Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

I shall speak also to Amendments 74, 75 and 80, and shall comment on government amendments that also fall within this grouping. Our amendments fall into two groups. Amendments 67 and 74 both raise issues of equity. Amendment 67 asks that young people who have been receiving free school meals should get free lunches at college. We feel that it is not right that their counterparts who stay on at school and who have been receiving free school meals remain eligible, whereas those who choose to move on to college lose their entitlement. Often those who move on to college come from more disadvantaged homes and choose to leave school and go to college to pursue different careers or because they find the college atmosphere more conducive than school. This becomes a bigger problem with the raising of the participation age because many more young people who are now leaving school and going into work will continue within an education framework and will choose to go to college. Therefore, we will probably find a considerable increase in the number of young people who, having been eligible for free school meals when they were at school, go on to college and lose that eligibility. In responding to a similar amendment in Committee the Minister cited the fact that these young people are entitled to educational maintenance allowances and that their families also receive child benefit and child tax credits. But so do those who stay on at school, so there is nothing to offset the inequity. The noble Lord, Lord Baker, who is not in his place, asked me in Committee how much it would cost. I promised to find out, and the estimate from the AoC is that the numbers involved would be approximately 95,000 young people at a total cost of something like £33 million. It is a not insubstantial sum, but nevertheless it is only one-third of the budget that goes to the LSIS each year. In terms of priorities, this is considerable. We recognise that in these economic times it is a considerable sum for the Exchequer to swallow. The Government also said in their response that the issue was among those being considered in the review of the financing of 16 to 19 year-olds. We ask that the Government give a firm commitment in this review that the disparity between those attending college and those staying on at school will be specifically addressed. Per student it amounts to something like £225 a year. Why should our more disadvantaged young people not receive that advantage when they could do so? This issue must be specifically addressed within that review rather than merely being one of the items on the agenda that, in the end, fails to be considered. It is unfair to the students and unfair to the colleges which currently have to use their hardship funds to help those obviously needy young people who cannot meet their needs in any other way. The first issue of inequity is that of free meals. Amendment 74 refers to the funding gap between the amount received by colleges per student and that received per student in sixth form. In 2005 the then Secretary of State, Ruth Kelly, promised to close the gap by 2010. As the Minister pointed out when we discussed this in Committee, the Government have reduced the gap from 14 per cent to about 6 per cent. The best he could do was to promise that the gap would get no bigger. Again, we argue that this is just not good enough. The college sector takes some of the most disadvantaged young people and with the raising of the participation age it will play a crucial role in delivering that Government’s skills agenda. It is totally unfair that the college sector should be expected to do this on the basis of less money per student than their counterparts—young people in sixth form in schools. Again, we are looking for an assurance about the actual gap, as the work done for the Learning and Skills Council by KPMG, and published in March 2008, made that somewhat larger than the Minister stated. Although the gap had come down when measured in 2005 terms, it pointed out that while there was a 3 per cent difference in funding rates as such, there were additional differences relating to teacher pension grants paid to schools, equivalent to a 2.61 per cent bonus per student, and additional teacher pay grants—teachers in secondary schools are often paid more than college lecturers—worth 3.98 per cent per student. The total gap in those KPMG figures for the LSC was 9.6 per cent for the academic year 2008-09—and that conclusion did not take account of the fact that colleges have to pay VAT on standard supplies and services and, in addition, are expected to make a 40 per cent contribution to their capital costs. All told, then, the Association of Colleges reckons that the gap is somewhat larger than the 6 per cent that the Minister spoke about. Nevertheless, since nobody really denies the existence of the gap, we are really looking for an assurance that by 2013, for example, when the raising of the participation age takes effect, the gap will have been closed. It is no good assuring us that the gap will not increase, because it is grossly unfair that it exists at all. We want a firm commitment that the gap will be abolished and that the funding per student, whether they are at a further education college or in a school sixth form, is equivalent. Amendment 75 asks, again, that the functions of the YPLA as explained in the briefing papers that have been issued to us should be written into the Bill. This amendment differs in two respects from that discussed in Committee. First, subsection (b) of the proposed new clause refers to the development of a regional skills strategy, and for the need for the YPLA to, ""work with the relevant regional, sub-regional and local authorities"," in helping to develop analyses and plans to meet local needs. That arises directly from the discussions that we have had relating to the letter from the noble Lord, Lord Mandelson, at the end of July to Jim Brathwaite at SEEDA. In that letter, it became clear that it was intended that the RDA would lead the development of the regional skills strategy, which, ""would constitute an investment plan that would become funding on the Skills Funding Agency"." Any regional skills strategy has to consider 16 to 19 year-olds, not just those over 19, whether at school, in college, in apprenticeships or working and training. Will the regional skills strategy be binding on the YPLA, and what role will the YPLA play in helping to formulate that strategy? Originally, the idea was that the YPLA would be just a light-touch authority, distributing funds to local authorities and working with them and their sub-regional groupings to ensure that they had appropriate data, and so forth, on which to plan. Now, it seems that the RDA has usurped that role. Is that really so? What role are the RDAs going to play in relation to the YPLA? The other difference in this amendment is subsection (e), its final one, which gives the Secretary of State the power to change the functions of the YPLA as he may direct. This meets the objection which I know always arises from parliamentary counsel that detailed functions written into a Bill make it impossible to change the functions of an organisation. Perhaps I might reiterate: the functions as described in this proposed new clause are taken almost word for word from the briefing papers that we have received about the YPLA. Essentially, we feel that if this is what they are going to do, it ought to be stated in the Bill. Finally, Amendment 80 is at the request of the AoC, representing its attempt to provide for itself a means of short-cutting the bureaucracy and appealing directly to the YPLA, should the complex machinery for agreeing grants between colleges and LEAs break down. I described in Committee the seven-step process that such an agreement needs, and the fears of colleges that with agreement needed from so many intermediaries, it would be impossible to meet budget deadlines. I do not intend to repeat the saga although I think it is very impressive, but given all the complications surely it is reasonable for colleges to be able to go direct to the YPLA to seek to speed things along. I said in Committee that I thought it was a very mild amendment. I urge the Government to meet its demands. Government Amendments 69, 70, 71 and 72 all apply to Schedule 3 and meet our request in Committee that the YPLA should have a minimum of 10, not six, members, and in particular should have members representing the full range of the YPLA responsibilities. Amendments 71 and 72 relate to the appointment of the chief executive of the YPLA. We had asked that after the first appointment, the CEO should be appointed by the board itself on conditions set by the YPLA, although those should all be subject to the approval of the Secretary of State. These amendments meet precisely these demands and we are very grateful to the Government for listening to our requests. I beg to move.