should be 99 rather than 30, because I would like to think that any adult who was not literate or numerate could be provided with free education in that area. There is a long and proud tradition in adult education of providing free literacy and numeracy training for all adults of any age. Many local authorities have provided it for free for many years through their adult education services, and it is a great sadness to me that in recent years that has ceased and people have had to pay for it. This is a modest amendment, saying simply that it would be a very slight increase in public expenditure because the courses are already being offered to the under-25s, so to add in another couple of adults who are over 25 would not cost a penny more. It would be an important contribution to the employability of a lot of the population. I beg to move.