Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
MS LIZ
WALLIS, PROFESSOR
GEOFF LAYER,
DR ROGER
BENNETT, MR
GARY WILLIAMSON,
MS LINDA
FLORANCE, MR
MARK ANDREWS,
MR TOM
SMITH AND
MS RUTH
ADAMS
14 MAY 2008
Q40 Mr Marsden: Before we lose the
point about apprenticeships, I just want to come back on a very
specific point, Ruth, and then I will ask Geoff if he would like
to comment on this. Going back to your document, the target for
some additional 50,000 apprenticeships which has been identified
in this region; does that include adult as well as young apprentices?
Ms Adams: I believe it does, yes.
Q41 Mr Marsden: In which case my
question to Geoff is a broader one. We know what is going to happen
with demography in the next few years, and Chris Humphries as
the head of the Commission for Skills has continually harped on
about this. Have we got in this region the focus right in terms
of adult versus traditional apprenticeships and have the universities
begun to take this on board in terms of their learners and their
skills?
Professor Layer: Just before I
start that I had better point out that the demographic factors
in Bradford are a bit different to everybody else's. There is
a whole series of key issues around the adult trainer and the
adult learner which have been affected over the last five to six
years by certain policy changes and we have debated issues around
LSCs, et cetera. In terms of the balance from the university perspective,
and I will come back to the region, in the way the policy has
developed, over the last few years we have been focused very much
on the 18 to 30 group with the 18 to 30 target and that has been
a target which has been driven by the precursor of this I guess
around full-time students engaging in undergraduate programmes
despite some of the bits at the margins that have been a real
driver and a real shift, and you have seen exponential growth
in that. That has been at the cost of other forms of innovation
and other forms of learning and it is very traditional. What we
have not done across the university sector generally is reflect
on where adults might be coming from and different types of entry
routes. In my institution it is a very, very small handful of
students who will progress from apprenticeships into higher education,
despite many efforts that colleagues have engaged in there. Some
of that is to do with are we sure what they are and are we confident
that we can take that forward, but some of it is also to do with,
"I am doing an apprenticeship, I am doing worked-base learning
and I want to stay in the workplace and the form of higher education
that we have got is not really right for me."
Q42 Dr Blackman-Woods: Do foundation
degrees not provide a possible route?
Professor Layer: Foundation degrees
can provide a potential route and then you are into a scenario
about are you distinguishing between what an apprentice can and
cannot go into, and that is a key issue. Also you are into the
fact that it is not all universities who are major providers of
foundation degrees and you are rather limited in that area. You
are also into carrying on with your studies whilst working and
that is the advantage of foundation degrees, but that is there
and it is a potential route. It has still got a lot of growth
to achieve its goals and its aims. The issue is around what higher
education is providing today and it has been very traditional
generally. In order to meet these level four targets it has got
to provide something far more flexible. You have talked very much
to date about being qualifications driven. One of the advantages
of the higher education sector is that it is not qualifications
driven in its funding methodology in the same limited way that
others have been talking about. It is much more open and flexible
and that has to be the agenda for the next five years, essentially
putting that flexibility into place. In terms of the region, I
guess the question is about the region as well. Regional engagement
is quite mixed across the different city regions that we have
in the engagement of adults and the engagement of the ways they
work, but I think it is quite evident that the numbers have remained
broadly the same progressing into higher education as adults.
What we have not had is the interaction that you have had at other
age groups.
Q43 Mr Marsden: Can I just come back
finally then to this whole issue of plans and targets. You have
got all those targets, and the targets in the latest document
supersede the Regional Economic Strategy, and also what Gary said
earlier about the change of names and everything else. I am tempted
to say that Mr Spock said, "It's life, Captain, but not as
we know it," and that might be said about some of these things!
Do you think that your experience is that you have to deal with
far too many documents, far too many initiatives and you simply
do not have time properly to implement them?
Ms Adams: Yes, I think that is
a fair assessment.
Q44 Mr Marsden: Does anybody dissent
from that view around the table that you have got document overload?
Dr Bennett: Without question.
Mr Williamson: I am not so sure
it is documents actually, it is committees and groups.
Q45 Mr Marsden: Committees and groups
produce documents.
Mr Williamson: Can I just pick
up on the apprenticeship. I would say that we are quite bullish
in Leeds in the employers' groups. We are a small employer, we
employ 30 people, and we have taken apprenticeships of young people
and it is a fantastic route and the momentum is building in terms
of creating your own employees through that route. I think you
will find not 20,000 or 30,000 in Leeds but there will be take-up
from employers because they can see it as a positive route to
developing some of their own skills through day release to colleges.
We need clarity on that. There is another group of employers that
need to be convinced as well. It is all right using my members
to say employers do not buy in but how many apprentices are there
in the public sector? How many do you have at Yorkshire Forward
or at Leeds City Council's building here, the NHS or others? They
are very large employers and that is a route for them to build
their own workforce.
Mr Andrews: I was very pleasantly
encouraged at the Apprentices Ambassadors meeting that the Permanent
Secretary of DIUS, Ian Watmore, is going to champion apprenticeships
with the public sector. I think that is tremendous news and I
wish him very well with that. I would like to come in on the apprenticeship
thing because in our company we are seeing probably about 15 people
a year who have come through the apprenticeship programme going
on to do foundation and honours degrees. Some of it is about the
selectivity of the people that you pull in, they have to have
the academic ability to do it, but I do think the other issue
on apprenticeships is there is a fundamental piece of work that
has got to be done in getting to parents and teachers about the
value of apprenticeships. Pushing more and more people to university
has almost worked against the apprenticeship and it may well be
working against the diploma that you touched on earlier. I feel
there is a massive task to overhaul the careers service, and this
Connexions shambles has got huge fundamental problems—
Q46 Mr Marsden: It is about how you
badge them.
Mr Andrews: It is about how you
badge them but it also about how they are equipped. One of the
STEM skills issues—and I speak as an engineer here—is
we have got to get to 12-year-olds and show them that there are
interesting and attractive things you can do with science, maths
and engineering. You cannot rely on school teachers and careers
advisers to do that and it has got to done at a young age, so
I think the whole thing with STEM skills and apprenticeships requires
some really challenging almost advertising campaigns on a national
level to engage teachers and parents.
Dr Bennett: Can I come in on the
back of that. At my college we have set up a pre- apprenticeship
training scheme as part of our 14 to 16 skills centre engaging
with schools and employers. We have attracted sponsorship from
employers so they are looking at year 10s and year 11s in terms
of pre-apprenticeship training. We are dropping the seeds of employment
and workforce development and all the rest of that and that has
gone down very well in North Lincolnshire with our employers,
and it connects and integrates schools, colleges and employers.
Q47 Mr Boswell: And parents?
Dr Bennett: And parents.
Ms Florance: I agree with everything
that has been said on apprenticeships but a point I would not
wish to be lost in all of this, as an example, in my own sector
between now and 2014 we need about 35,000 people just for replacement
for retirement. Actually we are not going to find all of those
within the young people that are going to be there, and the point
for us is more flexibility and more support to bring people through
the basic skills route perhaps but also on into qualifications
and apprenticeships at an older age because that is going to be
our workforce for the future and that is what is going to make
us more productive as UK plc.
Professor Layer: Just quickly
on what Mark said, where I totally agree with him and I think
it has really hit the nail on the head, if we want this agenda
to succeed what we have to do is to create real parity of esteem
across all those different routes so that it is understood amongst
parents as well as young people. In terms of documentation and
policies, it seems to have increased in size since the machinery
of government changes and with the creation of the new department
of DIUS and the separation of DSFC, from our perspective, that
has led to a significant increase in policy.
Chairman: It is just an illusion!
Dr Blackman-Woods: I am glad that in
the last couple of answers there was a bit of passion in it because
I was readily falling into profound depression, I have to tell
you! My first question is you are the people in this region who
will have to drive forward this Leitch agenda and the upskilling
and reskilling agenda, so do you feel equipped to do that, and
how are you going to get employers and young people and others
who you have described in Barnsley engaged in this agenda if you
are not passionate about it and if you are not building the capacity
in order to deliver Leitch? That is to anybody—anybody with
passion!
Chairman: We want passion for the rest
of this session!
Q48 Mr Boswell: That is a prequalification.
Dr Bennett: I think it is about
partnership and collaboration and I think it is about developing
trust between what you can actually achieve and deliver on that
commitment. I think any sort of region or sub-region, if I just
touch on the Centres of Vocational Excellence (COVEs) initiative,
another initiative that we went through, which was great because
it was about employers and it was about trying to get employer
connectivity with colleges and the communities, and it did deliver
against agendas and it did bring together employers and it did
bring together providers of skills training and it more or less
worked. I am using that word `worked' broadly but it did. I think
whatever we do has to be seen to be achieved or be achievable
and that will actually motivate a partnership. We have all sat
round partnership committees where it has not worked or you have
been loath to go to them, or whatever it might be, because you
think why are you wasting your time there. If that can be driven
and the targets can be challenging but achievable I think you
have got half a chance of delivering it.
Ms Wallis: I do think that the
diplomas, taking into account the recent publicity, offer a valuable
opportunity for this collaboration agenda because they are the
vehicle for mixing up schools, employers, careers, those charged
with enterprise, a whole range of people. To make the diplomas
work, colleges and schools have to work together, colleges and
employers have to work together and schools and education business
partnerships have to work together. I think the diplomas are already
disrupting the system, causing collaboration and we just have
to hang on in there through the process of discomfort which is
happening at the moment and recognise that it is a long haul job.
Certainly Digital 2010 as an initiative which is looking at the
improvement of digital skills in the region is emphasising and
prioritising the diplomas as a Trojan horse for achieving much
of that.
Q49 Dr Blackman-Woods: So that might
solve the problems of young people. What about SMEs training and
upskilling their current workforce, what is going to get SMEs
enthused? You are saying that this issue of them wanting these
bite-sized chunks of learning that do not actually deliver a qualification
has got to be addressed. We cannot just sit around and say, "That
is fine, SME, you can do that." How do we get them to say
it is really important?
Ms Wallis: May I very briefly
mention something that happened. A few years back there was a
programme in South Yorkshire that was Learning and Skills Council-funded
which was about really improving digital skills and the labour
market for the creative and digital industries. It was very successful
in engaging small employers who had not engaged with education
and training before, and the key to that was the flexibility of
the funding. It was about being able to use the funding flexibly.
Also the other point was specialist brokers. We have talked earlier
about there being too many initiatives and we need to streamline.
If streamlining means you then have big organisations out there
that are about offering a uniform business offer to businesses,
we lose the plot, because a sectoral approach is the thing that
works and very specialist networks located locally. Yes, it is
the Sector Skills Council but the translation of the sector skills
council expertise into the very specialist business support organisation
that exists locally—and I can name you them round the region—who
are the mediator, that speak the language and that know the very
precise needs of each area and the small businesses within them.
Q50 Dr Blackman-Woods: So is Train
to Gain a useless structure?
Ms Wallis: If you have Train to
Gain and you also have specialist brokers in the mix, I believe
that is the important factor.
Ms Florance: Building on that
sectoral approach and perhaps explaining from my position—I
am involved right across the nine regions as opposed to just purely
Yorkshire and Humberside—I have left a meeting this morning
where we are negotiating with the LSC, which is potentially part
of the answer on this but which potentially could get lost in
the changes that are currently occurring, and that is that each
sector is being asked to draw up a compact for the way in which
the skills delivery system in the regions (and it is at regional
level) will pick up on what that sector wants and needs in terms
of Train to Gain brokerage. What the brokers need to know about
how they need to approach a particular sector, and what are the
offers and the products that they can pick up on to support that
business development. My fear is—and this has been a long
drawn-out process, we are six months down the road and I understand
it will be at least September before DIUS sign this off—that
in the changes that are occurring there, somehow these compacts
will be another thing put on a shelf, and that will be tragic
as far as our employers are concerned, who are making a real commitment
to say, "If this is what the system will do for me, I will
get out of bed and I will do these things with my workforce."
If I get that commitment and then we are back on the shelf again,
it is another cynicism that is going to be built into the system.
Dr Bennett: Can I raise a point
about Train to Gain, the brokerage has been the single worst thing
about Train to Gain. In my college, and many colleges up and down
the country will tell you the same, we achieve Train to Gain target—in
spite of the brokerage and in spite of the brokerage system. I
have got a £2.5 million contract for Train to Gain and we
achieve it and we will achieve it at the year end this year but
we will achieve it in spite of the brokers.
Professor Layer: You asked about
how we will try and do it and how we are up for it, et cetera
and I have identified four things. I think there is a distinction
between two different forms of working with people and planning.
One is a sectoral base and the other is a district base or a geographical
area where it is a city region, and I think they are two very
different things. Providers like ours and North Lindsey have worked
from a sectoral base and a district base and you do both of those
things and you have to work with both of those things. I think
the crucial thing that we need to address, and we are addressing,
is in terms of working in partnership. I made the point before
about, yes, we are looking at labour market data but it is far
more important to us to talk to specific employers and identify
what the needs are and to work through with them what they are
and then be able to supply them. The final thing that we need
to invest in, change or develop is the capacity-building within
the organisation to deliver to a new agenda because it is a new
agenda that we need.
Mr Andrews: I support all the
comments that are being made about brokerage and the mechanics
and improving the system from where it is now, but I think that
the fundamental issue of getting to SMEs is going to take more
than that. This is a national problem that clearly exists in Yorkshire.
I am very strongly of the view that you have got to go back to
some basics and it takes a stick and a carrot. The carrot has
got to be fiscal support in the form of taxation relief to companies
that are training. Without doing that, it is very difficult to
see why ten-man bands would do it. Fundamentally there has to
be some kind of support that comes to the training agenda from
corporate taxation relief for small companies. The second one
(and for me as I say the carrot approach) is about modifying the
outlook of both employees and customers on the issue of qualifications.
I see those as two very deliberate counts. In other words, for
me if I am trying to attract graduate engineers now and I am not
prepared to do an indentured scheme with IET to get them to be
chartered, I will not get them in. You need to get that going
on all the way through the system so people say, "If I am
not going to get a level two apprenticeship out of this, why would
I come and work for you?" You have to create the demand from
the people who are going to be employees. Similarly I think that
more can be done through supply chains, in other words, customers
saying, "We want to see that you are qualified to do that
job." I look at it in my industry in big construction, if
somebody is not qualified to be an electrician they are not going
to work on one of my sites.
Q51 Mr Boswell: So you would favour
a licence to practise, would you?
Mr Andrews: I would but it needs
to be done at the micro level because the issue is while a big
contractor like me is going to have qualified people, the guy
who any one of us might get round to do something at our house,
we are not going to say, "Show me your electrical apprenticeship
qualification," but maybe we should.
Mr Williamson: We have been very
negative and all we have done is moan, especially about the targets
and the end game. All I keep on about is employer engagement.
It is not the targets and if you can explain the benefits in very
simple language to a small number of employers as we have done—and
the diplomas are fantastic because they really shake up the educationalists
because they do not like employers commenting about the curriculum,
they do not want employers talking about how long the placements
should be and what they should do but gradually they can see the
benefit. There is a passion in the groups that we have got involved
in—and I can only speak for Leeds—that has stunned
us because we thought it would be more of the same. It has been
fantastic and there are small two- or three-people businesses
as well as the large businesses within the consortium of 40 employers
in each one and they are involved often they are parents and they
do understand the systems because their kids go to school and
they can see the problems and barriers and the opportunities.
In terms of your other question how do you enliven small businesses
to take on the current unemployed or upskill the current workforce,
that is a far more difficult one because it is always told as
a generic that training is good for you or it is good for your
CSR policy. Actually you have got to get down and talk, as Liz
was saying, specifically about the needs of that business, and
it will not be unique (because everybody thinks their own problems
are unique) and then sell the benefit. It has got to be done face-to-face.
Q52 Chairman: Very quickly, Liz,
I do not want to stop this enthusiasm.
Ms Wallis: My point is that somewhere
way back when we mentioned young people, and they do not get mentioned
in this mix and yet maybe the young people themselves can help
to unlock the door here. We need to look for joins between some
other things that are happening because if young people are to
contribute to this debate, you have got to put them in a position
where at school age onwards they are starting to contribute to
how their learning is shaped and what they are participating in.
We have to look at some of the initiatives that are doing this
at the moment that are looking, in the nicest possible way, at
how you break the curriculum and how you enable young people to
become more creative participants in that whole process of learning
and they will also then start to dictate how they contribute to
that skills agenda. Just to name something that I am aware of,
things like Creative Partnerships which I know is never seen in
this context, is all about developing creativity in schools and
in the curriculum and also things like the local enterprise growth
initiatives which have schools programmes which are about enabling
young people to be enterprising about their own futures, and there
are young people around the country who are seizing those opportunities.
Mr Smith: I am very passionate—
Q53 Dr Blackman-Woods: Good!
Mr Smith:—I kind of feel
I sold Barnsley a really rubbish line there at the beginning,
but we have talked about engagement with businesses; it is engagement
with the community. I use that word but I do not mean community
in its traditional way because I include schools, businesses,
employers and young people. However, I will tell you one of the
things it is is about families as well and the power of working
with families, either as adults as learners or children within
those families, and that whole agenda. We have seen a significant
shift over the last six years in Barnsley in terms of that reengagement
and that aspirational aspect of learning which does have an impact
on people's skills and qualifications but it also has a much wider
impact and it takes a long time. Going back to targets and in
terms of what Ruth and Geoff were saying, it takes a long time
sometimes to get people to level two and then a little bit to
level three. We need to be thinking about working with our communities
as well, and I think if we can get that right—and I know
we have talked a lot about cultural change, there is a cultural
change in communities as well—then that kind of drive to
aspire to achieve whether it is a qualification or within a work
context is really important.
Q54 Chairman: I am coming to you
now, Geoff. We have got five minutes each for the last two questions,
that is 10 minutes altogether. Level three! An awful lot is expected
of both FE and HE in this agenda. What is happening in our region
with FE colleges and HE institutions working together to actually
deliver this agenda? Are you aware of anything that has happened?
Dr Bennett: We work with our partner
universities. Most colleges will partner with their local universities
and we are no different. We partner with a number of universities
and we are working with them on level four in particular on the
high level skills because that is where the integration is. We
are doing that and have been doing that way before Leitch.
Q55 Mr Marsden: Which are your universities?
Dr Bennett: University of Lincoln,
University of Huddersfield, University of Hull and Sheffield Hallam.
So we have a primary initiative with the University of Lincoln
because that is our backyard university but we were on this agenda
way before Leitch.
Q56 Chairman: But you are not bothered
about the rest of the region? I do not mean that in a derogative
sense.
Dr Bennett: We are doing our bit
sub-regionally to contribute to the region.
Q57 Chairman: The same with you Geoff?
Professor Layer: Very much so.
There are now four lifelong learning networks in Yorkshire and
Humber and that is a deliberate strategy about developing vocational
progression routes.
Q58 Chairman: Whose strategy?
Professor Layer: The Higher Education
Funding Council for England and I suspect it is the RDA. The RDA
certainly sits on the boards and the LSC sits on the boards and
they are partnerships between colleges and universities that are
developing progression routes in a geographical patch, so to speak,
and they are very employer-based and employers are engaged in
them and they tend to be sector-specific.
Q59 Chairman: FE and HE is alive
and kicking in your area?
Professor Layer: It is very alive
and it is very kicking, yes.
Mr Williamson: In Leeds we have
got the debate for FE merger, as you well know, but again business
has been involved.
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