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Mr. Paul Tyler (North Cornwall): What about Donaldson?
Mr. Norris: The hon. Gentleman who speaks for the Liberal Democrats is far too intelligent to fail to appreciate that the Donaldson report considered all matters relating to vessels' safety and the prevention of pollution from merchant shipping following the Braer disaster. It was not, as he well knows, an inquiry into the accident itself.
Until the MAIB report and Professor Edwards' assessment--Professor Edwards will report to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales--have been completed and their recommendations considered, it would be inappropriate to suggest that there is a need to
re-examine or amplify any of Lord Donaldson's recommendations. We have made it clear that we respect the conclusions of Lord Donaldson's report--
It being Two o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.
sitting suspended, pursuant to Standing Order No. 10 (Wednesday sittings), till half-past Two o'clock.
EDUCATION AND EMPLOYMENT
Access to Work
1. Mrs. Helen Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if unemployed people will be required to make a personal contribution to support given under access to work. [25078]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Mr. James Paice): Unemployed people will not be required to make a contribution to approved support under access to work.
Mrs. Jackson: I wish slightly to extend my question so that the Minister can tell us whether the Government's U-turn on increasing the budget for access to work so that individuals in work can also benefit is a result, in his view, of impressive campaigning for restoration by disabled people throughout the country in work and out of work.
One of my constituents is Julie Smethurst, a self-employed Braillist. Will the Minister take the opportunity to clarify whether she, as a self-employed worker, will be able to benefit from restoration for the maintenance of her essential equipment, which enables her to stay in work?
Mr. Paice:
The hon. Lady obviously has not studied what has already been going on, or she would not have been so nonplussed by my main answer. We have studied what took place in access to work and the increasing demands that were being made on it last year. That is why the Government made available a 50 per cent. increase for access to work's budget this year. That is a clear demonstration of the Government's understanding of the importance of access to work for disabled people.
The hon. Lady should know that self-employed people will be eligible again for access to work as from 1 June. My noble Friend the Minister of State, who deals specifically with these matters in the Department, is reviewing precisely the terms of assistance for self-employed people under access to work, but I can confirm that they will be eligible.
Mr. David Nicholson:
The earlier exchange that my hon. Friend had with the hon. Lady is the best example that I can remember in recent years of a typical Labour party smear falling, as it were, at the first fence. Will my hon. Friend continue his efforts to improve all the resources and services that are available to unemployed people, whatever their age? Will he contrast this country's record in reducing the number of unemployed of all ages with the records of countries that until recently were governed by socialist Governments, such as France and Spain?
Mr. Paice:
I am not even sure that the hon. Lady's question reached the first fence, but the idea of a smear jumping a fence leaves me somewhat perturbed. It is more likely that it slipped over before it started.
My hon. Friend is entirely right to draw careful attention to the Government's success in reducing unemployment for all people, be they disabled or otherwise. Through access to work and the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, the Government have put in place important measures to help disabled people, but he is also right to identify the fact that jobs are created by successful businesses. The countries to which he has drawn attention, such as France, have prevented their businesses from being successful and from creating jobs because they have burdened them with the minimum wage, the social chapter and various other burdens on employers, which act against the interests of all people, disabled or otherwise.
Mr. Llwyd:
I welcome the access to work budget increase, but has the Minister considered the effect of employer contributions on smaller firms? Surely it is not right that multinationals and small firms employing typically fewer than 20 people should pay the same amount of contributions. Will he consider targeting the scheme slightly better and enabling smaller firms to take on more disabled people?
Mr. Paice:
Eighty-four per cent. of disabled people are employed in firms of more than 20 employees--more than the number employed in firms of fewer than 20 employees, which are exempted from the Disability Discrimination Act. It is not possible specifically to target help at smaller firms, because the legislation says that access to work is assistance to the individual, not to the firm. Therefore, in terms of the size of firms, we are prevented from discriminating in targeting the scheme.
2. Mr. Waterson:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what assessment she has made of the prospects for youth unemployment in (a) the United Kingdom and (b) other EU countries. [25079]
The Minister of State, Department for Education and Employment (Mr. Eric Forth):
Unemployment among young people in the United Kingdom is well below the European Union average. The prospects for our young people are good, so long as we do not destroy jobs by a national minimum wage or other unnecessary and damaging regulations.
Mr. Waterson:
Will my hon. Friend confirm that, in this country, unemployment among the under-25s is some 5 per cent. below the European average and roughly half that in France? Is he aware of the Employment Policy Institute's view that a national minimum wage would destroy job prospects, especially among small firms? Would a minimum wage not be a gross betrayal of our young people?
Mr. Forth:
It must now be the case that the Labour party is the last organisation in this country not to recognise the folly of a statutory national minimum wage. Everyone else has--the expert institute that my hon. Friend has mentioned, and, more significantly, the electorate and especially young people. All of them realise that countries that have statutory national minimum wages have extraordinarily high youth unemployment and,
Mr. Byers:
Will the Minister confirm that, as a percentage of total unemployment, in 1995 youth unemployment in the United Kingdom stood at 28.8 per cent., twice that in Germany and lower than that in only three other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries in the European Union? In the light of that, will he concede that this is an issue not of the minimum wage but of the opportunities that we give to our young people? When will the Government invest in young people's future by providing a high-quality training programme to give them the skills that they need, or are the Government prepared simply to stand to one side and see a whole generation be the innocent victims of their failed economic and social policies?
Mr. Forth:
I readily pay tribute to the hon. Gentleman's ever more ingenious use of statistics and figures. He has excelled himself today by digging up a convoluted and obscure figure which means nothing to anyone. Let me give him a straightforward fact that will demonstrate that he is on the wrong track. The latest figures available show that, six months after leaving training, 71 per cent. of young people completing youth training in England and Wales were in a job. That demonstrates the effectiveness of what we are doing as well as anything else could.
Mr. Garnier:
If my hon. Friend wants evidence to support the facts that he has announced, will he come to my constituency, where he will find that the unemployment level is 1,750, out of an electorate of more than 79,000, and that schools are actively engaged in making links with industry and industry is actively engaged in making links with schools to produce the courses, both at apprenticeship and in schools, that benefit the employment sector? Will he further invite the hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers), who asked that fatuous question, to have a look for himself at what is going on in the real world?
Mr. Forth:
I am delighted by my hon. and learned Friend's typically positive approach. It typifies the Conservative party's recognition of real success at local level, with different institutions working together to achieve positive results. I doubt very much whether Opposition Members are sufficiently interested or motivated to go to observe a success story for themselves, but I hope that my hon. and learned Friend will have more luck in persuading Opposition Front Benchers of the success to which he referred than I seem to be having.
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