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Session 2009 - 10
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Delegated Legislation Committee Debates



The Committee consisted of the following Members:

Chair: Mr. David Amess
Abbott, Ms Diane (Hackney, North and Stoke Newington) (Lab)
Beresford, Sir Paul (Mole Valley) (Con)
Brennan, Kevin (Minister for Further Education, Skills, Apprenticeships and Consumer Affairs)
Burt, Lorely (Solihull) (LD)
Carswell, Mr. Douglas (Harwich) (Con)
Hayes, Mr. John (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
Heppell, Mr. John (Nottingham, East) (Lab)
Jack, Mr. Michael (Fylde) (Con)
Kaufman, Sir Gerald (Manchester, Gorton) (Lab)
McGovern, Mr. Jim (Dundee, West) (Lab)
Mitchell, Mr. Austin (Great Grimsby) (Lab)
Morgan, Julie (Cardiff, North) (Lab)
Owen, Albert (Ynys Môn) (Lab)
Palmer, Dr. Nick (Broxtowe) (Lab)
Thurso, John (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
Wright, Jeremy (Rugby and Kenilworth) (Con)
Eliot Barrass, Committee Clerk
† attended the Committee

The following also attended, pursuant to Standing Order No. 118(2):

Crabb, Mr. Stephen (Preseli Pembrokeshire) (Con)

Fourth Delegated Legislation Committee

Tuesday 9 March 2010

[Mr. David Amess in the Chair]

Draft Employee Study and Training (Qualifying Period of Employment) Regulations 2010
10.30 am
The Minister for Further Education, Skills, Apprenticeships and Consumer Affairs (Kevin Brennan): I beg to move,
That the Committee has considered the draft Employee Study and Training (Qualifying Period of Employment) Regulations 2010.
It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this morning, Mr. Amess.
The draft regulations are provided for by section 63 of the Employment Rights Act 1996, as amended by section 40 of the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009. From 6 April 2010, that section will confer on eligible employees the right to ask their employer for time to train. The change has widespread support, including from the Confederation of British Industry and the Trades Union Congress.
The provision will initially apply to employees in organisations with 250 or more employees, and from April 2011 it will be extended to apply to employees in organisations of all sizes. We are implementing the right in two stages, so that small and medium-sized organisations have more time to prepare to implement it. The draft regulations provide that only individuals who have been in continuous employment with their employer for at least 26 weeks are eligible to make a request for time to train under the new procedures.
The decision to set that 26-week minimum has been taken after careful reflection and primarily for two reasons. First, we think it is right that employers should be required to consider requests only from people with whom they have established a working relationship. Secondly, when the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill was being considered by the House, concern was expressed that such a new right might cause further administrative burdens on organisations. The Government understand that concern, which is why the right to request time to train has been closely modelled on the flexible working arrangements, including alignment with the point at which an employee can make requests under those arrangements, so that entitlement accrues at the same point. That will allow organisations to introduce the new arrangements with a minimum of adjustment to their existing systems. It is also the case that employers will be required to consider only one request from an employee in any 12-month period.
It is worth mentioning that the 26-week condition does not prevent or limit employers from considering an employee’s training and development needs at any other time, if that is what they wish to do. The right is not one that is conferred on employees at the expense of their employers, but one that is intended to be of mutual interest. Requests made under the right must explain how the employee’s performance is expected to improve as a result of training and how it will benefit the employer’s business.
Mr. Michael Jack (Fylde) (Con): Given that those whom the right will benefit will be aged over 18 or 19, can the Minister tell the Committee what discussions have been held with providers of further education to ensure that sufficient additional capacity is to be available, as I imagine that some of these people would be net extra in terms of the volume of training currently undertaken?
Kevin Brennan: The measure does not require the employer or the state necessarily to pay for the training. The employees themselves may want to support their training by going to a private training provider or an FE college to undertake the kind of training that is necessary. Good employers may already have in-house provision and arrangements for training that they would like their employees to follow. I therefore do not think there is necessarily a capacity constraint on the system in terms of supply of training that should cause us concern. No doubt, the right hon. Gentleman has something in mind.
Mr. Jack: I am more than grateful to the Minister for giving way a second time. Had he read the report of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, which I had the honour of chairing, on the rural economy, he would have noted the point we made about post-19 training and the dearth of available capacity for those in employment in a rural situation who wish to avail themselves of new skills to enhance their ability to contribute to their existing business or even to develop new opportunities. The basis of my question was whether there is sufficient capacity to accommodate those who wish to take up the right that the regulations would confer upon them.
Kevin Brennan: I should be delighted to read that Select Committee report, which I am sure makes compelling reading. As Skills Minister, I should be happy to look at that question in the context of the rural economy. The Government have done a huge amount to support in-work training for individuals through the Train to Gain programme, which has played a significant role in helping people who are already in work into training; it applies and is available equally to those working in the rural economy. The regulations relate to the right to request time for training to an employer and do not deal with the supply of that training, which is something that I will be happy to look at in the context to which the right hon. Gentleman, in his eminent role as the Chair of that Select Committee, has drawn to my attention.
Mr. John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con): The Minister is dealing with a point that I had intended to raise later in my own exciting contribution to the debate. There are suspicions that Train to Gain has a big deadweight cost. Will the Minister tell us the Department’s latest figure for the deadweight cost of Train to Gain?
Kevin Brennan: I hesitate to stray too wide of the regulations, Mr. Amess, as I can see from the look on your face that you would not tolerate that. I look forward to the hon. Gentleman’s contribution—his speeches are always exciting. I suspect that he might be referring to the report by the Public Accounts Committee and the National Audit Office on Train to Gain. The report said that the programme was having a successful impact. It gave some disputed views on be the possible level of so-called deadweight costs associated with the Train to Gain because what employers say they would be prepared to engage in to support training is not always the same as what happens in practice. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the Government will soon give our detailed responses to the figures contained in that report.
Dr. Nick Palmer (Broxtowe) (Lab): I apologise for missing the first minutes of my hon. Friend’s remarks. Does he agree that an application for time off for training would in practice need to be serious enough that the applicant can identify a potential provider of the training? If applicants merely said that they wanted time off to look for a provider, the employer could reasonably say, “Well, come back when you’ve found one.” In fact, we would be creating an additional market to which we could reasonably expect providers to respond.
The Chair: Order. Before the Minister replies, I should point out that the discussion is going much wider than the statutory instrument before the Committee I hope that the Minister will not be tempted to go into detail on that point.
Kevin Brennan: I shall not be tempted to go into detail, Mr. Amess, and will simply say yes.
Mr. Jack: On a point of order, Mr. Amess. The slightly wider area that has been raised in the debate is dealt with in the accompanying memorandum. Will you give us guidance on how wide we can go, given that the skills pledge and Train to Gain, to name but two relevant measures, are mentioned in the explanatory memorandum?
The Chair: I have been advised that any debate should be specifically on the right to training, rather than any wider matters.
Kevin Brennan: Thank you for that wise guidance, Mr. Amess.
The commercial advantages that accrue to companies that undertake to improve the skills of their work force have been established pretty conclusively. We know also that many employers take the training needs of their staff extremely seriously. As employees exercise the new right, it will, we hope, encourage more employers to get more involved in training, to involve their staff more in strengthening their business and to derive the benefits. At the same time it will spur many employees themselves to think about and take responsibility for their own training needs. The draft regulations mark an important step toward making sure that the future skills needs of employers and employees alike are met effectively. I commend them to the Committee.
10.39 pm
Mr. Hayes: What a delight it is to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Amess, sagacious by its nature, as are all your contributions to our affairs.
The draft regulations set out the length of time that an employee must have been employed to qualify for an entitlement to training. The employee would make an application under the new statutory right to request to spend time undertaking study or training. Under the regulations, an employee must have been employed for 26 weeks, which is the length of time envisaged when Bill that became the Apprenticeship, Skills, Children and Learning Act 2009, which introduces the new right, passed through the Commons.
As the Minister will know, I served on the Committee stage of that Bill. We debated the matter at some length. We made it clear that Conservatives support the right because we support the maxim that lies behind it: we need a more highly trained and highly skilled work force if we are to maintain our competitiveness. There are, however, aspects of the statutory instrument and the accompanying notes into which I wish to delve.
The CBI and the TUC, as the Minister mentioned, support the provisions, although the Institute of Directors raised concerns that deserve amplification. Clause 39 of the Bill, which became section 40 of the Act, deals with those matters. The measure is not uncontentious, because of the costs associated with the provision of the right. That is why the IOD commented as it did. I will come to the specific points it made in a moment.
The “Time to Train” consultation document published last year, talks about giving employees
“a right to a serious conversation with their employer about their skills development”.
The Conservatives agree with that right. Proper training is essential in any business. A business that fails to train and develop its staff will not be successful. Sometimes, however, an employee’s desire to be trained is not recognised by the employer, or the employer does not have in place an adequate training plan for staff. Most employers do, but we know of occasions when employees feel frustrated because their desire to develop their skills and to improve their competencies is not recognised adequately within their firm.
The need to improve access to training unites the whole House. It is a cross-party matter. The impact assessment states:
“Over a third of people with poor literacy and numeracy receive benefits...compared with less than one in ten of those with better skills.”
We know that good skills enable people to get jobs, to keep jobs and to improve their status once they are in employment. As the explanatory notes state, three options were considered in the consultation: doing nothing, employing a voluntary approach and legislating for a right to time to study. The IOD says:
“the merits of pursuing a voluntary approach were not adequately explored.”
Perhaps the Minister could tell us why he thinks the IOD came to that conclusion and to what degree the voluntary approach was explored.
The IOD continues:
“No evidence was presented to support the implication that employers are not open to training requests, deny employees the opportunity to discuss training needs or do not treat requests seriously. Employees already have the ‘right’ to request training—there is no bar to these conversations whatsoever... Skills are crucial to the UK’s future competitiveness, but so is the maintenance of a low regulatory environment in which business and enterprise can flourish. The introduction of a right to request training is not simply the wrong solution, it adds to the pipeline of impending regulations that will add to the administrative burden on employers. This is undesirable in any case. In the middle of a recession, it is spectacularly unhelpful.”
What further consideration has the Minister given to the impact of the provisions in the light of current economic circumstances? When we first debated them, the prevailing economic context was rather different. It is important that the Minister avail the Committee of the further work that, I have no doubt, he has demanded of his Department to measure the impact of the provisions in current circumstances. It would be unthinkable not to have commissioned that work and equally undesirable not to make the refreshed modelling available to the Committee before it makes any judgment on the statutory instrument.
The IOD goes on to point out that many businesses hold regular appraisals for their employees, during which employees’ training needs are discussed. It therefore suggests in its brief to Government—debated during the passage of the 2009 Act to which the regulations refer—that
“Where employers already offer documented annual appraisals which include discussion of training needs, such provision will constitute grounds for fulfilment of the right to request training obligations...Without such a change those employers that already provide opportunities to discuss training needs will become subject to repeat requests for training: a burden that penalises those organisations that already have existing provision for training discussions.”
Will the Minister say how such employers will be dealt with under the order? I mentioned at the outset that some businesses do not do as well as they might in this respect, but most do. It would be nonsense to cut across existing good practice: we want to build on that, rather than contradict it or even produce something that is parallel. Neither an overlap with existing good practice nor something that inhibits it is desirable. Will the Minister say how that will be dealt with in the light of the IOD’s remarks?
Data from the Learning and Skills Council show that business invests about £39 billion a year in training. The CBI survey found that 89 per cent. of firms have a training and development plan—when I said “most” I was understating the case somewhat. The CBI, therefore, wishes the legislation to be clear that,
“Where a firm already has good arrangements for discussing training in place (eg annual performance reviews), training needs can be dealt with through these existing arrangements without recourse to legislation.”
It is important that the Minister assures businesses and members of the Committee that the Government are sensitive to the perfectly proper caveats articulated by the IOD and the CBI.
 
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