Enterprise Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2016-04-19
Topic: Education
Robert Stevenson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, the Minister said when she introduced the first set of amendments that the Bill was now in better shape than when it started. We can all agree with that, in particular with reference to apprenticeships. These amendments fill a lacuna in the area of apprenticeships, which we pointed out in Committee and on Report. Indeed, we tried very hard to get some movement from the Government on this but were rebuffed robustly, as is the noble Baroness’s way, albeit in a very gentle and appropriate manner. Therefore, it is all the more of a pleasure to see these amendments come back, which, in some senses, begin to address some of the big issues about what we need to do as a country to ensure that the apprenticeship route for vocational education is acknowledged, and made attractive to parents and the young people who might wish to take them, as has sadly been lacking for too many years However, there are some issues with the proposals, which I do not want in any sense to use to argue against them, but although we have some movement here there are still quite a lot of questions that have to be resolved. We will watch this with interest. I suspect—although I have no knowledge of this—that it might be something that your Lordships’ House may have to deal with as we go forward. For instance, the focus is rightly on trying to ensure that apprenticeships are of a high quality, but there is very little detail on what the new institute will do on that, and what it might not, at this stage, be appropriate to do. It has a good foundation with the people on it, but perhaps in its staffing it does not reach as far as it could towards issues that might give some reassurance that they are thinking about the quality levels. There is a problem about the age at which apprenticeships are offered. There are still too many people aged between 23 and 30 and not enough aged between 18 and 24. To what extent will the IFA have the tools to deal with that There is an assumption throughout a lot of people’s discussions and debate about apprenticeships that the focus will be on STEM subjects. In fact, I am sure the Minister will agree that there is just as much need to ensure that we have apprenticeships across the creative and other industries which supply so much of our national growth and which are being relied on to make sure that our economy is diversified—"STEAM", not STEM, might be a better way of putting it. In case there is any doubt about that, the "A" stands for the arts and the creative industries These proposals do not deal with what is going to happen to our colleges. Many FE colleges are going through periodic and differential reviews and their future does not seem at all clear. They are obviously very nervous about how this will happen. Again, we would not seek to do this through the Bill, but we need more clarity about what the infrastructure that will receive the ministrations of the IFA will be able to do Finally, the question of the vocational education and the sort of provision that is required to provide an interlacing approach for children leaving school and going on to higher and further education is not yet fully mapped out, although I am sure that the aspirations are there. We will need to spend more time on that—perhaps when the White Paper turns into a higher education Bill we will have that opportunity. However, at the bottom of all that there is a really difficult problem about productivity. The test will be, at the end of the day, whether the IFA has anything to offer us in terms of improving productivity in this country, which is sadly lagging behind our competitors. If it does, all power to it; if it does not, we may have to revisit it; but in the interim it is an exciting development, we wish it well and we welcome these clauses.