Antonia Bance (Tipton and Wednesbury) (Lab) I beg to move, That
this House has considered Skills England. It is an honour to serve
under you as Chair, Sir Christopher. I am so glad to have the
opportunity to raise the urgent need to reset our adult skills
system in England, to press my case for my constituency and region,
and to seek further information about the Government's plans. The
argument I will make today is this: Skills England cannot be just
another...Request free trial
(Tipton and Wednesbury)
(Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered Skills England.
It is an honour to serve under you as Chair, Sir Christopher. I
am so glad to have the opportunity to raise the urgent need to
reset our adult skills system in England, to press my case for my
constituency and region, and to seek further information about
the Government's plans. The argument I will make today is this:
Skills England cannot be just another quango. We need a confident
and directive organisation that takes what our economy needs,
directs provision, drives learner uptake, and delivers more
workers with higher skills ready for better jobs on higher wages.
I will also press the case for my constituency, for the Black
Country and for the wider west midlands. Judging by the number of
people here, there is some interest in this topic, and perhaps we
should seek further opportunities to talk about these issues. I
am sorry that in my inexperience, I asked only for a 30-minute
debate.
We are here today because the Conservatives oversaw a decade of
decline in skills, and it has made our country poorer. Employers
are unable to fill job vacancies, more than a third of vacancies
are down to skills shortages, learners cannot get the training
they need and industry is left without the skills to tackle the
challenges of the future. That is why Labour have pledged to
overhaul our skills system and set up a new body for skills:
Skills England. Skills England is a central part of our plan for
growth, good jobs and prosperity. It will have three key jobs: to
assess skills needs, to oversee the suite of qualifications and
courses on offer, and to co-ordinate all the players in the
sector, of which there are many. The point is to bring order to
the skills system, joining it up and making it more responsive to
what employers need.
I want to say a bit more about the nature of Skills England and
how it goes about its job. I have five key points. First, Skills
England must spot and respond to genuine skills needs through the
best available data and intel. We sometimes forget how hard it
is, caught up in the day-to-day, for employers to predict the
shape of the market for their goods and services in the future,
how the supply chains will change and what that means for their
workforce, products and quality. I hope that Skills England,
alongside our industrial strategy, can help with that.
One of the aspects of Skills England I am most pleased about is
that it will be tripartite, with unions on the board as of right.
Our movement has always taught working people to read, write, do
maths and, more recently, use computers, to help them get on in
life. As we face another industrial transition out of
energy-intensive and carbon-reliant industries, we need to plan
and manage with workers and use their insights too. Workers'
voices need to be around the table on skills, and with this
Government, I know that they will be.
Secondly, Skills England must be co-ordinated across Government
and, most importantly, with the Migration Advisory Committee and
the industrial strategy. I looked at the shortage occupation list
this morning and it is frankly an indictment of our skills system
that so many vital jobs in manufacturing and construction are
listed: bricklaying, welding—something those in my own area are
expert in—roofers, carpenters, joiners and retrofitters. No more.
Skills England must start to direct support to fill these skills
gaps so that we can grow our own. Above all, Skills England must
work hand in glove with our new industrial strategy and deliver
the skills training that will make the strategy real.
(Peterborough) (Lab)
Let me put on record that I am co-chair of the all-party
parliamentary group on apprenticeships. In preparation for your
speech, I totted it up and it seemed that Skills England will be
the fifth such national quango set up by Westminster since the
Manpower Services Commission in 1973. The average tenure of a
Skills Minister since 1997 has been 15 months—
Sir (in the Chair)
Order. It is helpful if you address your remarks through the
Chair, rather than turning away. Apart from anything else, it
makes it difficult for Hansard to record what you are saying.
I apologise, Sir Christopher; this is my first such intervention
in one of these debates. Since 1997, the average tenure for a
Skills Minister has been 15 months—longer than Liz Truss's, but
shorter than a premier league manager's. The average life of a
skills quango such as Skills England has been only eight years,
less time than most people spend in primary school. Does my hon.
Friend agree that the only way that Skills England will be a
success is if it is linked to industrial strategy, is tripartite
and brings together employers and unions? That would mean that we
would have a durable system and not a repeat of the failures of
the past, which saw short-term interventions that have not
delivered for working-class people.
As my hon. Friend might expect, I agree with him on all those
points. I hope very much that our current Skills Minister's
tenure is significantly longer than the average, and that Skills
England proves long-lasting and effective in responding to the
industrial strategy.
We expect the Green Paper on industrial strategy perhaps as early
as next week, but certainly by the Budget. This may be a tangent,
but it is important. I want an industrial strategy that makes
choices and sets out which sectors are our priorities—yes,
clusters where we are already world-beating, or could be, but
also places that are our priorities for industrial development
and catch-up. Good growth must level the playing field, and
national growth cannot be at the expense of left-behind places
like the one I represent.
However, Skills England must respond not just to industrial
strategy and migration, but to all of Government, as it touches
skills such as our agenda for getting people back to work. We
want people helped into real jobs that offer a route out and a
route up, and not just any job. That means no more jobcentres
running their own skills and education programmes separate to the
priorities of Skills England.
Third, we need a Skills England that is directive, not hands-off;
one that sees its role as supporting training that meets the
industrial strategy, not courses that do not. I will give an
example: one shortage occupation is lab technicians for our
world-leading life sciences sector. If the gap is lab
technicians, then it is Skills England's job to make sure that
the courses for lab techs run, are funded, are supported and are
filled. If that means that young women in an area cannot do
low-level hair and beauty courses that set them on a path to a
life on the minimum wage, but are instead channelled into a
higher-wage, higher-skilled job that offers a career path, such
as being a lab tech, so be it. That is Skills England doing its
job.
It may be easier and cheaper to run a business management course
in a classroom at a college, but given the shortage occupation
list and the industrial strategy, we need bricklayers and
welders. Yes, it will cost more to make the facilities available
and we may have to pay the lecturers a bit more too, but that is
what is needed.
(St Austell and Newquay)
(Lab)
Does my hon. Friend agree that to achieve any of the outlined
Skills England missions, we need a levelling of the playing field
over time for further education, in particular for wages in the
sector, and that we should work to rectify that, particularly in
teaching sectors that are challenging to recruit for, such as
critical minerals, as we see in Cornwall?
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. I was heartened to see
that in her letter to the School Teachers Review Body my right
hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education referenced the
need to ensure that the implications for further education
teachers are taken into account. I hope that, over time, we may
be able to hear a little more about the plans in that area.
My most recent point raises a number of questions because Skills
England does not hold the resources, although maybe it should—or
at least some. I will leave that with Ministers.
Fourth, we need a Skills England that is relentlessly
co-ordinating and engaging. As a country, we are still working
out how to move away from the hugely over-centralised government
machine, not least in places like my own west midlands where we
are still in the infancy of having a set of institutions, people,
power and money that help us determine our own future. I hope
that Skills England will be a trailblazer not only for skills,
but for a model of real partnership between regional and national
where combined authorities can actually input into national
policy.
I have three specific asks for the west midlands. Would the
Minister consider moving responsibility for commissioning local
skills improvement plans to combined authorities? Combined
authorities such as ours could have more of a role in shaping the
growth and skills levy. Finally, combined authorities are not
just one of a range of stakeholders for Skills England; they
should be represented at board level and in working groups as
part of its structure. If this work is led only from Whitehall,
missed opportunities will mean that local places are left behind.
Those places may well be best placed to support the join-up
required for coherent labour market policy, strategy and delivery
when different Departments are intervening in the same place.
I will say one further thing—my fifth point—about how Skills
England must work: it has to see its role as levering more money
into training, pushing employers to do more and making it easy
for them to do so. Employer investment in training has fallen
over the past decade. Investment per employee is down 19% since
2011. I hope that a clear skills strategy will start to change
that, sitting alongside, for the first time in a number of years,
a stable Government giving business the confidence to invest.
Skills England has to see its role as not just anticipating but
driving demand among learners. It should raise hopes and
aspirations and make it possible for young people to get the
skills they need, as well as for people in their 30s, 40s and 50s
to retrain and get on in life.
I will mention the role of unions again, because one of the least
comprehensible acts of the previous Government was the sheer
vandalism of ending the union learning fund in 2020. In 2020,
200,000 workers were supported into learning or training through
the union learning fund. It was open not just to union members or
in union workplaces, but to everyone, and it worked. Union
learning reached people that other initiatives just did not. Most
importantly, it reached basic skills learners. In union learning,
over two thirds of learners with no previous qualifications got
their first qualification. The fund added over £1.4 billion to
the economy through the boost to jobs, wages and productivity. It
cost £12 million, and that £12 million levered in £54 million
from employers, unions and training providers in its last year. I
very much hope that our new Government—so clear about the role of
unions in social partnership—will make use of the reach of unions
to workers and into workplaces that may otherwise not be reached
by learning.
I will finish by setting all this in the context of my
constituency of Tipton, Wednesbury and Coseley in the west
midlands. We are industrial towns shaped by factories, foundries,
mines and canals. In my area, 42% of young people leave school
without English and maths at grade 4 GCSE, and 2.5 times the
national average have no qualifications. Round our way, 40% of
job postings are looking for people with level 4 skills and
above, but just 16% of the applicants have a level 4
qualification. That is why our wages lag behind the national
average, employment rates are low and poverty rates are high.
I have—indulge me—three skills priorities for Tipton, Wednesbury
and Coseley. The first is manufacturing skills, and I wear the
“Made in Britain” badge. In Sandwell, 1,000 firms and 21,000 jobs
are in manufacturing, and we could make so much more than we
already do with a determined effort to get local people into the
right manufacturing skills courses to position us for advanced
manufacturing supply chains across our region.
The second skills priority is construction. Our aspiration as a
Government—something that is so close to my heart—is to build 1.5
million homes in the next five years. For that, the construction
industry training board tell me that the current workforce needs
to grow by 30%, with 150,000 more people working in construction.
Everywhere in the country will need construction workers, but if
we seek to bring up areas that have been left behind, we could
turn that massive skills need into an opportunity, train those
workers and bring those jobs to places such as ours.
Thirdly, we hear much about higher-level skills, but I am also
always here to champion basic skills. Having solid literacy and
numeracy skills gives workers a massive wage return and makes a
big contribution to our economy. We could add over £2 trillion by
the end of the century if we ensure that all young people get
good basic skills by the end of the decade. I will always stand
for high skills, good jobs and decent wages in Tipton, Wednesbury
and Coseley. I hope hon. Members have heard from me today what
approach Skills England should take to deliver for the country
and for areas such as mine—it must deliver for areas such as
mine.
4.16pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education ()
It is a real pleasure to speak in this debate. I congratulate my
hon. Friend the Member for Tipton and Wednesbury () on securing a debate on
this important subject. I am delighted to be the first Minister
in this Parliament to respond to a debate on skills, which I am
sure everyone across the House will agree are crucial to both
individuals and our economy.
The honour of being Minister for Skills actually falls to my
noble friend, , who has recently laid a skills Bill
before the other House. I know that she has already been out and
about in her short time in the role, meeting people at the sharp
end of skills delivery: providers, colleges, teachers and also
students, young people taking T-levels and apprentices. It is for
those people—people of all ages and backgrounds—that we need to
ensure that the skills system is working.
As this is a debate about skills, I must mention the fantastic
results that the UK achieved in the World Skills event in Lyon
last month. Students and apprentices from across the UK competed
with the best from around the globe and won two silver and two
bronze medals, as well as 12 medallions for achieving the
internationally recognised standard of excellence. The team
finished 10th in the medal table out of 60 countries, which
demonstrates the real commitment to excellence of our young
learners. I pay tribute to them.
We need to ensure that learners like that—indeed, all
learners—have access to the right opportunities. We know that the
skills landscape is ever changing, and that new technologies,
businesses and approaches all bring new skills needs. However, we
have not always kept up with that need. The current system is
incoherent, and too many people are unable to benefit from
it.
(Maidstone and Malling)
(Con)
I have the excellent MidKent College in my constituency, and they
tell me that there has been constant change in the skills
landscape over the last 10 years, with qualifications being
removed and then reintroduced. They have put it to me that more
certainty would make for much better long-term planning, not only
for students but for colleges.
I thank the hon. Member for mentioning the college in her
constituency of Maidstone and Malling. She raises a concerning
factor that should have been dealt with, so I am pleased to say
that in July the Secretary of State announced a review, led by
Becky Francis, of post-16 qualifications. Skills policy has too
often been made in isolation, which has made the system
confusing, as she has mentioned in relation to MidKent
College.
(Strangford) (DUP)
Just for the information of MPs from the mainland here, Northern
Ireland supplies construction workers to the mainland, who come
over to London by plane every week on Monday morning or Sunday
night. If we can produce workers in Northern Ireland who do work
in London, perhaps some contribution should be made to our
construction sector and our colleges back home so that we can
keep producing workers of great skill.
I thank the hon. Gentleman for that very interesting point. I
have not grasped the whole of that issue, so I would be happy to
have a further conversation with him about it.
The lack of a clear plan has led to confusion and widespread
skills shortages, which hinder economic growth. The lack of basic
skills among adults and reduced employer investment limit our
ability to meet domestic skills needs. Too many people have been
unable to access the benefits of quality post-16 education and
are more likely to face unemployment, lower wages and poorer
health. That is why meeting the skills needs of the next decade
is central to delivering the Government's five missions: economic
growth, opportunity for all, a stronger NHS, safer streets and
clean energy. We aim to create a clear, flexible, high-quality
skills system that supports people of all ages, breaks down
barriers to opportunity and drives economic growth.
(Bognor Regis and
Littlehampton) (Con)
On economic growth, nearly 50% of UK businesses have experienced
a cyber-security breach in the past 12 months, and cyber-attacks
cost the UK economy £27 billion annually. The country faces a
shortage of 93,000 cyber-security professionals, so does the
Minister agree that cyber-security skills development should be
prioritised in Skills England's agenda?
I thank the hon. Lady for that important and pertinent point.
Skills England's very purpose—[Interruption.] Indeed, I will come
on to speak about that. It will ensure that there is training
when employers identify skills gaps and those jobs are
needed.
Skills England will ensure that we have the highly trained
workforce we need to meet the national, regional and local skills
needs of the next decade, and it will be aligned with the
upcoming industrial strategy. That is a critical part of the
Government's mission to raise growth sustainably across the
country, support people to get better jobs and improve their
living standards. Skills England will provide an authoritative
assessment of national and regional skills needs in the economy
now and in the future. It will combine the best available
statistical data with insights generated by employers and other
key stakeholders. It will ensure that there is a comprehensive
suite of apprenticeships, training and technical qualifications
for individuals and employers to access, which will align with
skills gaps and what employers need. As part of that, it will
identify what training should be available via the new growth and
skills levy, which will replace the rigid apprenticeship levy, as
many have been calling for, to ensure that levy-funded training
delivers value for money, meets the needs of businesses and helps
to kick-start economic growth.
Will the Minister join me in congratulating my constituent Grace
Gourlay, who two weeks ago won the Peterborough Telegraph
advanced apprentice of the year award for her work at the end of
her second year of a four-year course at Caterpillar in engine
and test design? Does she agree that one of the big challenges
for Skills England in reforming the growth and skills levy is to
ensure that we reverse the decline in the number of young people
entering apprenticeships in skilled areas? We must begin to
reverse the 70% drop in young people taking up an apprenticeship
course.
I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend and join him in
celebrating all of Grace Gourlay's achievements.
Skills England will work together with combined authorities and
other places with devolved deals, as well as with other regional
organisations such as employer representation bodies, to ensure
that regional and national skills needs are met at all levels,
from essential skills to those delivered via higher education, in
line with the forthcoming industrial strategy.
To support our aim to ensure more local say in skills provision,
local skills improvement plans, or LSIPs, provide an agreed set
of actionable priorities that employers, providers and other
stakeholders in the local area can get behind, to drive change
and help to make technical education and training more responsive
to local labour market and employer needs.
Since autumn 2022, the designated employer representative bodies
leading the LSIPs have engaged thousands of local businesses on
their skills needs, helping to forge new and dynamic
relationships between businesses, skills providers and other
stakeholders in the skills system. The plans are a valuable
source of information and will provide important intelligence for
the newly established Skills England.
A £165 million local skills improvement fund has been made
available across all areas of the country to support providers to
respond collaboratively to the skills needs identified in the
plans. I am aware that a local collaboration of colleges in my
hon. Friend the Member for Tipton and Wednesbury's local area,
which is led by Solihull College and University Centre, has been
awarded £10.3 million of funding to support the west midlands
LSIP's priority actions. For example, Dudley College of
Technology is leading a project that has received £2.1 million to
support an expansion of the regional electrification and
engineering technical training offer, capital investment is being
used to upgrade existing facilities and offer new provision.
(Halesowen) (Lab)
Will the Minister give way?
I am afraid that I will not, as I really need to make
progress.
The west midlands LSIP has been recognising local challenges, as
well as opportunities, including the advancement of the country's
fastest growing tech sector, facilitating emerging strengths in
clean tech and green energy, and stimulating growth in priority
growth clusters identified by the West Midlands Combined
Authority, and creating a pipeline of new entrants into the
logistics and distribution industry by increasing the
availability of apprenticeships.
Offshore wind is a new technology that is being deployed around
the UK, including in the Celtic sea. It is estimated that up to
5,000 new jobs could be created in the area from the new supply
chain. Skills that will be critical to this industrial progress
include welding, marine vessel operation and cable laying.
It is good to know that Truro and Penwith College wants to
explore this sector. I know that green skills are a priority for
the college, with its focus on electric and hybrid vehicles,
renewables and retrofit for construction. The college also leads
the local skills improvement fund project for Cornwall, which
focuses on upskilling in these fields. We encourage colleges,
including those in Cornwall, to utilise their full adult skills
fund allocations. Colleges can grow their allocation by
overdelivering on their formula-funded provision by up to
110%.
I again thank my hon. Friend the Member for Tipton and Wednesbury
for securing this debate, on a matter that we both agree is
important. It has given me the opportunity to talk about our
plans for Skills England and for skills more widely. I am sure
that in the coming months and years there will be more discussion
and debate about skills, because they are critical to the
prosperity of our businesses and employers, the prosperity of
individuals, and indeed the prosperity of the nation. As I have
set out today, we are already starting to make reforms to the
skills system with the introduction of key measures, such as
establishing Skills England to ensure that we have the highly
trained workforce needed to meet the national, regional and local
skills needs of the next decade and beyond.
Question put and agreed to.
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