| Home Page |
Column 125
House of Commons
Tuesday 1 December 1992
The House met at half-past Two o'clock
PRAYERS
[Madam Speaker-- in the Chair ]
Message from the Queen
The Vice-Chamberlain of the Household-- reported Her Majesty's Answer to the Address, as follows :
I have received your Addresses praying that the Double Taxation Relief (Taxes on Income) (Guyana) Order 1992 and the Double Taxation Relief (Taxes on Income) (Falkland Islands) Order 1992 be made in the form of drafts laid before your House.
I will comply with your request.
Oral Answers to Questions
EMPLOYMENT
Merseyside Training and Enterprise Council
1. Mr. Wareing : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what changes she is planning in the funding of Merseyside training and enterprise council.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Employment (Mr. Patrick McLoughlin) : Merseyside training and enterprise council's budget this year is more than £50 million, allowing it to help more than 20,000 people. The regional director will discuss funding for next year with that TEC in the next few weeks.
Mr. Wareing : Is the Minister aware that this year the funding of Merseyside TEC was 7.5 per cent. down in real terms, and that the 231,000 training weeks for which it contracted this year represented a 20 per cent. reduction compared with last year? What sort of Government talk about recovery but are prepared to pay more than treble the amount that they pay out to Merseyside TEC to keep unemployed people idle on Merseyside? Does the Minister appreciate the fact that I represent one of the worst unemployment zones in the country and that when people there hear the Prime Minister talk about recovery they laugh, and laugh and laugh. I cannot wish my constituents a prosperous new year, because the Government will have to go before they can have one.
Mr. McLoughlin : If anybody laughs, it must be at the hon. Gentleman's whingeing. One must look at what has happened in his constituency. In July 1986, unemployment was 9,472 ; in October 1992, it was 6,394--down by 33 per cent. I hope that even the hon. Gentleman could welcome that.
Mr. Simon Coombs : What has been the take-up of resources for employment action within the Merseyside
Column 126
training and enterprise council area? Do the Government intend to make funds for employment action more widely available in the future?Mr. McLoughlin : I am grateful to my hon. Friend. None of the training schemes that we have introduced has ever received the Opposition's support. They whinge about wanting training to be provided, yet criticise every scheme that we put forward positively. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced some new training initiatives that will come into force as a result of the excellent settlement that she managed to achieve during the public expenditure round.
Mr. Alton : Is the Minister aware that, from this very day, the disabled people previously being trained at the Greenbank project in Liverpool will cease to be trained there because of the reductions in funding by the Merseyside TEC ? Does he accept that the disabled are a vulnerable group of people, about whom he has received personal representations ? Will he look again at the funding for that specific group and see whether additional resources can be made available to the Merseyside TEC for their benefit ?
Mr. McLoughlin : That point has been brought to our attention. My noble Friend Viscount Ullswater has been dealing with the matter and I assure the hon. Gentleman that we shall look at it again.
Mr. Evennett : Does my hon. Friend agree that business and community leaders have welcomed TECs as the best way to deliver training, taking into account local needs ?
Mr. McLoughlin : That is the case. The simple fact is that TECs are making a substantial contribution throughout the country both locally and nationally.
Unfair Dismissal
2. Mr. Mackinlay : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what action she proposes to take to protect people employed for less than two years from unfair or arbitrary dismissal.
The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Michael Forsyth) : Many people without two years' service are already protected against unfair dismissals, for example, for trade union reasons or on grounds of race or sex.
Mr. Mackinlay : Will the Minister reflect on the fact that many hundreds of people will be disappointed by his reply, bearing in mind that they have suffered unfair and arbitrary dismissal and have no remedy because they have been employed for less than two years, and many part-time workers, particularly women, have to be employed for five years before they have a remedy? Many people who are rich and powerful obtain substantial sums in compensation, but ordinary workers have no remedy. Is that consistent with maintaining the rule of law and in the spirit of the rules of natural justice?
Mr. Forsyth : At a time of high unemployment we must be wary about making changes that would make recruitment of people more difficult or less likely. But perhaps I can reassure the hon. Gentleman in at least one respect. We plan to extend the rights that people enjoy
Column 127
against unfair dismissal to include pregnant women and to extend protection without a qualifying period to workers who are dismissed on health and safety grounds.Mr. Sykes : Does my hon. Friend agree with the people of Scarborough and Whitby who welcome the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill, on the standing Committee of which I have the privilege to serve, which protects individuals against the unfair and alien practices so long practised by the trade union movement?
Mr. Forsyth : I entirely agree with the people of Scarborough, particularly in their sending my hon. Friend to the House. I welcome his participation on the Committee stage of the Trade Union Reform and Employment Rights Bill, which, as he rightly emphasises, extends employment rights for a number of our fellow citizens.
Ms. Quin : Will the Minister confirm that no other European Community country has as long a qualifying period as we do for protection against unfair dismissal? Will he further confirm that no other country savagely penalises part-time workers in the way that we do? Is he not in favour of a level playing field in Europe?
Mr. Forsyth : Certainly not. We have a higher proportion of women and part-time workers in our work force than do many of our European partners. We have a higher percentage of women in our work force than any other European country, apart from Denmark. The hon. Lady, perhaps unwittingly, has made my point. Were I to take her advice there might be fewer opportunities in the labour market for women, part-time workers and others. Is that what she wants?
Local Initiative Fund
3. Mr. Andrew Mitchell : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what plans she has to provide further support for the local initiative fund.
The Secretary of State for Employment (Mrs. Gillian Shephard) : I am pleased to tell my hon. Friend that the local initiative fund, which allows training and enterprise councils and local enterprise companies to develop new ideas in support of training and business growth, will be increased by £12 million in 1993-94.
Mr. Mitchell : Given that that fund goes to support local training initiatives by TECs and related bodies, will my right hon. Friend reassure the House that TECs and similar bodies now have sufficient funding to redeem the Government's pledge to school leavers that they will all be offered a place on a training programme?
Mrs. Shephard : Yes. We have always made it clear that TECs will be adequately resourced for that purpose. In the five months since June, 99,000 young people in England have entered youth training. Estimates from TECs last week suggest that of all those young people who left school this summer, about 19,000 have yet to take up a training place. I have written today to the Chairman of the Select Committee on Employment with full details of how TECs are meeting that guarantee and I am taking a close TEC- by-TEC interest to ensure that that guarantee is met.
Mr. Ronnie Campbell : What would the Secretary of State say to the organisation in my constituency called
Column 128
Mustard Seed which must fold at the end of the month because it does not have the money to keep going and because the TEC does not have enough money? Mustard Seed deals with the back-end--with the young people leaving school who cannot get jobs or apprenticeships. What advice does the Secretary of State have for organisations such as those run by the Church who are trying to keep those kids off the streets and off the dole, but which are folding because of a lack of money? What guarantee does the right hon. Lady have for them?Mrs. Shephard : I have always made it absolutely clear that we stand by the guarantee of places for young people. All TECs and LECs are adequately resourced to meet the youth training guarantee. If any TEC or LEC can show that it is not, we will certainly look at its case.
Training and Enterprise Councils
4. Mr. Milligan : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what measures she is taking to meet the concerns which have been expressed by TECs.
Mrs. Gillian Shephard : Last month, I was pleased to be able to announce a package of measures that has been welcomed by TECs throughout the country.
Mr. Milligan : I thank my right hon. Friend for the statement that she made in reply to the previous question, but is she aware that 1, 000 young people in Hampshire still have not been able to get training places? Hampshire TEC has a most imaginative scheme for providing initial training, to try to get those young persons up to the level that private business requires. Can my right hon. Friend explain what will be the effect in Hampshire of the announcement that she just made?
Mrs. Shephard : I can certainly explain with pleasure to my hon. Friend that close attention is being paid to Hampshire TEC's particular problems with meeting the guarantee. As I said, all TECs have the resources required to meet it. In fact, we have provided for 244,000 places for young people in the current year and the number required is only 216,000. There is no problem with resources, but there may be a problem with Hampshire TEC --as there are with some others--in finding employer placements. Each and every TEC--few now are finding difficulty--will be helped to meet the guarantee by the end of this month.
Mr. Wallace : How can the Secretary of State say that the guarantee is being met when she has just heard that 1,000 young people in Hampshire have no training places? A similar survey in Fife also found a large shortfall. Is not the reason that the right hon. Lady's budget for this year is £3.5 billion, when, in 1987, in real terms, it was £5.1 billion? In other words, the Secretary of State has only two thirds of the amount that was available in 1987, but unemployment is roughly at the same level. Is not the right hon. Lady abdicating her responsibilities to those who are unemployed and seeking training?
Mrs. Shephard : Unlike the hon. Gentleman, we welcome the fact that more young people are staying on at school. That results, perforce, in fewer young people coming forward for a training place. As I said, some TECs have found it difficult this year to find employer placements. There is of course always a surge of demand when young people make up their minds to choose youth
Column 129
training in the autumn. I repeat that there need be no problem of inadequate resources preventing TECs and LECs from meeting the guarantee.Mr. Heald : Does my right hon. Friend agree that training and enterprise councils can play a special role in cases where there are large redundancies by co-ordinating task forces--as they have done in Hertfordshire and in my constituency in north Hertfordshire?
Mrs. Shephard : Yes. Hertfordshire TEC has played a key role in helping with British Aerospace redundancies, and I was delighted by the positive and strong response made by TECs in preparing plans to cope with pit closures.
Mr. Tony Lloyd : How can the Secretary of State claim that TECs are happy with the settlement when last year, this year, and next year they received and will receive real-terms cuts in their budgets at a time when long-term unemployment and unemployment generally are continuing to rise?
How can the right hon. Lady tell the House that she is keeping to the guarantee when, by her own figures, she admits that 19,000 young people have not been found a youth training place? Will she undertake to re- examine the situation whereby many young people for whom the guarantee has not been honoured find themselves without any income? Will she talk to her friend at the Department of Social Security and suggest that those young people should once again receive some kind of benefit?
Mrs. Shephard : As the hon. Gentleman knows perfectly well, there is a special hardship allowance and bridging allowances for young people who are between YT places. Given that in the House on 20 November the hon. Gentleman wrongly claimed that 75,000 young people were waiting for a training place, I thought that he would welcome today's figures.
Mr. Sweeney : Does my right hon. Friend accept that Britain is unique in offering a guaranteed place on a training scheme for all 16 to 17 -year-olds?
Mrs. Shephard : Yes, I accept my hon. Friend's point. There is no question but that we have a better record in that respect than many of our European counterparts, including France.
Labour Statistics
5. Mr. Campbell-Savours : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if she will make a statement about employment levels in west Cumbria.
Mr. McLoughlin : The most up-to-date figures are available down to regional level and show that between March 1983 and June 1992 the civilian work force in employment in the northern region, which includes west Cumbria, increased by 67,000.
Mr. Campbell-Savours : Does not the Department of Trade and Industry's current national energy review, with all the talk about coal, important as that is, have major implications for employment in the nuclear industry in west Cumbria? What guarantee have we that the voice of the nuclear industry, as in the case advocated by the West Cumbria TEC, is being channelled into the Department of
Column 130
Employment and relayed on to the Department of Trade and Industry when decisions are taken on the regional assistance map?Mr. McLoughlin : I am sure that that case will be taken into account if the TECs feed it into the review currently being undertaken by the President of the Board of Trade. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman would like to feed that view to his Front-Bench colleagues.
Retraining
6. Mr. David Nicholson : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if she will make a statement on developments in the retraining of unemployed adults aged over 21 years.
Mrs. Gillian Shephard : On 12 November I announced training for work, a new programme for those aged 18 and over who have been unemployed for six months or more. It will start from April 1993 as part of a new range of measures that together will provide 500,000 more opportunities to help unemployed people back to work--resulting in 1.5 million available places.
Mr. Nicholson : I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply. The whole House will recognise the priority that the Government place on training for people of 16 and 17, and we welcome the remarks that my right hon. Friend made earlier today. However, is she aware that in our constituencies people are concerned about the plight of people over 18, and over 21, who face unemployment in this dreadful and prolonged recession? That concern is especially marked among those who have retired from work. Will my right hon. Friend redouble her efforts to provide retraining and suitable employment advice for the people whom I have mentioned, and make efforts to bring the below-average TECs up to the standard of the best? Will she also tell me what role she envisages for job clubs?
Mrs. Shephard : My hon. Friend may be reassured about the performance of TECs by the knowledge that a larger proportion of their funding will be output related. In other words, the money that they receive for training will be related to the output of jobs and qualifications. We now have a big package of measures which should meet the needs of all those who need to be retrained, reskilled and helped back into work, and we have a vastly increased number of places in job clubs, which have an excellent record in helping people back to work.
Mr. Olner : Can the Minister tell my constituents who have recently been made redundant from Rolls-Royce, Alvis and Clarkson Machine Tools--men who are at the pinnacle of their skills and experience in modern technology --what on earth she will offer them in the way of training?
Mrs. Shephard : The hon. Gentleman will know that the Government cannot create jobs. It is business, industry and commerce which create jobs. The role of the Government is to prepare the right framework for the recovery, to help people to get jobs, to prepare people for the jobs available and to help them keep in touch with the jobs market. Our new 1.5 million place programme is designed to do exactly that.
Sir Peter Emery : Although we see the importance of training, will my right hon. Friend make it absolutely clear
Column 131
that the proportion of the population in employment in the United Kingdom is far greater than the proportion in almost any other country in the European Community? That point should be underlined.Mrs. Shephard : I thank my hon. Friend. We have a higher participation rate of people in work than any other EC country except Denmark. That also applies to women in employment.
Mr. Dobson : The Opposition welcome the announcement by the Secretary of State today in so far as it acknowledges the abject failure of the existing schemes for people who are out of work. Will the right hon. Lady confirm that only one in five people who have been on employment training schemes have gone on to get a job, and that people who have not been on schemes have, therefore, stood a better chance of getting a job than those who have been on employment schemes? Surely the answer is not a host of schemes, but a Government who will come forward with a package that will provide jobs that people can get. People do not want training : they want work.
Mrs. Shephard : The hon. Gentleman should have listened to what I said. The funding for training and enterprise councils is to be output related--related to the outcome of training in terms of obtaining jobs and obtaining qualifications.
The hon. Gentleman's enthusiasm for employers is a little ill placed, given his remarks about them as recently as September. He said of employers :
"These people are stinking, lousy, thieving, incompetent scum." How much credibility does the hon. Gentleman have?
Mr. Bellingham : When my right hon. Friend is next in Norfolk, will she find time to visit the King's Lynn job club, which I recently opened? If she does, she will hear support for the way in which she has protected her Department's budget in real terms. She will also hear some people say that many firms tell them that if they are over 50, they are too old to apply for jobs. What advice would she give such people?
Mrs. Shephard : I know my hon. Friend's job club. He may know that last year, before I had any connection with my present
responsibilities, I visited that job club.
I should perhaps declare an interest in the question of people over 50. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State will announce later this week the membership of a working group that is designed to bring to employers' attention the qualities of people over 50 in the work force.
Unemployment, Barrow and Furness
7. Mr. Hutton : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what policies she intends to pursue to reduce unemployment in Barrow and Furness.
Mr. McLoughlin : The Employment Service and Cumbria TEC deliver a wide range of employment, enterprise and training programmes to help unemployed people in Barrow and Furness find the best and quickest route back to employment.
Mr. Hutton : Is the Minister aware that my constituency has experienced the biggest increase in unemployment of any constituency in the north of England over the past two
Column 132
years? Unemployment has doubled during that period. Unemployment now affects every family and every part of my constituency. Will the Minister give my constituents two assurances? First, will he increase the resources available to the Cumbria training and enterprise council this year, instead of imposing further cuts on it, so that young people especially can have access to quality training now that apprenticeships at VSEL have finished? Secondly, will he assure my constituents that he will place his Department at the front of a new and fresh initiative to secure jobs in my constituency by giving it assisted area status?Mr. McLoughlin : As the hon. Gentleman knows, assisted area status is a matter for the Department of Trade and Industry. I am sure that he has made representations to my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade.
We shall discuss with each TEC over the next few months the allocation of budgets. We shall, of course, want to look at the detail of what has happened in particular areas and at the training requirements that are necessary in each area.
Astra Training Services
9. Mr. Mullin : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment if she will make a statement on the value of contracts placed by training and enterprise councils with Astra Training Services.
Mr. McLoughlin : Contracts placed by training and enterprise councils are a matter for the councils individually, and the Department does not collect information on the amount of business that TECs place with individual training providers.
Mr. Mullin : Is the Minister aware that, since Astra was handed over, along with a large sum of public money, to a group of former civil servants, that company has reneged on its pension commitments and demanded from its employees on pain of dismissal salary cuts of 10 and 15 per cent., and that employees have recently been surprised to discover that they are now owned by a company called Schroeder Ventures? Is the Minister able to assure the House that that is not just the beginning of an asset-stripping operation and another privatisation scandal?
Mr. McLoughlin : The sale was conducted on a clean-break basis. It is not for Ministers to comment on what is happening in private companies.
Lady Olga Maitland : May I give a warm welcome to the initiatives that have been announced today to help 18-year-olds and others? However, is my hon. Friend aware that the information services--
Madam Speaker : Order. The question is specific to TECs with Astra Training Services. One has to keep to the question.
Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service
10. Mr. Riddick : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment whether she has any plans to privatise ACAS.
Column 133
Mr. Michael Forsyth : ACAS will continue as an independent statutory body charged with improving industrial relations, but, following representations from my hon. Friend and others, its duty to extend collective bargaining will be removed.
Mr. Riddick : As it is clearly inappropriate for Government bodies such as ACAS to promote collective bargaining in this day and age, may I congratulate my hon. Friend on the statement that he has just made? Is he aware that the Institute of Directors is advocating the full privatisation of ACAS? Is that not a first-class idea?
Mr. Forsyth : I was not aware of that fact and, no, I do not think that it is a first-class idea. My hon. Friend, having persuaded the Department to abandon the terms of reference which put a duty on ACAS to promote collective bargaining, should quit while he is ahead.
Mr. Eric Clarke : In the past, ACAS was very helpful in industrial disputes. Because it is being privatised, will there be a bonus system, a productivity agreement, or what? Will people who are liked be appointed, rather than people who can do the job? I fear that ACAS will become a Government-friendly society and will demonstrate the attitude that the Minister is demonstrating today.
Mr. Forsyth : I am not quite sure what is going on. I have just said to my hon. Friend the Member for Colne Valley (Mr. Riddick) that we would not be privatising ACAS. The hon. Gentleman has given the argument for privatising ACAS. If he had gone on for much longer I might have had second thoughts.
Youth Training
11. Mr. French : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the youth training scheme.
Mr. Michael Forsyth : More than three quarters of all young people who complete their YT training go into a job, further education or training. I am concerned, however, about the operation of the YT guarantee, and my right hon. Friend has taken steps to ensure that every training and enterprise council meets its obligations.
Mr. French : Is my hon. Friend completely satisfied that, in terms of monitoring and organising YT placements, there can no longer be any grounds for trainees to say that their time is not well used because they are required to make the tea or sweep the floor?
Mr. Forsyth : I am not entirely satisfied about any aspect of YT, but credit should be given to the extent to which the scheme is a considerable success. My hon. Friend will know that his own TEC--Gloucester TEC--is doing extremely well on the delivery of YT, with 90 per cent. of those involved getting a job in or at the end of their period of training. I agree with my hon. Friend that we have to continue to improve the monitoring of the YT scheme and to ensure that more of its output is related to its funding, which is precisely what my right hon. Friend has done since her appointment as Secretary of State.
Mr. Llwyd : Does the Minister accept that, dealing with the YT scheme in general, it is high time that the Government made funding available for young people to
Column 134
take job opportunities so that they are able to take full part in the scheme? In rural areas, they are paid insufficient to enable them to travel to take up YT.Yesterday I was discussing this very subject with various people in north Wales. The main impediment to the take-up of YT schemes unfortunately is that very matter. Will the Government rethink?
Mr. Forsyth : The hon. Gentleman is making a serious point which is worthy of consideration. There are problems in rural areas. One effect of the flexibility to which my right hon. Friend was able to get agreement, and which will apply to TECs under the new proposals, is that there will be more scope to tackle the difficulties which the hon. Gentleman has identified.
Labour Statistics
12. Mr. Robathan : To ask the Secretary of State for Employment when she last met training and enterprise council chairmen to discuss progress on young people's unemployment.
Mr. McLoughlin : My right hon. Friend meets TEC chairmen frequently to discuss with them the arrangements they are making to meet the vocational education, training and employment needs of young people.
Mr. Robathan : I understand from speaking to TECs that one problem is finding work placement schemes for people in YT. What measures is my hon. Friend taking to encourage employers to take people into work placement schemes?
Mr. McLoughlin : I am grateful to my hon. Friend. We have initiated a variety of schemes which we have asked TECs to pursue. Since my right hon. Friend has occupied her present position she has made abundantly clear to TECs the importance that she places on their meeting the youth training guarantee. I notice that the hon. Member for Stretford (Mr. Lloyd) has not withdrawn the remarks he made on 20 November, reported at column. 568 of Hansard, but the figures are nowhere near those about which the Opposition have been scaremongering.
Miss Lestor : Would the hon. Gentleman perhaps like notice of what I hope to raise shortly when I come to see him or a member of his Department? In an area like Salford, an area of long-term unemployment, we do not have the industry that can offer people YT places ; the places that were being offered have been withdrawn either because the firms have gone out of existence or have stopped taking in people. In that respect, many of the young people in my constituency expect to join their fathers and become long-term unemployed. That is disastrous for all of them.
| Next Section
| Home Page |