I ought first to declare an interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I looked at these amendments and found myself agreeing with every single one. I looked back and remembered when we had the technical education Bill and, when we were in Committee in the Moses Room, I think there were probably about eight to 10 of us. How wonderful it is now to see how people have realised the importance of technical and vocational education—we have a proper Committee for a further education/vocational education/skills Bill.
I do not have a problem with local skills improvement plans—does anyone? It seems eminently sensible that you look at the needs of each locality in terms of business, job creation and development, and put that plan together. It is not something where you say, “Nationally, we will all do this”; you look at each local area. I was interested to hear the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, talk about Cumbria. He will be pleased to know that I spent a week in Keswick and, as we walked around, virtually every single restaurant, hotel and shop had an advert pleading for people to work in the hospitality industry. Clearly, that is a skill that is needed in that area. It is obviously brought about because of Brexit, but that was a problem even when we were in the EU—there were not enough people in the hospitality industry.
I look at my own city of Liverpool, and back in the 1960s and 1970s we were the poorest region in Europe and, as a result, we qualified for what was called Objective 1 money—nearly €1 billion, I think. We got that twice; we got two tranches because our GDP was among the lowest in Europe. Why did we get a second tranche? Because the first time we failed completely to use the money effectively. We did not draw up a plan; we did not say, “What skills do we need? How can we turn the economy around?” We just sort of threw the money about. For example, FE colleges were booming with hairdressing and beauty treatment courses, so we gave them money to develop those courses. Yet there was a shortage at the time of engineers and of people in the construction industry, but there was no plan to say, “This is how we should be doing it.” So the notion of a local skills improvement plan seems eminently sensible.
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I have a query about who should be putting that plan together. I have always said, “Look, employers want to run their businesses. They don’t want to be
sitting round tables taking evidence, following government diktats and consulting people. They’ve got jobs to do. They want to make their businesses successful.” In a sense it should be the other way round. Whoever is doing this should be consulting with employers, not asking employers to do this work. But here we are. We have this.
If this is going to be employer-led, whatever that may mean, it is hugely important that other partners—and I use the term partners—are properly involved. The key partners must be the further education colleges, without a shadow of a doubt. They are the ones that are going to deliver this. If they feel that they have been pushed aside or neglected, it is not going to happen as well as it should. Then there is a whole host of other people who should be involved. Mention has been made, quite rightly, of the combined authorities—the metro mayoral authorities. I think we have nine of them now. They have been tasked with this—not only tasked, we have given them money. Liverpool City Region now gets £40 million a year. They have some other resources as well, so we should be involving them—not just involving, but partnering up with them. Again, that is important.
I want to raise some of the particularly important issues that have been identified. The noble Lord, Lord Baker, is right again when he says that we have made a mess. We have made a mess of our 11 to 16 schooling. It was not just Michael Gove, it was his coalition partners who sat by and allowed this to happen, much to my party’s shame. But that is in the past. We have to move forward and we have to recognise that, as I said at Second Reading, education should not be about just a knowledge and learning-based curriculum, it should be about a whole host of other things as well.
I am so glad that my noble friend Lord Addington again raised the issue of special educational needs, because here is an important group of young people who need to be part of this plan.
I want to go back to schooling. I have heard mention three times now of the London Challenge and how successful this was. I do not doubt it was successful, but I remind the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, that in Liverpool where our education service was failing, we were about to be privatised and the Minister at the time saw me and our chief executive and said, “Look, we don’t really want to privatise you. How about we work together to turn Liverpool around?” The noble Baroness, Lady Morris, came to Liverpool on numerous occasions—she was almost an adopted Scouser. Like the London Challenge, we were able to turn that around; at one stage Liverpool became the top-performing core city. It was not difficult to see how that was achieved. It was achieved by people working together and by realising that it was about the quality of teachers and the quality of leadership in schools—and also, to some extent, the quality of resources that were available.
Talking about the quality of teachers, if we are to get these local skills improvement plans to work, it also has to be about the provision and quality in further education. I repeat the plea that we look at the status of teachers and lecturers in further education. To my mind, it is a bit concerning that if you are a maths teacher, for example, in a school academy, you
can earn considerably more than if you are a maths teacher in a further education college. Can the Minister explain why that is the case? Should there not be the resources in further education to make sure that we get the right quality, if we have not already got it?
Talking about the overall budget of colleges, if we are to identify skills that are needed in this local skills improvement plan, we have to ensure that the colleges are given time to develop those courses. That means an understanding that the money will be around for a period of time to develop those courses. You cannot suddenly say, “We need skills in this sector” and then start up the course when you have not then got the money to keep that course going. Again, that is hugely important.
I am so glad that the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, and other noble Lords have mentioned the importance of remote learning. The Open University has been amazing in making that provision. Wherever people are, they can develop skills and knowledge through remote learning. Let us hope that continues.
It is interesting for me that, just by chance, as this Bill goes through your Lordships’ House, I also serve on the Select Committee looking at youth unemployment. It would perhaps be worth the Minister looking through some of the evidence given to that Select Committee. It is absolutely eye-opening. Only today we were hearing from disadvantaged young people and those in the careers service dealing with disadvantaged people. This is a whole host of people that we need to engage if we are to make these skills improvement plans work. Staggeringly, in the construction industry, for example, where we know that there is a national shortage, only 6% of people working in that industry are black, Asian or minority ethnic. Only 6%—why is that? Is that because they do not feel comfortable in that industry? Is that because there is overt racism? I do not know the reason. But there must be a reason it is only 6%. If you look at engineering—again, where there are national shortages—why is it only 7% black, Asian and minority ethnic people working in that industry? The other startling thing—again, my jaw dropped open—was to hear many young people who are desperate for a job tell us they did not feel confident going to Jobcentre Plus. They were nervous to apply for apprenticeships. They were nervous about and did not think it right to go for Kickstart. Why is that? These are issues that we need to get to the bottom of because they impact on the work we do.
In the Minister’s letter on the local skills improvement plan, which I got today, I was pleased to see that the priorities of local stakeholders will be considered when developing local skills improvement plans and that employer representative bodies will—kindly—engage with employers and then clear guidance will be set out. I also note that the Secretary of State will approve a local skills improvement plan before it is published and will require evidence that statutory guidance has been followed in the process of delivering this plan. I hope that will mean that they have to be absolutely confident that all the key partners have been able to have an input into those plans.
Finally, I just want to mention that, in putting forward these local skills improvement plans, there will be national requirements that are not locally based. The one that people have mentioned that springs to mind is the utility industry, where there is a national skills requirement. I would like to understand from the Minister how its voice will be heard, which is, in a sense, quite separate from local needs.