Examination of Witnesses (Questions 500
- 503)
WEDNESDAY 22 MARCH 2000
THE RT
HON RICHARD
CABORN MP, THE
LORD SAINSBURY
OF TURVILLE,
MR DAVID
EVANS AND
MR PAUL
MCINTYRE
500. There is a hint in what you said of something
that might be very significant for urban areas. At the present
time the European Union rules for funding industry are percentages
of capital cost—30 per cent for tier 1 and 20 per cent for
tier 2—and the UK has traditionally introduced another internal
limit of £17,000 a job and £12,000 a job. Are you saying
the UK is going to drop those price-per-job guidelines and just
go by the European Union guidelines in the future?
(Mr Caborn) I am saying that that will be part of
the assessment of the RSA. Those assessments will be made at the
local level as to what the worth of those jobs are. In broad terms,
an RSA dispenses up to £1 million absolutely at the local
level; between £1 million and £2 million of RSA is referred
and decided on their recommendation and above £2 million
is decided at the national level through a board. Those boards
have been made. All we have said to those boards is we would like
them to review it, not just on the criteria of the number of jobs
but look at the quality of the jobs. If I can just say, in my
own area—and one has to be careful when you talk about call
centres—a call centre has just been developed in my constituency
in Sheffield. It is a Dixons call centre and it looks as if it
will have 2,000 jobs, 1,000 of which are going to be graduate
jobs. The reason they have actually located there is because they
have got a supply of graduates from the universities. So that
is a very different call centre, it is actually a knowledge centre
for the work as far as their products are concerned, which can
be totally different to another call centre. One has to be careful
when we broad-brush some—
Chairman
501. However, you have actually used the phrase
"more quality projects". So we would like to know which
are the projects that did not have that quality in the past.
(Mr Caborn) I think I have given you that example,
Mr Bennett. There are call centres and call centres. I think a
call centre of the Dixons type, which is going to employ 1,000
graduates, is slightly different to a call centre that is actually
for the clearance of insurance.
Mrs Dunwoody
502. That would depend on the terms of the people
working in the call centre. Dixons is a well-known anti-union
establishment.
(Mr Caborn) I was not asked to discuss labour relations,
I was discussing the investment policy.
503. You are telling us about the quality of
jobs. You are saying one call centre is different from another.
Certainly, but that depends on whether the people in that call
centre are treated in a particular way.
(Mr Caborn) I was talking about intellectual property,
not about employment rights.
Mrs Dunwoody: So they intellectually work long
hours but that will not have the same effect.
Chairman: I think we had better leave this at
this point. Can I thank you very much for your evidence.
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