EXAMINATION
OF WITNESSES
(QUESTIONS 400-407)
TUC
4 NOVEMBER 2008
Q400 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: It has hardly been
a success, has it?
MS
O'GRADY: It
clearly remains a problem,
Q401 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: It is the compulsory
approach and yet people still fall through the net in great numbers.
MS
O'GRADY: Absolutely
they do and I think if you look at the academic research on this,
it is an incredibly complicated problem. What you are seeing is
a connection between NEETs and a whole range of factors from issues
around housing, family breakdown, poverty, teenage parenthood,
drug abuse, offending. There could be one or a whole combination
of those factors involved. It is an incredibly complicated issue.
Recently I have visited the Prince's Trust programmes where they
do, in my experience, absolutely fantastic work, but it does not
come cheap; it is incredibly expensive and often those young people,
who are often quite troubled young people, actually need the equivalent
of the guardian angel. They need somebody who is standing with
them, a coach, to take them through a difficult time in their
life, often in the absence of really good family support and that
costs money. It is possible to solve but as a society you have
to be prepared to invest in the young people who need it most,
and again I would argue that over a lifetime that is worth it
and it is worth doing.
Q402 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: The New Deal for young
people, as it was called, has not been cheap and it has not produced
any obvious results. There are more people now not in education,
employment or training than there were in 1997; it has cost a
fortune and we are still where we were eleven years ago. Do we
need to spend more money on it?
MS
O'GRADY: No,
I think it has very deep roots. A superficial approach does not
help any of us to really address some of the very deep-rooted
causes. There are big issues around growing family breakdown and
what causes that, about growing inequalities in society, issues
about housing and opportunities for young people, very big and
complicated issues that require sustained investment in those
young people. There are broader social causes that have to be
addressed, too.
Q403 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: You talked earlier
about STEM subjects. It would be very good if we could get more
employers to take part in university sponsorship but are the schools
doing enough? If you do not teach science, then who is going to
read it at university?
MR
PAGE: There
is a problem with science. There is a problem in the sense that
we do not have enough qualified science teachers and that means
fewer children are encouraged to study science in the sixth form,
which means we do not have enough science teachers and that goes
round in a circle. That is a circle that we certainly need to
break.
MS
O'GRADY: There
is some good news on that, though, and you would have to check
it. It is not my job to represent the Government but, as I understand
it, the numbers of young people studying science STEM subject
GCSEs, "A" levels and university applications have gone
up. Again, I do not think we should rubbish where we are in making
progress.
Q404 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: Yes, but we have to
ask why we have dropped so far, do we not? The problem is that
we have dropped so far, so it is fine that we might be turning
a corner and the numbers are going up, but we have lost a whole
generation, possibly two generations, of potential scientists,
mathematicians, engineers, all sorts of people. It is fine that
the numbers are going up but do we not need to do something a
bit more proactively vigorously and forceful to make it happen?
MR
PAGE: We produced
a policy paper on science earlier this year and we included science
in education as part of that. We would be happy to send a copy
of that to the Committee if that would be helpful. Among the things
we called for was better careers advice—careers advisers
are often generalists and will point people in the most obvious
rather than the less obvious direction—and better equality
of opportunity in science. The number of girls interested in science
at quite a young age is high and then it tends to drop off as
they approach 16. We would like to find out why that happens.
Girls are likely to see themselves in one set of occupations and
boys are more likely to see themselves as scientists. We would
like to challenge that. There are a number of challenges with
regard to science policy, you are right. As Frances said, we have
started to turn the corner. Hopefully we can build on that.
Q405 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: As a final thought,
what are your ideas for developing an enterprise culture in the
UK?
MR
PAGE: Obviously
we do need to develop an enterprise culture. I think there are
many aspects as to how we go about doing that. The Government
has given quite a lead on developing an enterprise culture and
BERR puts a lot of focus on that. We need to support that. Growing
enterprise is important; growing good enterprises that employ
lots of people and treat their workforces well is an important
part of that.
Q406 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: Enterprise is something
slightly different from being nice to your workers. I would have
thought that being nice to your workers is something we should
all hopefully take for granted because there is human capital
there. An enterprise culture is different from being nice to your
workers; it is something more.
MS
O'GRADY: An
enterprise culture is also about encouraging the workforce to
be enterprising—that is the point—and the way that
you do that. Just to give ourselves a plug, we have for example
a union learn arm, a training and education arm of the trade union
movement called Unionlearn, and 20,000 union learning reps encouraging
every worker in all walks of life to get trained, to train not
just for the task but for their own development and future progression.
That, to me, is one essential strand of an enterprise culture
in Britain.
Q407 MISS
KIRKBRIDE: Does the TUC offer
bursaries or help people to set up their own businesses?
MS
O'GRADY: We
are an organisation representing workers.
MISS KIRKBRIDE:
So you do not, even though—
CHAIRMAN: That
is a bigger debate we are opening up there. I am going to rule
that one out. It is an interesting question. I am very grateful.
It is very frustrating because we have had to skim quite lightly
over the surface of some important issues. If you feel that you
want to add to your written evidence, in the light of what you
have said to us today and our discussion, we would certainly welcome
that. Thank you very much indeed for coming. We really appreciate
the trouble you have taken and your answers.
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