Examination of Witness (Questions 200
- 218)
TUESDAY 23 MAY 2000
RT HON
DAVID BLUNKETT,
MP
200. So if it is that important, which PSA targets
do you think relate to the skills targets?
(Mr Blunkett) When we work those out with the discussions
on the spending review from July, we shall be able to publish
them. People will then be aware of what we are setting in terms
of the development of the new learning and skills council programme,
including the actual direction.
201. So there are no targets at the moment?
(Mr Blunkett) We have a range of targets which were
established by NIESR, obviously with information and data from
Government, but they were established with business in terms of
targets for achievement of intermediate and advanced-level skills.
Those targets are still being worked on at this moment in time,
but the resources devoted to them will make a difference to their
achievement. However, unlike the schools or early-years sector,
we do not have direct control over the resources which are being
applied by businesses themselves, although businesses are rightly
seeking a substantial say over the six billion resources which
from 2002 we shall be devoting to skills education.
202. Can I come in on that?
(Mr Blunkett) Yes, I just wanted to finished my answer.
203. In fact, you have some control, because
you seem to have borne down on franchising in the FE sector, to
such an extent that the number actually completing FE courses
is probably half a million less over the last three years than
if you had sustained the number going into FE at the level you
inherited. Does that not worry you, at a time when the number
of vacancies in the economy is at an all-time high?
(Mr Blunkett) It is possibly 200,000 less.
204. Full-time equivalent.
(Mr Blunkett) And no, it does not worry me, because
weeding out two-hour courses provided by a franchisee 50 miles
away, on a subject area and on a discipline of no relevance whatsoever
to the economic prosperity of that locality, did not achieve a
bridging of the skills gap; and weeding out that lack of quality
and those spurious franchising deals is something that I am proud
of and not something to apologise for.
Mr St Aubyn: I do not think we would dispute
that.
Chairman: We need to move on, because time is
getting very short.
Dr Harris
205. There has been a lot of stress on reducing
class size. That has brought to light issues to do with teacher
supply, which relate to that. How worried are you about teacher
supply in, for example, the sciences and maths?
(Mr Blunkett) I am worried enough to have invested
the substantial sums from the March Budget in the new programme
of £6,000 training salaries for postgraduate trainees, the
additional top-up new-style golden hellos to make £10,000
for those shortage subjects, including science, and of course
the £13,000 payment per trainee to schools offering employment-based
routes, which I think is a very imaginative and effective programme.
There has already been a substantial uplift over the last six
weeks, in comparison with the six weeks this time last year, of
over a fifth in terms of applications, which is very encouraging.
206. If that works, do you wish you had done
it a year or even two years earlier, because it is an admission
that the previous policies had not worked in a significant way?
(Mr Blunkett) There has been a graph from 1992/93
onwards of just making targets in the primary and failing substantially
to meet targets in secondary recruitment. If I had the resources
and I had been in a position to do so, would I have liked to have
done it earlier? The answer is yes.
207. So sticking to those spending plans famously,
perhaps infamously, may have stored up problems for the future,
for the future supply of teachers, is that what you are saying?
(Mr Blunkett) No, I am not, because each individual
element that this Committee, myself and Ministers would like to
spend on would have had to have been weighed against each other.
Clearly, if you take a view that at any moment in time you would
like to have done everything possible, you would have done absolutely
nothing; in other words, you can only get so much even out of
£1 billion extra.
Judy Mallaber
208. May I ask about the Objective 3 PSA targets
on helping people without a job into work. Specifically, I would
like to ask you how you interpret the achievements on those targets.
Are they showing that the Employment Service has been performing
well, or were the targets too easy, or is it just that there is
a healthy job market, or is there some other factor which we should
take into account in why there is success in achieving those targets?
(Mr Blunkett) I do not think we should make the mistake
that people make on A Level and GCSE reports that every time you
do well there must be something amiss. I think that actually achieving
targets at a time when 920,000 additional men and women are in
a job, and when we have claimant unemployment down to levels of
January 1980, is something to be really proud of and is successful.
I think the change in the operation of the Employment Service,
including the operation of the various New Deal programmes, has
been very effective. I think that the change in culture and attitude
has been effective. We still think there is more that can be done,
which is why we are transferring resources for work-based learning
to the Employment Service from next April, so that as with the
New Deal programmes for 18 to 24, we can link skills and training.
We are looking very closely, as Members will be aware, at how
we can link into employers with induction and training, so that
there can be specific programmes linked to a particular sector
or company, rather than simply training people and hoping that
within the market they will be picked up.
209. Can I move on to asking about your relationship
with the Treasury, because clearly employment policy in getting
the unemployed back into work is one of the apples of their eye.
Can you tell us something about how that responsibility is shared,
and would it in any sense be fair to say that it is the Treasury
that decides what the target should be and makes the important
policy decisions?
(Mr Blunkett) No, it would not be fair to say that.
I am in constant negotiations with the Chief Secretary about what
is achievable, and that is understandable. Fortunately for me,
he understands these matters very well. The macro role of the
Treasury is crucial in terms of being able to achieve our employment
objectives. The ability of my department to deliver—and
it is our job to deliver both through the Employment Service and
through the development of the skills agenda—is made possible
by the role of the Treasury in terms of their overall macro policy,
not simply in terms of demand within the economy, but the changes
which are worked through with myself and with the Secretary of
State for Social Security on a more responsive and reflective
welfare state and benefits system, which is why the amalgamation
of the Employment Service and the Benefits Agency is a sensible
and natural process which in retrospect probably ought to have
been done years ago, but where the computer facilities probably
would not have been up to it.
Mr O'Brien
210. Following on the previous line of questioning,
if one looks at the New Deal, and particularly with the youth
unemployment, certainly on the statistics which appear to have
been accepted and published between April 1993 and May 1997 when
long-term youth unemployment was falling at the rate of 5,000
a month and is now only at 2,700 a month, and now, even on the
Government's own figures where the figures variously range in
terms of the spend to date on New Deal for young unemployed people
between £750,000 and £1 billion, could you give some
indication of your understanding of the number who have actually
moved into new jobs, those who would have got jobs anyway and
those who stay in those jobs beyond the first 13 weeks, so that
we can actually get a real readout of sustainable employment?
(Mr Blunkett) Fortunately I have checked what you
asked the Permanent Secretary last week. I am able to assure the
Committee that in the just over two years the New Deal programmes
have been up and running, for the New Deal employment there has
been a 70 per cent drop compared with a 52 per cent drop for the
equivalent period prior to that, so there has been a substantial
improvement in terms of that cohort. I am particularly proud of
that, because we are dealing with a difficult cohort under the
New Deal programmes and those who have been unemployed for a substantial
period of time, and we are dealing with an increasingly challenging
group within that cohort, because the greater the propensity to
get people into jobs, the easier it is to get those jobs for those
who have already got skills or are able to present themselves
well, therefore the greater the challenge for those who remain.
But yes, we are pleased. The figures will be brought out this
Thursday or possibly next Thursday on the next monthly cohort.
Under the last monthly cohort we got just under 2,000 or 3,000
18 to 24 year olds into work, three-quarters of them in sustained
jobs, and on the NIESR analysis—which you will be familiar
with—which was only for the first period of the full New
Deal programme in its 1998/99 run, there was an analysis that
at least 40 to 50 per cent of those who got jobs would actually
not have found themselves in work had it not been for the New
Deal programmes. I think in any comparator with previous schemes—and
this is not a job scheme, it is a preparation for employability—those
figures are very good.
211. If I can follow that up briefly, Chairman,
it seems to be easy to bandy about figures, so I shall try to
avoid that. It does seem, though, that if you take into account
the number who would have got jobs anyway or, as you put it, those
who would not have got jobs anyway, that is a proportion of the
overall number, so what assessment have you made of the training
and education option for those who did not get a sustainable job?
I am very mindful of the number who are not sustaining their job
beyond the first 13 weeks.
(Mr Blunkett) I think it is a very fair question.
We are having a look at what happens to those on the education
and training full-time option when they subsequently continue
education and come out at the other end. In other words, the analysis
of the figures at the moment is inadequate, and I do not think
we make any bones about this. My colleague, the Employment and
Equal Opportunities Minister, was, I think, giving separate evidence
on a separate day last week and may well have referred to this
fact that we need to refine the statistics so that we actually
find out when someone has got the first part of qualifications
under their belt and they go on, because of that opportunity,
to take a qualification which requires a second or subsequent
year, whether that has actually assisted them directly to get
a job which is relevant to, and can therefore be assigned to,
having taken that particular qualification. We have not got those
statistics yet, and when we have I think we shall have a much
better idea as to whether the full-time education option has been
more successful than would apparently be the case at the moment.
Judy Mallaber
212. You have referred to the fact that we are
now trying to deal with those young unemployed people who are
the hardest to place, and we have had some comments from the Employment
Minister, in giving evidence on seeking to tackle the problems
of numeracy and literacy in that group. How optimistic would you
be that we can tackle that seriously, once they have got to that
stage in their development without those skills? What would you
see as the key things which we need to be doing to tackle that
within the New Deal programme?
(Mr Blunkett) I am optimistic, but I think that the
delivery of those basic skills needs to be seen in the context
of the very substantial number of those young people who have
other challenges, and therefore we need to ensure that in providing
rehabilitation support services we take co-ordinated action rather
than simply saying, "We'd like you to take a numeracy course",
important as that is. I also think that looking into competence
with information and communication technology can help, partly
because young people in particular are interested in learning
and are turned on by, are enthused by, engaging with ICT, partly
because obviously you can then develop the kind of software programs
which are being so successful in reading recovery and in numeracy
recovery in schools. In other words, we can apply to adults the
lessons that we are learning in terms of integrated learning systems.
Valerie Davey
213. I think every fair person must say that
New Deal is a good news story, especially for those young people
and now older ones who are now finding employment again. Can I
come back to your relationship, though, over another PSA agreement
with the Treasury? Is there a good news story for you when you
go back to the Treasury for the next spending review? Are you
told, "Right, here are higher targets", and if you have
not achieved the target you have got less money? How does it work
when it is now put on the table in front of the Treasury?
(Mr Blunkett) I need to be very careful how I answer
your question. We establish targets in our department with the
partners who have the responsibility for delivering them. We indicate
what can be achieved with a given resource. We then talk through
with colleagues whether that is robust, and we have the normal
discussions about the robustness of our expectations within that
given sum of money, given the historic delivery, what has been
managed in other areas, what comparators we can use elsewhere.
So they are, and have been, our targets. Fortunately, we have
done a lot of work in the past on what could be expected within
the system, and we have stretched very hard those who are our
partners in delivering them, whether it is in schools or whether
it is in the Employment Service, in delivering on the ground.
214. The implication, however, is that you reward
those who clearly are doing well, but in education terms there
is a problem there, because those who do not achieve or do not
necessarily do so well have traditionally been those who have
received most money. There is a conundrum here which I do not
understand for the now very clearly defined PSA and targets which
you yourself are setting and also the Treasury.
(Mr Blunkett) There is an interesting debate about
whether you set PSA targets, whether you lay down objectives and
maybe floor targets and then you simply leave people to get on
with it. We have adopted the notion of intervention in inverse
proportion to success. We have, as you know, been accused of being
very hands-on and centralist. I think that is necessary and at
the moment remains necessary in order to provide greater equality
of opportunity, to ensure best practice is spread and used and
that we do not simply allow those who are failing within the system
to continue failing those who rely upon them, given that whether
it is children in school or whether it is unemployed people attending
a job centre, they have no control mechanisms over the failure
of those who are delivering. We do, and we are now using them.
The difficulty of governments in the past, of all persuasions,
was that they pronounced, they appealed, but they had no mechanisms—certainly
from the previous Department of Education and Science and the
Department of Employment—actually to ensure that there was
a delivery mechanism. From the 1998 Act and from the changes in
the Employment Service and New Deal, we have put those in place.
Inevitably, that brings cries from people who believe that we
are being too hands on. I hope that we will reach a position before
very long where the changes are effective and where the system
is working well for all those who rely on it.
Valerie Davey: Thank you. I hope the Treasury
thinks so too.
Chairman: Very quickly, Secretary of State,
perhaps we could move on to a couple of questions on red tape
in schools.
Mr Sheerman
215. There is no doubt that if spending is going
to be effective, it has got to be effective at the chalkface,
in the school, where the education is delivered. In this Committee
we hear, as we go round the country, two complaints. One is about
red tape, and it is certainly borne out by Lord Haskins' suggestions
and inquiry. The other is that there is an initiative fatigue
there. Indeed, an impeccable source over the weekend seems to
have said that "sometimes it looked as though the Government
strategy was just one damned initiative after another". At
the chalkface it does seem sometimes that the communications system
is overloaded, so that even though there is a desire for Government
to make things happen at the chalkface, it is communicated in
not quite the form that makes the people on the ground feel highly
motivated—in other words, they get demotivated because they
are getting a mixed message or the wrong message. Is there anything
your Department could rapidly do to clear up that lack of communications
which Lord Haskins put his finger on?
(Mr Blunkett) If there is perceived to be a problem,
then there is a problem, therefore we should address it, and we
will. The working party that was established with the involvement
of the teacher unions went part way to addressing the issue of
bureaucracy, but not the whole way. The issue of communications
was a point well made by Chris Haskins and those who were working
with him. Incidentally, there were nine head teachers, I think,
on the group, so it is not surprising that their views were fairly
predominant. I accept the thrust of what was being said. Not only
do I accept it, we were actually working on it and working alongside
the investigation material which they were drawing on. So I will
take action in these areas. I do not accept the point about the
"initiative-itis", although I do plead guilty to having
asked those in the system, throughout the Education Service, to
do an enormous amount in a very short period of time. The youngsters
do not have another round, they will not come round again in the
schools system, so we have to move as fast as we can. All I can
tell you is that these initiatives that people complain about
are enormously popular, people are scrabbling to get them; they
want Excellence in Cities, which I have not heard anybody criticise
yet, although I am sure that there are Members who will get round
to it eventually. I have far more schools than we can cope with
wanting specialist school status, working with their neighbouring
schools in the community, far more wanting to work on the Beacon
School initiative than we can cope with, far more schools wanting
mini education action zones as part of the development of their
programme of co-operation, and a tremendous enthusiasm, both from
pupils and teachers, for the literacy and numeracy programmes.
Therefore, when we get down to identifying which initiatives it
is that they like and dislike, there seems to be a great enthusiasm
for taking up the plethora of initiatives enthusiastically,
Chairman
216. Finally, a very brief question from Nick
St Aubyn.
(Mr Blunkett) You are not going to criticise Excellence
in Cities?
Mr St Aubyn
217. There are some things we do agree on, Secretary
of State, including the value of small class sizes in the early
years, but according to a recent letter received from your Department[1],
it would appear that you are now claiming that the full costs
of funding the early years infant class pledge is to be funded
by the savings from the assisted places scheme—not just
the marginal cost of the assisted places scheme, but the full
cost. Do you think it is a price worth paying to have smaller
class sizes in the first three years, when we are now seeing larger
class sizes in secondary schools, partly because children who
would have been on assisted places are being absorbed into those
schools, and according to this analysis there is no extra funding
for extra teachers to provide for them?
(Mr Blunkett) Of course, in answering the last part
of your question I was working on the presumption of the previous
Secretary of State, Ken Clarke, who made it absolutely clear that
the marginal cost of absorbing a particular pupil into a particular
class was so small that it could not be taken account of by Treasury
allocations.
218. If you let the class size rise.
(Mr Blunkett) We have not been letting the class size
rise. Firstly, the assisted places scheme—and this was a
clear manifesto proposal—has assisted very substantially
in enabling us in the medium and long term to be able to sustain
those lower class sizes which are effectively being put in place.
Secondly, clearly there has not been shown to be a knock-on in
Key Stage 2 for the 8 to 11 year olds which people said there
would be, because we have seen for the first time in ten years
an adjustment downwards in both class size and PTR. Thirdly, the
amount that was allocated to secondary schools from this year's
Budget alone, as part of the major uplift of over 8 per cent in
real terms, would have allowed secondary schools to employ an
extra 3,500 teachers. We are not pressing secondary schools to
spend the money on additional teachers; we are giving them flexibility
to make choices about how best to address the standards agenda.
If we did, however, if we were centralist enough to determine
a class size pledge for secondary, we could cut the pupil teacher
ratio in secondary schools by 0.4 now, from this September, thereby
reversing that decade of year-on-year increase.
Chairman: It is now 10.45. We must keep faith
with the Secretary of State. Can I thank you, David, on behalf
of us all, for giving us this time. We have only scratched the
surface of the subjects we wanted to explore with you, but it
has been a very productive session, if I may say so. Thank you
very much indeed.
1 See HC 502-i, p29. Back
|
