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Cold Weather (Elderly People)
3.31 pm
Mr. David Winnick (Walsall, North) : I beg to ask leave to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 20 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that should have urgent consideration, namely,
"the urgent need for assistance for heating to be given to the elderly of limited means during the very cold weather."
The matter is specific, because of the cold weather that is being experienced all over the country. It is important, because a very large number of pensioners on very small incomes simply do not have anything like the means to keep their accommodation adequately heated. It requires urgent consideration, because it is downright scandalous that so many pensioners on such incomes should have to suffer in the present cold spell--the coldest we have had since January 1987.
The Government's cold weather payments are far from adequate. When all the conditions have been met, all that is paid is £5 a week. One could hardly describe that as a large sum of money. How many right hon. and hon. Members could keep their homes adequately heated on £5 a week? In today's Evening Standard, there is a cartoon that adequately sums up all the bureaucratic red tape that has to be cut through before the £5 is actually paid.
Let me relate to the House the information that I have. There are 64 weather stations in the country. In the areas of only a very small number of those--nine or 10--have the conditions for making the payments been met. That means that, in the great majority of areas, the payments, however inadequate, are not being made. Why is it that, in this country, 10 to 20 per cent. more elderly people die during the winter months than at other times of the year, and why is the figure here far higher than that in other European countries? In most European countries it is about 5 per cent. Surely this demonstrates the hardship, misery and deprivation that so many elderly people in this country suffer during the winter months. It is time the Government took action. It is time they allowed elderly people cold weather payments--and more.
I hope that, in view of all these circumstances, Mr. Speaker, you will consider the matter sufficiently important to allow a debate to take place.
Mr. Speaker : The hon. Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) asks leave to move the Adjournment of the House under Standing Order No. 20 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter that he believes should have urgent consideration, namely,
"The urgent need for assistance for heating to be given to the elderly of limited means during the very cold weather."
As the House knows, under Standing Order No. 20 I have to announce my decision to the House without giving any reasons. I have listened with concern to what the hon. Gentleman has said. As he knows, I have to decide whether the application comes within the Standing Order and, if so, whether a debate should take place today or tomorrow. I regret that the matter that he has raised does not meet the requirements of the Standing Order and I therefore cannot submit his application to the House.
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Points of Order
3.35 pm
Mr. Max Madden (Bradford, West) : On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker : I shall take first the point of order from the hon. Member for Monklands, West (Mr. Clarke).
Mr. Tom Clarke (Monklands, West) : On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I hope that you will accept that what I am about to say is not even an implied criticism of you. Those who follow our proceedings carefully will have been greatly surprised this afternoon that the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick), who is no longer in the Chamber, asked two questions when some of us did not even have an opportunity to ask one.
There could be a great deal of confusion in the minds of those who follow our proceedings, because we have now adopted a system whereby, although hon. Members, including myself, may have tabled questions a fortnight ago, if we were not in the top 40, our questions do not appear on the Order Paper. Is it possible to look at that, because it is causing confusion that we all want to avoid?
Mr. Speaker : I am sorry that I was not able to call the hon. Gentleman. I think that that is really the reason for his point of order. I debated with myself whether to call the hon. Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) on question 17, since we did reach it. I could have stopped there, but that would have been to the detriment of the hon. Members for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber (Sir R. Johnston) and for Dundee, West (Mr. Ross). I judged that, on balance, I should call Question 17.
Mr. Alexander Eadie (Midlothian) : Further to that point of order, Mr. Speaker. With all due respect, perhaps you did not grasp the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Monklands, West (Mr. Clarke). He was trying to say that hon. Members table oral questions to particular Ministers but their names may not appear on the Order Paper. For example, I have tabled three successive times for Energy questions and my name has never appeared on the Order Paper, and I have tabled questions for three successive Scottish Question Times and my name has never appeared on the Order Paper. Our constituents may begin to think that we are not trying to table questions. My hon. Friend the Member for Monklands, West made a substantial point, which requires looking into. I am sure that you will see, Mr. Speaker, that hon. Members are trying to table questions to respective Ministers.
Mr. Speaker : I did get the point. The hon. Gentleman will know that there was a debate on this matter before Christmas and it was agreed that there should be an experiment on printing the first 40 questions. [Interruption.] Well, that is so. The Procedure Committee has the matter under review. The hon. Member for Midlothian (Mr. Eadie) has raised the substantial point that his constituents may feel that he is not tabling questions. He should put that point to the Procedure Committee which, is I have said, as currently looking into the matter, and it may come forward with an adjustment that would meet the hon. Gentleman's point.
Mr. Max Madden (Bradford, West) : On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I am sure that you, like most other
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people, would agree that it is easier to decide how many angels could fit on the head of a needle rather than what triggers the Government's severe cold weather payments. Will you confirm that the Minister for Social Security, and Disabled People who is responsible for these matters and who was giggling and chatting to his neighbour during the Standing Order No. 20 application by my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick), has nothing to prevent him from coming to the Dispatch Box to explain to you and the House when the Government are going to stop elderly people from freezing, and when they are going to make the cold weather payments?Mr. Speaker : The Minister was here and undoubtedly heard what was said. I cannot comment on the other matters that the hon. Gentleman has raised.
Mr. John McFall (Dumbarton) : Further to the point of order of my hon. Friend the Member for Monklands, West (Mr. Clarke), Mr. Speaker. Could not questions be shown on the Order Paper on the first possible day, so that we could show our constituents? They are becoming increasingly frustrated about hon. Members from English constituencies asking two questions, whereas we can ask none. I suggest that you concentrate on Scottish Members so that names such as Lochaber--
Mr. Speaker : Order. Does the hon. Gentleman expect to be called during questions in which English Members are involved?
Mr. McFall indicated assent.
Mr. Speaker : That is right--he does, because this is a United Kingdom Parliament. I must ensure a proper balance in this place, and I seek to do so.
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Disability Discrimination
3.40 pm
Mr. John Hughes (Coventry, North-East) : I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to render unlawful certain kinds of discrimination on grounds of disability ; and for connected purposes.
After years and years of endless rhetoric, nice noises, reams of paper and innumerable reports, there is still an astonishing degree of public and national and local government indifference to the needs of disabled people. The process of education has failed miserably and attempts to create public and establishment awareness have been lamentably unsuccessful. It has been a waste of time--especially for disabled people and their carers, whose time is of the highest premium.
Nothing short of a national scandal exists. Every hour of every day, an employer, a transport provider, a shopkeeper, Department after Department and even hospitals discriminate against disabled people. Disgracefully, public and establishment ignorance, indifference and prejudice subjects disabled people daily to the most arduous and unnecessary physically and mentally exhausting tasks. People fail to realise that carrying out the simplest, yet essential, bodily function can become an ordeal. Unlike any other member of the public, who can pop into the nearest toilet, a disabled person who does not own a toilet key under the Royal Association for Disability and Rehabilitation scheme or who has mislaid or lost his key is in real trouble, and may be confronted with a considerable trek to obtain relief.
A constituent of mine declares that even a routine hospital visit can be a humiliating nightmare. When she is forced to leave her most essential aid at home, she becomes, as she aptly puts it, a piece of furniture that is moved on and off an ambulance and deposited at hospital into a typist's swivel chair over which she has no control. That problem is not unique. It affects many of my constituents and the constituents of every Member of Parliament. It is the norm, which the House and the Government have failed to do anything about. The situation is worse than that, because, in their latest proclamation, the Government are setting out to erode the meagre employment benefits of disabled people. Disgracefully, the Government ignore unjustifiable discrimination, which frustrates employment opportunities for otherwise able people.
Examples of that enormous problem, which the Government choose to ignore, are available from the many organisations that represent disabled people. They have it on record that the head of one civil service department prefers the aspidistra, rubber plants and yucca plants to a disabled person in a public place. Consider the effect of that message on an employee who is forced to sit in an office unemployed because the boss of the department did not want an executive officer with cerebral palsy dealing with the public. Can hon. Members imagine the feeling of a person with an upper limb disability because of the drug thalidomide who was turned down for a job because the interviewing panel decided that the applicant could not write as her arms looked different, even though she had completed a comprehensive job application by hand?
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The upset and trauma that results from such insensitivity are unimaginable. Many other reasons why disabled people are humiliated are just as extreme and disgraceful. Disabled people are rejected for jobs because the managing director's dog does not like wheelchairs. They are refused access to a company pension scheme because they have scoliosis, which is a lateral curvature of the spine and has no effect on life expectancy or ability to do a job.Surprisingly, even the magic of money, which is normally the key to any door, fails to dent the barrier of discrimination. Even a millionaire can be discriminated against. A millionaire can go along to a Giro bank and open an account, but a disabled millionaire can forget it. Giro is not interested. The extent and form of discrimination is unbelievable.
Regrettably, I even found it necessary to draw to the attention of the House in an early-day motion the circumstances of many of my disabled or elderly constituents who were effectively imprisoned in their homes for seven weeks while a major renovation programme was carried out on the lift that served their homes. In this day and age, those circumstances are unacceptable. No elderly or disabled citizen's freedom of access, or exit from his or her home should be subject to such restriction. No elderly citizen or disabled person should be housed above ground level if the accommodation is not served by two lifts.
The needs of the disabled are of the greatest magnitude. More than 6 million people are affected. My hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Mr. Wareing) and my right hon. Friends the Members for Stoke-on- Trent, South (Mr. Ashley) and for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Morris) have ably presented Bills on
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this important subject. Each Bill set out to eradicate this form of discrimination. However, even after their efforts the problem still exists. It must be tackled now. The disabled cannot wait until education has erased the prejudice that prevails in every private and Government organisation.Ideally, the first item on the agenda of any national or local government meeting should require committee members to consider whether any other item of their business discriminates against disabled people. That could be done easily and without legislation now. That simple measure, however, cannot take care of the multitude of sins against the disabled buried in present legislation, with which we cannot afford to play around. The slate needs to be wiped clean and the present legislation replaced by one Bill only, as happened in America.
The key to the problem is here in the hands of hon. Members. My Bill sets out to establish in terms of employment, transport and access, a clear and comprehensive prohibition of discrimination on the basis of disability. I welcome this opportunity to present a Bill which is supported by many major organisations representing disabled people.
Question put and agreed to.
Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. John Hughes, Mr. Don Dixon, Mr. Martin Redmond, Mr. Dave Nellist, Mrs. Audrey Wise, Mrs. Alice Mahon, Ms. Dawn Primarolo, Ms. Mildred Gordon, Mr. Frank Cook, Mr. Harry Barnes and Mr. Dennis Skinner.
Disability Discrimination
Mr. John Hughes accordingly presented a Bill to render unlawful certain kinds of discrimination on grounds of disability ; and for connected purposes : And the same was read the First time ; and ordered to be read a Second time upon Friday 22 February and to be printed. [Bill 78.]
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Opposition Day
[5th Allotted Day]
Training
3.49 pm
Mr. Speaker : I must announce to the House that I have selected the amendment in the name of the Prime Minister.
Mr. Tony Blair (Sedgefield) : I beg to move,
That this House deplores the fact that at a time of deepening recession, with thousands more each day facing unemployment, the Government is cutting back on investment in training ; believes this sends entirely the wrong signal to industry ; and condemns the Government's failure to deliver the training policy Britain needs to boost skills and provide for the country's industrial future. Let me remind the Secretary of State of the background to the debate. This year, 25,000 companies will go to the wall ; this month, tens of thousands of new redundancies will be announced ; last month alone, it was announced that 1,200 jobs were to go in Derby, 1,200 at British Rail Engineering Ltd., 1,000 at London Transport, 450 at Mattessons Walls and 350 at GEC, and 3,500 jobs are in jeopardy at Lewis's stores. There are countless more thousands of jobs in jeopardy up and down the country.
When the Minister speaks, I defy him to tell us that he has any reason to believe that, when he announces next week's unemployment figures, they will be any lower than the appalling 80,000 rise in unemployment announced in December. If that is right, it means that, today and every day, 3,000 more people join the dole queue. That is the reality in Britain today under the Government.
The recession is not some distant theory, it is here, it is now and it is everywhere. A short time ago, the new Prime Minister promised us a classless society ; instead he has only brought us a classless recession, hitting everyone in equal measure.
Let us be clear that the distinctive feature of this recession is not that it is happening in the south and not in the north, but that it is happening everywhere--in the south-east and the south as well as in the north and in Wales and Scotland. It is affecting new technology and old, manufacturing as well as services. It is affecting every region of Britain, in every sector of industry, in every occupation at the workplace.
It is the extraordinary achievement of the Government that, having divided the nation for 11 years, they have finally united it in recession. Yet not one word of apology have we had, nor one expression of regret. We have not had one new initiative to tackle the rising unemployment that the Government have created. Let us examine the ministerial gloss that has been put on the unemployment figures by right hon. and hon. Members.
When unemployment first rose in the spring, we were told that it was
"a short period of slower growth, concentrated in the south, not the north".
In the summer, as unemployment rose higher, we were told that it was
"concentrated mainly in the south."
In the autumn, as the figures rose again and the desperation grew greater, we were given the rather implausible excuse that it was "concentrated on men, not women."
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Finally, two weeks ago, when unemployment levels had risen in every area of Britain, covering all categories of people, the Minister fell back on the final refuge of all failed Ministers. He told us that we must"get these figures in perspective."
Let me tell the right hon. and learned Gentleman the perspective of my constituents and that of countless thousands and millions of other people. They were told that this Government had created an economic miracle, and they have not. They were told that the problems would be temporary, and they are not. They were promised that there would be no recession, and there is. Promises followed by betrayal, boom followed by burst, that is the record of this Tory Government and all Tory Governments.
The Government, having created the recession, surely cannot duck their responsibilities for the victims. Perhaps what is most devastating of all in this period of rising unemployment is that we still suffer skill shortages in vital areas of industry. In the north-east for example, a report published a few days ago said that more than 20 per cent. of firms in the region experienced shortages of skilled labour. In the north-west, where unemployment has risen by about 15,000 recently, 30 per cent. of manufacturing firms were found to have major skill shortages. In the west midlands, where unemployment has risen sharply in the past few months, the Black Country development corporation conducted a survey among more than 1, 800 companies. Despite the high unemployment, it was not plant capacity but skill shortages that were inhibiting expansion. Just a week ago--just a few days ago--the Financial Times told us that a report commissioned into the leather-making industry, a key area of trade which does £150 million- worth of trade every year, showed that the constraint to growth was lack of skills. Yet the chamber of commerce survey for the fourth quarter of 1990, bang up to date for last December, gave the staggering figure that over 50 per cent. of manufacturing companies and almost 50 per cent. of service companies reported recruiting difficulties. There was not a single area of the country where such companies did not suffer a shortage of skilled labour.
Can there be any more fundamental indictment of failure than that--that, at a time of rising unemployment, we still cannot provide the skilled labour we need for our future? The shortages are concentrated in the very areas in which we most need to compete effectively ;, the areas where we have the largest balance of payments deficit and the areas of most acute skill shortages are correlated.
We need to train, not simply to develop people at the workplace but, crucially, for the economic success of this country.
Mr. Patrick Nicholls (Teignbridge) : If the hon. Gentleman is as worried about these skills shortages as he says, perhaps he would care to tell the House why the Labour party has opposed every single training initiative since 1979. While he realises that the word for which he is groping is no, perhaps he will reflect that spending by this Government on training is exactly six times in cash terms as much as that of the Labour Government. That is the record and the case which the hon. Gentleman should answer.
Mr. Blair : That is an extraordinary intervention in a week when the hon. Gentleman's Government have
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announced the collapse of employment training, the scheme which they introduced. If he examines the comparisons between Britain and our main competitors, he will see that the areas in which we most need skills to be developed, are the very areas where skills are most lacking.For example, in the decade up to 1988, the number of people with intermediate vocational qualifications grew by just 3 per cent. in Britain to the paltry figure of 26 per cent. That is a critical area for manufacturing and industry. In France, the figure rose by 8 per cent. to reach 40 per cent. and Germany is already 64 per cent. ahead in that category.
Mr. Nicholls : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Blair : I give way out of generosity.
Mr. Nicholls : Why, then, has the Labour party opposed every single major training initiative since 1979? That is the question. That is what we need to hear from the hon. Gentleman.
Mr. Blair : The subject of our debate is the Government's failure. The reason why we did not support the Government's training policy was that we disagreed with it. I should have thought that even the hon. Gentleman would realise that that is why we are debating this motion today.
If the comparitive figures are broken down, for example in the critical areas of engineering and technology, we find that an astonishing gap opens out at the craft level. In Britain every year, 35,000 craftsmen and women gain their qualifications. In France, the figure is 92,000. In Germany, the figure is 120,000. Is it any wonder, when our competitors develop their skills to so much greater a degree than us, that we have the manufacturing deficit in our trade of which we are all aware? Those figures will be confirmed by a major new study as yet unpublished, by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research into intermediate skills in the United Kingdom, France and Germany. It is worth referring to that study.
Mr. Frank Haynes (Ashfield) : Does my hon. Friend agree that the ex- Minister responsible for training, the hon. Member for Teignbridge (Mr. Nicholls), has a nerve? We are having the debate today because the Government have been a complete failure in training and this nation needs the opportunity of a proper training programme, not the programme which the hon. Gentleman pushed forward as a failed training Minister.
Mr. Blair : As I am well acquainted with the hon. Gentleman, I am not the least surprised by his nerve.
The most up-to-date comparison of numbers of technicians in manufacturing in Britain, France and Germany gives us some clue to our economic performance. Whereas Britain has 31 per cent. of technicians with no qualifications at all, France has only 27 per cent. and Germany only 8 per cent. At the critical intermediate level of those who are qualified, we find that France is about 10 or 15 per cent. ahead of Britain and Germany is producing 30 per cent. more qualified people a year.
The report goes on to study the effect of this skills gap on our companies. Based on interviews conducted with people in British industry, it concludes :
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"In Britain foremen in both spinning and engineering frequently mention that crisis management, chasing missing materials, rescheduling to cope with machine breakdown or training new staff where turnover was very high and new employees were normally untrained occupied the greater part of their time."The study goes on to compare the numbers of foremen and supervisors with qualifications in different countries. In the past decade, Britain has trained about 50,000 of them ; in the same period, Germany has trained 50,000 every single year. Surely that is why we are not doing as well as we should.
Mr. Ian Bruce (Dorset, South) : Surely the statistics that the hon. Gentleman quotes so eloquently tend to show that the amount spent by this Government is broadly comparable with that spent by the other Governments he has mentioned. Unfortunately, our manufacturing industry has not spent as much of its own money on training as its European counterparts and has failed to see the advantages that it would derive from spending as much. Surely hon. Members on both sides of the House should urge industry to appreciate that.
Mr. Blair : I do not believe that that is correct, but in any event I know of no main industrial competitor that would cut its training budget at a time of rising unemployment. The hon. Gentleman should pressurise Ministers to realise that.
Mr. Phillip Oppenheim (Amber Valley) : Will a future Labour Government make an increase in the training budget an immediate priority or does the hon. Gentleman agree with the shadow Chief Secretary, who has said that the only immediate priorities for a future Labour Government would be child benefit and pensions?
Mr. Blair : What we would not do is cut the training budget at a time like this. I should have thought that the hon. Gentleman would be worried about the 25 per cent. increase in unemployment in his constituency in the past few months.
Virtually all other international comparisons show the same trends. France and Germany have four times as many electricians as we do. Germany has five times the number of mechanical engineers and 10 times our output of trained staff in clothing and textiles. It produces 10 times the number of people qualified in office work every year. France produces seven times the number of people in the retail trade every year--
Dr. Kim Howells (Pontypridd) : Is not it true that the implications of what my hon. Friend is discussing are significant for large areas of this country, because, although it is important to areas such as south Wales to have inward investment, all too often it is concentrated on assembly line factories, not on primary production or research and development, which would provide real money, real jobs and real security of employment?
Mr. Blair : My hon. Friend is right. He mentions one of the main reasons for investing in those skills.
The comparisons in relation to virtually every sector of industry are frightening. If we agree that we need a training revolution, surely it must start with our young people. However, in such training we have the biggest gap with the very countries with which we need to catch up. Britain is virtually the only country that is cutting capital spending on schools as a real percentage of GDP. It is the
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only country in the industrialised world with fewer than 40 per cent. of young people staying on in higher education and training. If young people were leaving school and going into first- class training, that would give some satisfaction. There are 300,000 or more young people on the youth training scheme. On the Government's own figures, fewer than half of those receive a proper qualification at the end of the training. More than 50 per cent. of the young people employed, unemployed or in employment outside YTS receive no training whatever.At the very time when that is happening in Britain, Germany will this year increase the number of apprenticeships to almost 2 million. Now we can see why this country has fallen behind. Against a background of rising unemployment, skill shortages and a skills deficit in vital areas of trade, we look to see how the Government are responding.
Mr. James Arbuthnot (Wanstead and Woodford) : The hon. Gentleman finds it difficult to answer the question posed by my hon. Friend the Member for Amber Valley (Mr. Oppenheim). Would extra spending by a Labour Government be a priority or would it come about as resources allowed?
Mr. Blair : The answer is obviously yes. If the hon. Gentleman had been here for the speech by the shadow Chancellor, my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Monklands, East (Mr. Smith), he would have heard him say exactly that. Of course that is one of our priorities. The Government are betraying the future of the country by cutting skills.
The Government say that, because fewer young people are coming on to the Labour market, they want to cut expenditure on training. On our calculations, the youth training budget will be cut in real terms by about £100 million over the next few years. If that is because fewer young people are coming on to the labour market, would not any sensible Government, given the state of qualifications among our young people, reallocate that money and provide better quality training? The real dereliction concerns the 100,000 young people who leave school every year, go to work and receive no training whatever. In other countries it would be unthinkable--indeed, unlawful--for that to happen.
Mr. Nicholls rose --
Mr. Blair : I shall not give way. I should be happy to educate the hon. Gentleman, but this is a debate, not a seminar.
There is growing support for Labour's policy of some form of intervention for young people that would put training within a proper legislative framework and ensure that public money provided decent training and proper qualifications. We are today beginning a new process of consultation on our proposal with training and enterprise councils, industry and unions. Why does not the Secretary of State do that? He should consult people to see whether there is support for proper legislation to ensure that young people are helped.
Mr. Andrew Mitchell (Gedling) : I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman, who is now dealing with TECs. I am a great supporter of TECs, and I understood that the hon. Gentleman also supported them. When he was recently out of the country, his hon. Friend the Member
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for Fife, Central (Mr. McLeish) gave an interview on, I think, Radio Sheffield, and deliberately rubbished TECs. Is the Labour party in favour of TECs or not?Mr. Blair : That is complete nonsense, as I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, Central (Mr. McLeish) will tell us.
The cuts in youth training are bad enough, but those in training for the unemployed are savage. Some 30 per cent., or £300 million, will be taken out of the budget for training the unemployed next year alone. Thousands of those presently receiving training will be denied it. Would any other Government, at a time of rising unemployment, when training and retraining have never been more important, cut and savage the budget for training the unemployed?
We are proffered the reason that the Government have discovered that training is not always the best thing for the unemployed. I have only two things to say to that. First, that is a mighty curious thing to say. I remember when the predecessor of the Secretary of State for Employment introduced employment training. He told us that the reason why it had to be introduced, replacing the community programme, was because training was what the long-termed unemployed required. What has changed? Did he decide that training was no longer necessary and make the budget cut, or did he agree the cut in the budget and then cast around for an excuse to justify it?
Secondly, in all the criticisms of employment training and in all the campaigns to change it, and in all the studies and reports of its inadequacies--including those of the South Derby TEC and the Manchester TEC, which published reports last year, that of the Select Committee on Employment, which published a report last year, and the Department's evaluation study, no one has ever said that the problem with employment training was that there was too much of it. When we see the cuts in youth training and employment training, we are entitled to look for some help in training for those already in work. It is here that we find the most serious gaps in Government policy. We know that, in the year 2000, 80 per cent. of those in the work force now will still be employed. We know that, in a recession, training will always be cut. A recent CBI survey shows a declining trend of those companies still wanting to invest more in training. There is no proper policy for in-work training whatever, apart from exhortation.
The Secretary of State has endorsed the standard, developed by industry, unions and others, of investors in people. He has endorsed the kite mark for training excellence, which is given to employers who have proper training plans drawn up in consultation with their work force, involving each employee in the upgrading of his or her skill and evaluated or costed according to a universal standard. His predecessor set out as a Government target the aim that, by 31 December 1995--less than five years away--all employers, large or small, should become investors in people.
Why can the Secretary of State not accept what the Labour party urges--that he will not succeed in that target by exhortation alone? If all that were required were persuasion, even these Ministers could have succeeded long ago. Even if he cannot accept our case on that, he should have retained the Department of Employment budget so as to find other ways to use that money to stimulate training. Are we really saying that, with some
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