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Mr. James Wallace (Orkney and Shetland) : Other speakers, especially the hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett), have already pointed out that we are debating training at a time when our provision is at a low ebb compared with that of our competitors. That can be illustrated by reference to statistics. Only about 32 per cent. of young people in Britain stay on at school until they are 18, compared to some 76 per cent. in the United States and 95 per cent. in Japan. Figures show that about 39 per cent. of 16 and 17-year-olds are currently in full-time education ; 9 per cent. are unemployed ; 24 per cent. are on youth training schemes ; and 30 per cent. are in
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employment. Those in employment often receive no training. A recent survey suggested that only 5 per cent. were on day release schemes. So we start at a competitive disadvantage compared with those with whom we shall shortly be competing on even more equal terms once the single market becomes further established.Against that background, the Government's response in recent White Papers has been to set up TECs in England and Wales and local enterprise companies in Scotland. Just as they are getting under way in England and Wales and are about to be inaugurated in Scotland, the Government introduce the new clause, which my hon. Friends and I will not oppose. But what the Government are giving by way of tax incentives they are taking away through the cuts that are about to take place in the training budget.
Hon. Members who, like me, are not members of the Select Committee on Employment will have seen recent televised exchanges in that Committee with the chairman of the Training Agency who, when put under pressure, eventually admitted that, with training already in a poor state in Britain, the amount actually to be spent on training, once one removed all the frills, would be cut. I understand that the youth training budget will be cut by 25 per cent. over three years, which in real terms approximates to 45 per cent.
The Financial Secretary will probably reply by referring to the demographic changes that are taking place and the fact that there are fewer youngsters in the age group to which youth training applies. But as we accept that more should be spent on training, we have a wonderful opportunity to take advantage of those demographic changes and increase in real terms the amount that we spend on training.
Mr. A. J. Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed) : My hon. Friend may recall that, when the Treasury and Civil Service Select Committee examined witnesses on that point, they claimed that expenditure could be reduced on training because there were now fewer people unemployed, which, apart from being a doubtful prophecy for the months ahead, suggests that the Government's view is that training is necessary only when people are out of work. That represents an extraordinary failure to grasp the training problems that we face.
Mr. Wallace : My hon. Friend, who is a distinguished member of that Select Committee, makes a valid point to which I shall return. The TECs and LECs are about to be given a remit for training, a substantial part of which is taken up with their being administrators of national training schemes--youth and employment training--which, in different parts of the country and in their own ways, no doubt have some merit, but which go nowhere near to addressing the real problems of training, in particular the need to train those who are already in employment.
We must consider the effects of the cuts in training expenditure. Figures I was given last week by the Shetland Islands council show that, in the current year, there will be a 10 per cent. cut there in training. About £21,000 per annum will be withdrawn from training in Shetland. I understand that a similar cut will apply in the Orkney Islands council part of my constituency. That is the first of a number of instalments, and further cuts are to take place next year.
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Although cuts are taking place and new contracts are coming into operation at the end of this month, there has been precious little consultation up to now about how the transition is to be achieved. One wonders, with the Government putting greater emphasis on TECs and LECs in the provision of training, what role the Government see for local authority involvement in training.4.45 pm
In my constituency, the role of the local authority in pump-priming and giving additional funds to assist with training has been important, not least in helping those with special needs. If the Government see no real role for local authorities and continue to put pressure on their expenditure in other directions, we are in danger of handing over responsibility to the private sector and losing what has been a valuable partnership with the involvement of local authorities. How does the Minister see the future role of local authorities in supporting training in their localities?
Coming to the TECs and LECs, with which the clause is concerned, the Government are taking a risk. If training is vital to our country's interests and they represent the main mechanism by which training is to be delivered, it must be in the interests of all hon. Members to be sure that that mechanism works. There is no point in wishing the TECs and LECs ill, and to the extent that the clause tries to assist what they are doing, it is to be welcomed. As I say, it is a risk. After all, in its White Paper entitled "Scottish Enterprise", the Scottish Office was more blunt than its English and Welsh counterparts about the role of the private sector up to now. That White Paper said :
"Efforts to date to persuade the private sector to take greater interest in and responsibility for training have had disappointing results. Far too many firms take little interest in assessing and training for their own future needs, assuming that supply will always be there to meet demand."
Now, having admitted the failure of the private sector, the Government are putting so many eggs in that basket that one hopes that they have properly weighed up the risk involved.
As I said in response to the intervention by my hon. Friend the Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith), we have training that will be particularly geared to employment training and the youth training scheme, with not enough attention being given to what can be done to provide training for those who are already in employment, for those with special needs and, as the hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) pointed out, for the training and encouragement of women. An obvious example is the special allowances for employment training that are available to single parents but are not available to married women. A number of married women in my constituency have made representations to me that they would be only too willing to take up employment training if they had that additional resource. It is a short- term attitude--we frequently see such an attitude being taken by the Government--to encourage more women into the workplace without providing additional incentives. Will the TECs have flexibility to encourage training for women?
The prospectus for the 1990s entitled "Training and Enterprise Councils", issued by the Department of Employment last year, stated :
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"At least two-thirds of the directors must be local business leaders who are chairmen, chief executives or top operational managers at local level of major companies.' "I welcome the effort that is being made to encourage local top people from business to take that interest, although I sometimes wonder whether they are sure of the level of commitment that they are making.
There could be an inadequacy in going for chief executives and top business leaders. We accept that, over the years, British business has been woefully inadequate in providing training. The trouble is that many of those at the top know precious little about training. They do not have expertise and skill in training. I hope that that point will be taken on board by those running the TECs and LECs. We need to provide for trainers, not just for trainees. We need people with skill and experience in training. The editorial in the Financial Times of 9 May 1990, to which the hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) referred, pointed out :
"The UK's educational reforms are threatened by a lack of qualified teachers. The same constraint applies in youth and adult training ; the difference is that it is almost certainly more severe. After decades of neglect and the near disappearance of traditional apprenticeships in many industries, the UK lacks the human resources required for a training revolution."
It is important for the TECs to address that problem.
Linked to that is the need to stimulate a culture of training. People must want to learn, and I agree with those who say that this matter cannot be left entirely to the state, the Government or local authorities. They cannot command people to learn and train. It is up to all concerned-- industry, parents and the schools--to generate an atmosphere in which young people see it as worth their while to stay on and achieve educational attainment or to go on a training course, and at the end of whatever they do they must see some reward for their training efforts.
We must examine the experience of other countries. For example, firms in France that provide less training than the average in their sector pay the extra costs of the firms that provide above-average amounts of training.
As I said in my opening remarks, other countries seem to manage training so much better than we do. We should not be ashamed or hesitant about looking at their experience and adapting some of what they do. By setting so much store by TECs and LECs, the Government are taking a risk which, if it does not come off, will put us even further behind.
Mr. Lilley : First, I welcome the good will that has been shown by hon. Members on both sides of the House towards the substance of the clauses, although there is disagreement about what has been omitted from them and concern about some matters which the amendments address. Before I continue, let me make one general observation. Although we have had a great deal of talk about the amount of money dedicated to training, and the involvement of the public and private sectors, so far in the debate there has been no mention of specific skills or the training curriculum.
Perhaps it is an indictment of us all, and the difference between our attitude and that on the continent, that when we talk about training we think about how much money we spend and not about the output of training, which is crucial. That is why the Government attach so much importance to TECs. We believe that the involvement of industry in the process of providing and managing training will ensure that it is orientated more to the generation of
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training suitable to the needs of people and businesses, and not simply to abstract management and spending a certain amount of money.The hon. Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) began with an accurate description of the training desert and the total lack of Government provision for school leavers that we inherited from the last Labour Government. At that time there was no youth training scheme or equivalent of employment training, there was no direct involvement of industry in the provision and management of training, there were no training credits, for which pilot schemes are now being announced, and there was little or no contact between schools and industry. There has been a huge change on all those fronts.
Mrs. Beckett : The Minister is right in listing all those provisions which did not exist then, but there also was not mass unemployment on a scale that made a training scheme necessary to take people off the unemployment registers. There was also a substantial number of high-quality apprenticeships run by private companies. From memory, I believe that a training company initiative to promote further training in the private sector was one of the first things that the present Government cancelled when they took office, and there was a campaign of co-operation between industry and schools. Another thing that the Government cancelled when they took office was the programme that we had started to put computers into schools, but they later reversed that decision. Whatever the Minister may imagine, I assure him that the picture he paints does not represent what was happening under the last Labour Government.
Mr. Lilley : The hon. Lady is entitled to her view that everything was all right then, but I am inclined to think that there has been a long- term weakness. We have taken a decade to get it right, but we are now getting it right.
We are now spending £900 million a year on youth training and £1.2 billion on employment training, and we have announced pilot programmes for training credits. The LECs will control some £2 billion out of a total budget of £2.5 billion of Government money to be spent on training. That is all good news, but the real improvement on a much larger scale has occurred in the private provision and expenditure on training. One estimate mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer in his Budget speech is that no less than £20 billion a year is being spent by private industry on training. I am sure that we all welcome that.
Last night, the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, East (Mr. Brown) reminded us of the hon. Lady's assurance that the Labour party has no spending demands beyond the two commitments to social security spending. Some scepticism was expressed in the House about whether the Labour party would be able to limit its demands for extra spending to those two commitments and, sure enough, the hon. Lady has broken her own self-denying ordinance today and called for more spending on training. The hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) joined in.
Mr. Battle : The Minister will have read the account in the Financial Times --perhaps he will say that it is a speculative newspaper report--that the budget for training in the Department of Employment was to be reduced. What action did he take when he read that report?
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Mr. Lilley : I certainly do not take action every time I read reports in the Financial Times ; if I did, I should be hyperactive.
The public expenditure round proceeds on its stately course every year and all sorts of reports are made in the newspapers in ignorance of what is really happening. However, it is clear that the number of young people requiring post-school training and, happily, the number of people who have been long-term unemployed is diminishing. That means that more people are in work where they should be receiving training from employers in private companies and in the state sector, and that is what is happening.
The hon. Lady asked specifically what is the likely impact of the clause. Obviously, that is impossible to assess as it is an enabling clause which will remove the disincentive to companies from making contributions to local employment companies.
Mr. Wallace : The Minister said that young people who are in work should be receiving their training there and that is what is happening. What is his evidence for that? Does he contradict the recent survey that I quoted showing that only 5 per cent. of 16 and 17-year olds in employment were getting day release to undertake further training? What is his information?
Mr. Lilley : I recall hearing one of my colleagues in the Department of Employment referring to some European statistics showing that a high and rising proportion of people in Britain are receiving training, and that we are beginning to compare favourably with a number of our continental competitors. That is good news. It is impossible to assess the likely response to the removal of a disincentive, but a similar incentive exists for contributions to local enterprise agencies which have raised some £35 million in recent years. Therefore, a significant but by no means enormous sum of money may be raised. The contributions that companies are making are very good news and demonstrate their sense of responsibility to their neighbourhoods and their recognition of the benefits that ultimately flow back to them from a better training environment. The hon. Lady asked whether a company would lose relief if it received training after making a gift, and particularly if it were the condition of making a gift. I reassure the hon. Lady that it would not. There is already full relief for any expenditure by a company on the provision of training for its own staff, whether it provides it on its own premises or whether it buys in training from a LEC or elsewhere. The clause will simply ensure that there will be relief for purely altruistic contributions which might not otherwise exist as LECs are not charities. The hon. Lady suggested in her amendments--which are helpful and well-intentioned ; we accept their underlying spirit--that relief should be removed only in so far as there is any benefit. I thought about that, but it does not seem necessary and it would certainly add an extra burden of complexity. The hon. Lady also asked about a possible drafting error in subsections (1) and (2). I shall examine the point and write to her, although I have been given a preliminary indication that there is no problem. It is a tribute to her assiduity that she should have discovered a potential error.
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5 pmThe hon. Member for Leeds, West rightly referred to the importance of provision for the handicapped and other special needs groups. I assure him that training and enterprise councils must set out plans for the provision that they will make for the handicapped and others before they can sign a contract. Obviously that matter will be considered carefully before a contract is signed.
The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) said that other countries managed their training much better than us and that we should learn from them. Training and enterprise councils are being established partly because of the lessons we learned abroad. Germany has been successful : a major part in managing and providing training there is played by chambers of commerce. We do not have the same network of statutory chambers of commerce, but TECs will essentially involve business in the provision and management of training in a similar way, so we hope that we are learning from others. Technically we are discussing simply the amendments before us. I have responded specifically to those by saying that we accept their spirit but feel that they are unnecessary and might lead to unnecessary complications. I hope that the Committee will not take them to a vote.
Mr. Battle : I found it surprising that the Minister said that the amendments would be too complicated. He said that, if a company gained benefit, it would lose the whole carrot and that it was not possible to find a way round that. We should encourage employers to come forward. Their record in the past has been bleak. That is why the Government have had to take the lead.
The skills shortage is not a new phenomenon. In 1982, when I served as a councillor on Leeds city council, it was involved, with the local chambers of commerce, in examining the skills needs of the future. Those were the years of recession in the engineering industry and in clothing and textiles. With the dismantling of some training boards, a shortage of some skills emerged precisely in the industries with new technology. The skills shortage was being identified then, eight or nine years ago, so it is not a new phenomenon. Yet the record of companies in providing training has not been commendable. The Government have been forced to offer tax concessions to employers to encourage them to take training seriously.
I welcome the Minister's response to the points about the disabled, women and ethnic minorities, but they need stronger emphasis. I am interested in the background to the clause and what will have to be agreed before a contract is signed. In the past companies have not been ready to provide schemes to train the disabled and women, and we may have to cajole them again. I hope the Minister agrees that it is not the case of the Government's saying, "We will have a partnership now."
There are problems about the Government's sticking to their funding contribution. I was not happy with the Minister's response on budget speculation. There should be hard bids. If the Secretary of State for Employment believes that he should work in partnership with companies, he should defend the employment and training budget and ensure that the Treasury will not cut the provision in order to cushion the poll tax.
Mrs. Alice Mahon (Halifax) : My hon. Friend has referred to gaps in training. Did he see "The Money
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Programme" to which my hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) has referred? In that programme we heard that invisibles had declined since 1986 and that, for the first time since the Napoleonic wars, we had a deficit in our invisible trade. One reason was that there was very little organised training for specialist functions in the financial sector. I do not think that the Minister can blame that on a Labour Government.Mr. Battle : My hon. Friend makes a telling point.
The identification of skills shortages has not been a new phenomenon. As industry has changed, there has been a shift from manufacturing to service. In Leeds, we set up training institutes to train women, people from the ethnic minorities and the disabled to enable them to enter jobs requiring new technology skills. The Government are trying to cajole employers to fall in with their plans. Unless the Government are prepared to keep their side of the partnership bargain and give a real commitment that the training will not be subject to annual budget dealing which may put the partnership at risk, how can employers be persuaded to put in cash? We agree with the clause, but we think that our amendment should be acceptable. The Financial Secretary said that he accepted the spirit of our proposals. Why can he not accept the content?
Mr. Lilley : I shall respond specifically to the initial concern of the hon. Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) about whether the amendments are necessary to avoid frightening people off. These subsections are essentially about avoidance. They are to prevent abuse of the scheme ; there is nothing particularly novel about it. There is an identical provision in the legislation that provides tax relief for contributions to local enterprise agencies. Its purpose is to ensure that relief is not available for contributions with strings attached--for example, a contribution made on the understanding that the training and enterprise council would later provide training for a member of the contributor's family in something not connected with the contributor's business. We do not want abuse where a firm will make a gift, with a rider attached that a nephew will get training on something wholly unconnected with the business. The purpose of the subsections is to see off that potential abuse.
We did not find difficulties in the case of an almost identical provision for local enterprise agencies. I do not imagine difficulties will arise in this case. Precisely because the provision is to see off improper strings being attached to gifts, there is no case for saying that, as the improper string cost only £4,000, tax relief should be lost on only £4,000. If there is abuse and an attempt at nepotism, it is better that it should be seen off outright by the loss of tax relief in its entirety. That is why the provision is set out as it is. I am sorry that I did not spell it out at greater lengths earlier. I am glad to have had the opportunity to do so in response to the hon. Gentleman's request for further clarification.
Mrs. Beckett : We have had an interesting though short debate. The hon. Member for Eastbourne (Mr. Gow), whose courtesy I appreciate, made, as always, a telling and effective speech. The hon. Gentleman said that responsibility for progress in training--and I think that he said that he was quoting Balfour, or perhaps it was Baldwin--rests with every man and woman in the country and, of course, we do not dispute that. He also said that there was a need
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to maintain a partnership between Government and industry in the provision of training. I am happy to place on record once more the point that I made in an intervention in his speech. We recognise, of course, that it has always been the case--and we hope that it always will be--that there is a great need for industry to provide good training. Nevertheless, we believe, as industry does, that the provision of such training is a partnership between Government and industry. There is a growing belief and concern that the Government are failing to provide their side of the partnership.My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, West (Mr. Battle) remarked in his first contribution on the way in which the cuts in training have been made not just in the overall budget, but in the provision of training and the cost of training being allowed per head. Again, the answer is giving in Cm 1006. In paragraph 26, table 6.5, which refers to youth training-- frequently quoted in the House and outside--shows clearly the decline in the gross public cost per trainee week, not only in the estimated outturn for 1989-90, but in the coming year and the two succeeding years. It estimates a fall from about £50 per head in 1989-90 to about £33 a head by 1992-93. There is no doubt that that will be a substantial cut and will have a damaging effect. The Financial Times editorial, which I quoted earlier, made explicitly the point that the Opposition so often try to make to the Government and which they tend to contest--that it is not possible to provide high quality training on the cheap, which the Government are attempting to do.
The hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace) talked especially about the training needs and problems identified in Scotland, and about the training needs of women and the disabled which, of course, we very much endorse.
The Financial Secretary has shown previously a trait--and I am not sure whether it is because he writes his speeches in advance and does not like to amend them
Mrs. Beckett : If I have insulted the Financial Secretary, I apologise. However, he has a tendency to make remarks that do not seem to some of us to be borne out by the debate. In this case, he said that the only worry expressed by the Opposition was about the provision of public funds and that nothing had been said about the detail of training.
That is not wholly accurate. I referred to the various targets that were needed. It is certainly the case that the Opposition in a variety of ways, including through our members of the Select Committee on Employment, have studied and been alarmed by the detail of what is happening in training. My hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Blair) gave some examples in the Budget debate which were taken from studies of sector training organisations obtained by our hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton), who is Chairman of the Select Committee on Employment.
It is worth reminding the House of one or two of the points that my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield identified. There is likely to be a shortfall by the middle of the 1990s of 50,000 trained people in information technology. The computer services industry council presently covers 44,000 people and that number is soon to increase substantially. At present, it has five full-time staff only, although it is an area of great need in which we have
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a substantial deficit. The national retailing training council covers 2.5 million people, but it has only five full-time staff. The United Kingdom Agricultural Supply Trade Association has 1.25 people covering the entire association. Only 0.6 of a person--and I do not know how the figure was arrived at--covers the National Association of Master Bakers, Confectioners and Caterers. The detailed studies of training confirm the alarm we expressed in the debate. I believe that only one in four companies train.The Financial Secretary then referred to the training desert. I thought that we were experiencing a wholly new phenomenon of commendable frankness, with Ministers admitting to sins of commission or omission, but I should have known better. He was talking about the previous Labour Government. I seem to recall that you, Mr. Walker, were a luminary adorning the Department of Employment. The Financial Secretary is fortunate that you are not in a position to set him straight by joining in our debate. Few who had any experience in the area would recognise the Financial Secretary's picture of the state of training then.
5.15 pm
The Financial Secretary referred to Opposition pressure on the Government to restore cuts in the provision of training to which we have referred in the debate. I am not sure whether it is deliberate on the part of the Ministers, or whether they simply have not grasped the distinction. In case it is the latter, let me make it plain. When we talk about the present public expenditure White Paper, about the present Budget or about Government policies, we set those remarks in the context of what we think that the Government should be doing now. We think that they should now be restoring the cuts they made in the training budget. It was in that context --
Mrs. Beckett : Yes, spending more. The Government should spend enough to restore the cuts they made in the training budget in the public expenditure White Paper. The Minister should recall that I made a similar point earlier, although I am not sure that he was paying quite the close attention that I should have liked to every word I said. I drew his attention then to the fact that, in the debate on the public expenditure White Paper, when we called for the restoration of the cuts in spending, we made several proposals about areas in which we thought that the Government were making mistaken choices in spending money and in which we would not spend money, and several other proposals about areas in which the Government were making cuts and in which we would not make cuts.
Ms. Diane Abbott (Hackney, North and Stoke Newington) : Does my hon. Friend agree that our concern for a full-hearted Government partnership for training is not just with the overall level of spending? We are concerned that training should be carried out not as a privatised entity, but within the framework of overall social objectives. In my constituency, the unemployment rate among young black males is one in two. Society will pay a terrible price for the Government's policy. The Government seek to back away from their responsibility for training. The training needs of young men in areas such as Hackney, inner London, Manchester and Birmingham
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are ignored. This country will pay a terrible price for the Government's lack of seriousness on training, not just in terms of overall finance, but in terms of the overall social objectives which a serious Government policy on training should have.Mrs. Beckett : Yes, I whole-heartedly endorse what my hon. Friend has said. Her observations about the way in which all of us draw on our experience of our constituencies and the problems there challenge the Government's view about the problems and the nature of the difficulties.
I reiterate for the benefit of the Financial Secretary, and in the perhaps vain hope that we shall not need to have these conversations over and over again that we proposed the restoration of the cuts in the public expenditure White Paper and that we also proposed cuts in spending in areas where we thought that the Government were misdirecting. I assure the hon. Gentleman that, broadly speaking, the cuts that we proposed and the cuts that we opposed balanced out. I assure him that there was no net increase in public expenditure in our package, which fits into the context of my remarks about our plans.
That brings me to my second point on the issue. The training cuts that we were discussing were in the context of what the Government are doing this year and what we think that they should be doing. When we referred to what a Labour Government would do, possibly in one year or two years--neither the Financial Secretary nor I can predict that--we were referring to a different framework. At the moment we have a couple of specific, clearly identified commitments which are our priorities. Beyond them, there are several desirable directions in which we should like public expenditure to move, but which we cannot quantify now. There is a clear distinction there and I assure the Financial Secretary that there was no contradiction in the points made by Opposition Members.
As we have identified, the overall context of clause 68 is one of encouraging business, through tax reliefs, to contribute to training programmes in TECs. It has been suggested in the press, and I am not aware that the Government have contradicted it, that the Government are drawing on the American experience. I remind the Financial Secretary of an article that appeared in The Economist on 21 April 1990. The article included several not very encouraging remarks about the Government's plans. It said that business men had responded to the Government's arguments with glum faces and that they were complaining that the Government might have shifted expenditure rather than reduced total investment. The article continued :
"A glance across the Atlantic"
at the models for these proposals
"deepens the gloom. Despite a strong American tradition of corporate largesse,"
the equivalent proposal in the United States
"has never received more than a tiny proportion of their money from private industry."
The article explains that one of the most successful training schemes in the country, in Philadelphia, raises only about 5 per cent. of its budget from the private sector.
The Economist, which is not exactly a left-wing magazine, stated that the Secretary of State
"and his colleagues could hardly have chosen a more effective way"--
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that is, through the cuts--"of sending a negative signal to a movement which stands or falls on voluntary effort. Some businessemen are asking themselves why they should be generous with their time and energy when the public budget is being squeezed and their own discretion to spend it is being so tightly constrained."
The Economist suggests that some more cynical souls are wondering whether the Government are trying to offload responsibility, even for the training schemes that they run at present.
Mrs. Mahon : Is my hon. Friend aware that the chairman of the Blackburn TEC threatened to resign because of the cuts in funding?
Mrs. Beckett : I was not aware that the chairman of the Blackburn TEC had threatened to resign. However, judging from the strength of his remarks and his depressed tone that he revealed in a television programme that I saw, I am sorry to say that I am not surprised to learn that he has threatened to resign.
An article in The Guardian on 21 March 1990 referred to the leader of a midlands TEC. The article said that the Government were trying to place responsibility on the private sector for providing training. The article was lukewarm about the proposals in clause 68. I listened with care to the observations made by the Financial Secretary, and I am glad that the Government do not believe that people would lose as a result of the difficulties that we identified and which we sought to address in amendment No. 21. The Financial Secretary believes that our amendment is unnecessary. However, we are not entirely convinced. I do not mean to criticise the Financial Secretary when I say that the drafting of legislation is an issue on which the Government's record is, how can I put it--
Mrs. Beckett : Shocking is probably the best way to put it. I was going to be more gentle than that. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney, North and Stoke Newington (Ms. Abbott) has probably described it better.
We have extensive experience of the Government assuring the House, in all good faith, that this or that provision in a clause meant this or that and was correctly drafted. However, we then discovered, sometimes before a Bill had completed all its stages and sometimes not until a subsequent year, that that was not so. I believe that there are some clauses in this Bill that correct something that the Government said did not need correcting from last year's Finance Act.
With respect to the Minister, if amendment No. 21 would do no harm and is merely regarded as unnecessary, we are inclined to press it to a Division. We have reservations about whether payment, not "wholly and exclusively", as needed by section 74 of the Act will cover the case to which the Financial Secretary referred. Of course, we understand his point about drafting the clause to stop people, according to his example, providing training or education for a nephew. We would not want people to avoid tax. However, although we share the Financial Secretary's desire to rule out tax avoidance--we wish that the Government shared our view about that more often--we believe that the Bill as drafted goes over the top. I intend to advise my hon. Friends to vote for amendment No. 21.
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In conclusion, I want to quote from the ubiquitous and extremely useful "Money Programme". That programme placed the context of this debate in a clear light. One of the contributors to the programme said :"We are moving away from the practices of our most successful competitors who supplement the market in training and regulate it heavily. We are moving towards complete dependence on the market." Unfortunately, that is the answer for the hon. Member for Eastbourne. We are very concerned about that and that is why we raise the issue and why I advise my hon. Friends, despite the assurance from the Financial Secretary, to be on the safe side and support amendment No. 21.
Mr. Frank Haynes (Ashfield) : With regard to this so-called incentive that the Government are giving to businesses in the form of tax relief to encourage them to take on their responsibilities for training, I must tell the Financial Secretary that we were telling the Government years ago that they were destroying the training of this nation.
Ms. Abbott : And would they listen?
Mr. Haynes : No, they would not. In fact, we were saying that before the young Minister became a Member of this House. I am sure that you, Mr. Walker, will remember this. I remember you at the Dispatch Box telling the Government of the day where they were going wrong on training.
The Financial Secretary should listen to these things, which have had to be said about training. The Government have missed the boat. They are trying to pour a little money into the pockets of the employers to have what the Government believe will be a sensible and successful training programme. I was a member of the Standing Committee that considered the Employment Bill, the Report stage of which we will debate on Thursday. In that Committee, Ministers tried to tell us what they were going to do about training. They are part of a Government who have almost destroyed training in this country. Ministers now squeal at the Dispatch Box that we do not have enough people with the skills to do the new jobs that are becoming available in the new technologies. They are bawling their eyes out. Even the Prime Minister at No. 10 is doing that. The Prime Minister and the Ministers on the Treasury Bench have some lessons to learn. I am sure that, like me, Mr. Walker, you remember the training programmes that we used to have. The responsibility then was where it should be. This Government have a responsibility, but they are trying to duck out of it by chucking a bit of corn down. It will not work, and it will not help the Government to stay in office at the next general election. The Government have failed the people who need training, especially youngsters coming out of school.
In the Minister's constituency as well as in mine, young people are put on so-called "training programmes", when they push brushes around a factory floor for about two years, but there is no job at the end of it for them, and we are now finding out that there will be an increase in unemployment because of the Government's policies. The Government have wasted money, and that has been at the expense of the ordinary folk that the Financial Secretary is supposed to represent and I certainly represent, back in the beautiful country of Nottinghamshire, where the Government have destroyed industry. Our mining industry used to have a first-class
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training programme, but what did that lot on the Treasury Bench do? They closed the pits, with the result that the training programme has been lost as well.5.30 pm
As I have said, the Government are chucking a bit of corn on to the floor of the Chamber in the hope that the employers will pick it up. The Ministers and the Government have another think coming because that will not happen. The Financial Secretary must have heard what my hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South (Mrs. Beckett) has just said about only one in four employers being interested in training. That is shocking. All of them should be involved. The Government should be encouraging employers to train.
The Financial Secretary has a little grin on his face, but I am trying to be serious for a change. Let us face it, from time to time I have sat in the Chamber and been bored to tears. The Government have poured out statistics until I am sick of hearing them. Sometimes we hear a speech that livens up the debate and which hon. Members enjoy, including you, Mr. Walker. I have seen you with a smile on your face sometimes. Indeed, you are smiling right now.
Nevertheless, training is a serious matter. It is all very well to dangle a carrot before the people who are supposed to be providing a proper training, but the Government have ducked their real responsibility for a number of years.
I shall give an example of an industry in my constituency that encourages the training of disabled people without any encouragement from that lot on the Treasury Bench. It has done so ever since I have been a Member of the House. Provisions governing the employment of disabled people are supposed to be on the statute book. Although firms do not have to follow the provisions, it is recommended that about 3 per cent. of the work force should comprise disabled people. In the firm that I am talking about, disabled people make up 3.5 per cent. of the work force and they are trained, which is how it should work but, oh no, training has gone down, down, and downhill under the Government.
Give us the opportunity at the next general election--I am sure that it is coming--and my party will sit on the Government Benches and do something about training programmes. My hon. Friend the Member for Derby, South has spelt out what should be done, but I do not think that the Financial Secretary was listening to her. He was gas-bagging to whoever was sitting next to him--
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