Examination of Witnesses (Questions 660
- 678)
WEDNESDAY 29 MARCH 2000
RT HON
ESTELLE MORRIS
AND BARONESS
BLACKSTONE
Chairman
660. Surely, it is not the planning process,
it is the money and it is your Department that has the money?
(Estelle Morris) In that case I am not that content
that we are getting the money out quickly enough. The point I
meant by the planning process was not so much the city councils'
planning departments but if a council says to us, "We have
got more people. Can we have a new school?" we do not say
yes immediately, we have to publish proposals, we have to consult,
we have to receive objections, we have to look at how it can be
financed, we have to look at value for money. There is a right
and proper process but I am conscious it is a bit lengthy.
Dr Ladyman
661. If they manage to cut through all that
and get the school built, if it is only at quarter capacity because
the rest of the housing estate is not occupied yet, the per capita
funding of pupils means the school does not have enough money.
Is there some way of cutting through the planning and some way
of your Department forward funding the school?
(Estelle Morris) We would not want to commit our Department
to funding for children who were not there but there is flexibility
within the local authority SSA of 20 per cent where they could
take that decision to make life easier for the children, but I
assume they do not employ the extra staff until they have got
the numbers of pupils.
662. One of the other tranches of the Urban
Task Force discussed was cross-disciplinary training in higher
education in order to get professionals different to what the
previous witnesses called "silos" so they are not all
blinkered in one department. Have you any views on how we should
do that?
(Baroness Blackstone) In general, universities need
to be much more aware than perhaps they were one or two years
ago of their local environment and their local communities and
they certainly have a very important role to play, I believe,
in urban regeneration. As far as the training that they get we
have to accept that most academic staff have to be specialists
because they have a particular discipline where they teach and
where they do research. I have no strong views one way or another
about that particular recommendation. It would be very much a
matter for universities to have a look at and I hope they will
look at it and see what they can do.
663. Do you see any prospect of introducing
into the National Curriculum Task Force ideas, things like urban
design and those type of things to be built in?
(Baroness Blackstone) The National Curriculum applies
to young children up to the age of 16. It does not apply to post-16
education and training. I will have to hand that one back to Estelle,
the Minister responsible for schools and I will take over for
when they become 16.
(Estelle Morris) Very joined-up thinking! One of the
pressures we have on us is that every time someone produces a
report they demand something extra be put in the National Curriculum
and talking about new initiatives and making life difficult for
teachers the worst thing we would want to do is that. In terms
of geography and the humanities curriculum we could look to see
where those openings are. We are trying to look at the Department
being less prescriptive, not more, about the National Curriculum
and indeed we have introduced more flexibility at key stage 4.
664. What about the regional resource centres?
I do not know which side of the fence this comes in in joined-up
government terms.
(Baroness Blackstone) Again I think the RDAs are very
important in this particular area. I think there is scope for
looking at regional resource centres perhaps in association with
RDAs in so far as they are concerned with economic development.
It is also the case that there is much more interaction now in
higher education between higher education institutions in a particular
region. There was a time when they really did operate as single
autonomous institutions with not a lot of contact with other institutions
in their own areas. That is really changing now. They meet as
a group and look at the particular needs of the region where they
are located, and also there is also much more cross discussion
between further education colleges and universities within particular
regions.
Mr Stevenson
665. Schools and higher and further education
establishments are seen as a community resource really, which
is right and proper, but is the reality not that a lot of that
resource is not used outside of school hours particularly in urban
areas? A) would you accept that as a proposition and B) what do
you think ought to be done to bring into use those facilities
for the communities outside of the formal hours?
(Baroness Blackstone) I am very very strongly in favour
of this happening. We have to, of course, take into account that
there has been a very big change in the composition of the student
body in both further education colleges and in universities and
higher education institutions because we have moved from a situation
where the vast majority were full-time students 16 to 19 year
olds in FE, 18 to 22 year olds approximately in universities to
a situation where half our students in universities are now mature
students and around a third of them study part time. This means
that universities have opened up teaching in the evenings and
at the weekends in a way they did not do 20 years ago. Similarly,
there has been an enormous expansion in opportunities for adult
learning, lifelong learning in our FE colleges which again means
they cannot shut up shop at half past five in the evening, they
use the facilities until quite late. I would like to see even
more of that. I would like to see more opportunities at the weekends
for people to come in and study. Again with the use of things
like PCs, computers that is all happening. That does not mean
to say there is not scope for—
666. I can understand that. I was thinking more
in terms of leisure and recreational activities. I suspect there
is not a Member round this table or any ten councillors you would
wish to speak to who does not get criticism from constituents
that there are no leisure facilities and yet you can look up the
street and see tennis courts, netball facilities, football pitches
not used, which is an important issue and one identified by the
Task Force. It is in that context as well as the others that I
think I would direct my question.
(Estelle Morris) I could draw attention to a number
of initiatives where we want to do that because I think you are
right. The reason it is not is simple things like caretaking costs,
lighting and heating costs of schools, and they simply have not
felt they can afford to stay open or they have to charge costs
which makes it difficult for local people. There are ways in which
we are trying to move towards that. In the Specialist Schools
programme you will be aware we developed a community aspect and
resourced that accordingly. Now every single specialist school
in the country has to have a programme for working with the community
and working with neighbouring schools. We have got, I think, just
below or just above 100 sports specialists schools so in those
schools facilities will be open to the community. One more initiative
where that has been a prerequisite is in the inner city learning
centres (which are part of the Excellence in Cities programmes)
which are attached to schools where a prime requirement is that
they are open 15 hours a day for the wider community. When we
put extra money into developing new initiatives we try to build
in the fact that schools should be open.
667. In terms of education development plans,
which presumably are preoccupied with educational issues, and
also other plans that local authorities develop, are you satisfied
that there is the necessary joined-up thinking between those different
elements of a local authority on this issue of how we bring into
more effective use these enormous facilities that are available
throughout the country in schools and further education colleges
which at the moment are being either under-utilised outside of
schools hours or not utilised at all? Are you satisfied that there
is strategic thinking both at local and national level?
(Estelle Morris) No, probably not. I think it could
be done better and I know the Government is working as an interdepartmental
committee to look at those initiatives. Some things are quite
simple, things like boundaries do not match up and different bits
of local authorities and government do not even talk to each other
about that. There is the potential to use facilities in the way
you have outlined if we can get some joined-up thinking. There
is an awful lot of planning required of local authorities and
I would like to think we had some rationalisation of that so that
we could co-ordinate that better.
(Baroness Blackstone) Can I add a word on the post-16
side of all this. Clearly there is provision here that probably
could be opened up and greater community use made of it. We have
set up and established local learning partnerships and they involve
all the different players in this including local authorities
who (apart from sixth forms) are not responsible for post-16 provision
with the exception of some adult and community learning. I think
there is scope for those partnerships to look at this issue and
certainly this is something I would like to take back and see
if we can encourage them to take it on board.
Chairman
668. I think we were warned you wanted to go
at 12 o'clock. I hope we can pinch five minutes of your time.
(Estelle Morris) I am happy with five minutes.
Mr Stevenson
669. I have one question and I shall be fairly
quick. It has been suggested that many areas particularly in the
Midlands and North have been successful in attracting students,
I often feel the education students, but perhaps also evidence
suggests that they are not very good at retaining them in many
ways. What do you think ought to be done to make it more attractive
for the economically successfully or newly qualified to make their
future and to stay in the Midlands and North rather than migrating
elsewhere?
(Baroness Blackstone) Of course in the end students
when they graduate will make their decisions in terms of where
they see the economic advantage, where they see the jobs that
are going to be fulfilling and going to provide them with a good
career, but I do think it is important that universities have
more contact with local employers both in the public sector and
the private sector and that is something we have been encouraging
and it is something that is taking place. We are also looking
at trying to improve work experience for young people while they
are studying so that they combine their study as full-time students
with some work experience which in most cases ought to be in a
company, in a firm, in a public sector employer in the area where
the university is located. If that experience is a good one, some
of those young people may well stay on. I think it is that kind
of scheme. We are developing what we call graduate apprenticeships
which are being piloted at the moment. We will develop them further
and that again should to help.
670. What sort of timescale are you talking
about?
(Baroness Blackstone) We have been piloting them over
the last two years. Next year we will expand them.
Mr Forsythe
671. Minister, there will be many fewer Skills
Councils than Training and Education Councils. You tell us that
they will be responsive to local needs but will they not be too
large and remote to do that?
(Baroness Blackstone) I did not quite catch that.
The local Skills Councils? We do not believe they will be. What
we have done is look at travel-to-work type and look at the economic
area of these particular communities to see whether it is cohesive
and coherent and makes sense. Having 47 of them in England I think
means that they are about the right size. They cannot be too small
given that they are, after all, trying to relate to local economies,
and not tiny micro local economies. So of course the proof will
be in the pudding. The second reading of the Bill to set them
up is in the House of Commons tomorrow. We will certainly want
to monitor them from this point of view but we think 47 is about
the right number.
672. There has been criticism that they will
be more centrally controlled than the TECs. Do you not think they
would have less flexibility than the TECs?
(Baroness Blackstone) We do not think so. The TECs—there
were 72 of them—tended, I think, to create a pattern of
provision which was very often difficult for users to get a grip
on. Some users had to relate to perhaps three or four different
TECs all with rather different kinds of systems, all with slightly
different cost arrangements in terms of charging. I think that
having a more coherent system which covers both college-based
learning and work-based learning will be a very big improvement,
and there will be local flexibility. Between 10 and 15 per cent
of their funding will be available for the Learning Skills Councils
to spend as they think fit for their particular local needs. So
I do not believe it will be too top down, but I do think it will
be much more coherent than it has been in the past.
673. If the Regional Development Agencies are
responsible for improving the economic competitiveness—and
skills are, of course, crucial for this—should the RDAs
be responsible for skills, and will there by co-operation between
the Regional Development Agencies and the Skills Councils?
(Baroness Blackstone) No, the RDAs are not responsible
for delivering education and training, but there will be a lot
of contact and co-operation between the National Skills Councils,
the Learning Skills Councils and the local ones. The RDAs' role
here, I think, is to provide information, both nationally and
locally, about what the particular needs are in a region, in the
context of their proposals and plans for economic development.
Chairman
674. Basically, you did not trust the RDAs,
did you, otherwise you could have given the RDAs the skills training
function, but you did not trust them?
(Baroness Blackstone) The RDAs were set up basically
to provide for improvements in the economic development of the
regions, they were never set up as education and training providers.
It is not a matter of trust, it is a matter of what they were
set up to do. Also I think the criticism which Mr Forsythe was
perhaps implying when he thought that we might not have enough
LSEs locally would certainly apply here if you had handed more
of this task over to the RDAs, because they cover huge areas and
I do not really think they would have been able to have the kind
of relationship with local providers that is necessary.
675. So you do trust the Regional Development
Agencies?
(Baroness Blackstone) Of course, to do the job they
have been set up to do, but not to do a completely different job
for which I do not think they have been set up.
Miss Anne McIntosh
676. I wonder if I could ask Baroness Blackstone
this question. Clearly we are in an interim situation at the moment
where the TECs know that they are being wound down. I am particularly
concerned about the staff being demoralised this autumn when,
for the reasons Clifford has said, there are going to be fewer
people employed by them and they are all going to be chasing each
other's jobs. How do you propose to keep staff morale up in delivering
the programmes which have been promised to be delivered by the
TECs, until such time as the Learning Skills Councils come into
effect next year?
(Baroness Blackstone) We are very conscious of the
difficulties which this kind of structural change always poses
for people who are working in particular organisations which are
not going to survive.
677. We are talking about unemployment.
(Baroness Blackstone) That, of course, is true not
only of the TECs but also of the Further Education Funding Council
and the Further Education Funding Council's regional structure
too. We are determined that we will, as soon as the Bill has made
a little more progress, get ahead with making appointments, so
that people are not going to be left until the last minute unsure
what their future is going to be. I am not quite sure whether
you are right in implying that large numbers of people will lose
their jobs. The structure which we are setting up is a very big
and complex one; it is going to be disbursing £6 billion
of public money. I would suggest that the majority of people who
are currently employed in the two different strands—in the
TEC work-based strand on the one hand and the colleges/FSE structure
on the other—if they want to continue, are likely to be
able to get a job. Some of them may not want to. Some of them
may, of course, have problems in moving house or travelling further
than a short distance from their homes. The arrangements are now
in the process of being planned, to make sure that people are
well aware of what their job opportunities will be and are very
quickly given job offers once we have the new LSCs in place.
Chairman
678. Very briefly, as we only have a few seconds
left, can we talk about children playing? Can much more be done
to make cities attractive places for children to play in and enjoy
life?
(Estelle Morris) I think that children's
play is important both for leisure and for learning. I would hope
that, for instance, when we build more schools, when we refurbish
schools, play is part of school activity and the one thing which
we would take into account. I think it is very much part of the
early years' curriculum, if that was the point of that particular
question.
Chairman: I think we must leave it at that.
Thank you very much for your evidence.
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