Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80-99)
Department for Work & Pensions, Learning &
Skills Council and Jobcentre Plus
26 November 2007
Q80 Mr. Dunne: It would be very helpful
if we could include that in our Report, Sir John.
How many employers are offering training under
Train to Gain? You have talked about the 47,000 mentioned on page
26; is that the universe, or are there more to go for?
Stephen Marston: The latest figure
for Train to Gain employer engagement is that 52,000 are working
with the scheme.
Q81 Mr. Dunne: Do you have a much
larger universe out there? There are 4.5 million small and medium-sized
businesses in this country, so, at first sight, 52,000 seems like
a small drop in the ocean when you compare it with the total number
of businesses in the country, although I think it is quite an
impressive number.
Mark Haysom: It is a small drop
in the ocean. That is why, as Stephen and I have said, there is
this huge ramping up of the Train to Gain programme over the next
three years. I have the learner numbers that we hope to achieve,
but not the number of employers. We can get that for you.
Stephen Marston: Our top-level
target is for the number of employees who have been supported
through training. From memory, that is something over 800,000
by the end of the CSR period.
Q82 Mr. Dunne: Finally, I come to
the learner support funds, on which a commitment has been made
in the CSR for £600 million a year, to include the educational
maintenance allowance (EMA). How successful has that allowance
been in encouraging those aged 16-plus to stay in school?
Stephen Marston: The evidence
is that it has been successful. I apologise that I do not have
specific figures with me, but I can certainly get them. In the
past two years, we have seen a very welcome increase in participation
rates at age 16. Those rates have, for many years, been one of
our weakest elements in the whole service, compared with other
countries. Just in the past two years, we have seen a significant
increase in participation and willingness to stay on at 16, and
we believe that a significant factor in that is the availability
of EMAs. We have an evaluation on that, and I would be happy to
provide that evaluation evidence. [5]
Q83 Mr. Dunne: Thank you. If the
Government succeed in increasing the school-leaving age to 18,
is it anticipated that the EMA will be available for all 16 to
18-year-olds who remain in education?
Stephen Marston: It is certainly
anticipated that there will be a continuing need for financial
support for those young people who need it.
Q84 Mr. Dunne: Has that been taken
into account? Is it assumed that that will apply in the course
of the CSR, or is it due to come in after the CSR period?
Stephen Marston: It would come
in after, because the current expectation is that the rise in
the participation age would take effect from 2013, which is well
beyond the end of this CSR period.
Q85 Phil Wilson: Has the figure that
35% of companies and employers do not offer any training decreased
in the past 10 years or remained static?
Stephen Marston: I think that
the latest national employer survey data show a small decrease
in the proportion of employers who are not training.
Q86 Phil Wilson: Over the past 10
years?
Stephen Marston: No; from 2005
to 2007.
Q87 Phil Wilson: Is there any particular
sector of the economy in which there is a lack of training and
employers are less likely to train their staff?
Stephen Marston: Yes, there certainly
are differences between sectors. I am sorry to put it the other
way around, but the sectors that have the highest skill and qualification
requirements include health, education and ICT. There is quite
a distinct sectoral pattern of highly skilled and low-skilled
sectors.
Q88 Phil Wilson: How do the figures
break down regionally—in the north-east of England, for
example, where I represent? Is there a lack of training there
compared with other regions?
Stephen Marston: I am sorry. I
do not have that breakdown. [6]
Q89 Phil Wilson: One of the big issues,
especially in the north-east, is the need to match skills with
what the labour market requires. Has that improved in the north-east,
or overall, in the past few years?
Stephen Marston: Yes, the situation
has improved very significantly. The north-east is one of the
areas that was in the vanguard of the employer training pilots.
There is a very good relationship between the regional development
agency—One NorthEast—and the Learning and Skills Council.
We would consider it one of the better regions, where you see
that integration between the regional economic strategy, the big
employers in the area and the Learning and Skills Council, trying
to understand what those employers are looking for and where the
growth in jobs will come, and then managing to work with colleges
and providers to meet those needs.
Q90 Phil Wilson: I want to ask about
the 13-week measure of a sustainable job. I noticed in the Report
that in New Zealand, for example, the figure is six months. Have
you any plans to change that measure or to look at it again?
Adam Sharples: We touched on this
point earlier and I explained that some of our programmes, such
as workstep, use a six-month definition. In pathways to work,
the big programme for IB claimants, which will be rolled out nationally
by next April, we are looking at the whole of the first six months
and counting the 13 weeks of work of at least 16 hours a week
in that first six months, so we look for sustainability over that
whole period. That is the definition used to make outcome payments
to the providers who are delivering those programmes. There is
definitely a debate about the best measure to use. On the whole,
we are tending to look for longer definitions of a sustained job.
Q91 Phil Wilson: The Report says
that you are hitting all the interim targets for the number of
people who are being skilled up. You said that there has been
an increase in the number of places. Are all those places filled,
or does a proportion of them remain empty during the year? The
aim is to improve the basic skills levels of 2.25 million adults.
According to diagram 13 on page 27 of the Report, the number of
course places available continues to rise. Are those places always
filled?
Mark Haysom: During the period,
we have been busy building capacity so that we can respond to
this huge challenge. Particularly successful has been capacity
building in terms of basic skills. Yes, the supply is at the moment
struggling to keep up with the demand, because the needs are so
great, as you can see.
Q92 Phil Wilson: And the targets
will be met for 2010? The interim figures are being passed.
Stephen Marston: That is right.
We will do our best to ensure that in 2010 we meet those targets.
Q93 Phil Wilson: You might not be
able to answer this question, but then what happens?
Stephen Marston: Then we roll
on to 2020. The work that Sandy Leitch did was all focused on
the longer term, towards the economy's skills needs for 2020.
So the targets that we set for this Comprehensive Spending Review
period are for a block of the next three years towards those longer-term
targets. We have a trajectory that takes us through to 2020 and,
in response to Mr. Dunne's question, we will try to show that
trajectory and how far we are on course towards that.[7]
Mark Haysom: It doesn't get any
easier.
Q94 Mr. Bacon: Mr. Marston, I would
like to ask you about the learner account. In 2001, there was
the individual learning accounts (ILA) fiasco. Seventy civil servants
spent two years afterwards trying to figure out how much of it
involved fraud—£300 million or so was spent, or at
least that is what was reported. Were you one of them?
Stephen Marston: No.
Q95 Mr. Bacon: You were very carefully
somewhere else for much of that time—you were in HEFCE—but
you returned to the Department in June 2002. We took evidence
on individual learning accounts in November 2002—so after
you were back in the Department—at which time you were Director
of the Skills Group. Do you remember whether you were one of the
folk sitting behind Sir David Normington at that hearing?
Stephen Marston: I do not remember
the occasion, but yes, I was certainly working with Sir David
on the consequences of that set of issues.
Q96 Mr. Bacon: Sir David sat here
and apologised profusely to the Chairman in his opening answer.
After about the fifth answer, there was not much more to hit him
with, because he had apologised so profusely. When he walked out,
a colleague was heard to say, "Well, I think you got away
with murder there." That was not you, by any chance?
Stephen Marston: I certainly did
not make that comment.
Q97 Mr. Bacon: Paragraph 4.19 of
the Report refers to a 2006 Education and Skills Committee Report
on returning to individual learner accounts, which said that the
problem with the ILAs was one of maladministration, rather than
the concept of such accounts. That was a very sensible conclusion.
Did you read the earlier 2002 Education and Skills Committee on
ILAs?
Stephen Marston: Yes, because
through my work since 2002 I have been very much involved with
the consequences of ILAs and with ensuring that we learn the lessons
from them. As David said, we very much regret what happened in
that area.
Q98 Mr. Bacon: Did you read the Public
Accounts Committee Report on the ILAs?
Stephen Marston: Yes.
Q99 Mr. Bacon: This is very encouraging.
I thought that they were excellent Reports: the Education and
Skills Committee Report was extremely thorough and detailed, and
the other made some valuable points as well, although it concentrated
more on the financial aspects. However, I want to explore how
you will do things differently. On quality assurance, there were,
notoriously and designedly, no quality controls, in an effort
to boost the number of training providers. Is there a lack of
training providers?
Stephen Marston: No, there is
not. You are right: that is one of the most significant lessons
that we learned and the most significant change to the way in
which we are designing skills accounts.
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