Skills and Post-16 Education Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2021-07-21
Topic: Education
Michael Goodall Watson (Labour, Centre-left): My Lords, we are very much in favour of Amendment 90C. I endorse the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, in moving it and those of the noble Lord, Lord Aberdare The life skills set out in the amendment are all essential building blocks in a developed, compassionate and forward-looking society. Many of these categories would fall under the heading of "social solidarity", a concept that is, I have to say, anathema to many in the Conservative Party who still hold to the infamous, and utterly fatuous, claim by Prime Minister Thatcher that "there’s no such thing as society." If the past 17 months show us anything, they have graphically described how society has pulled together in ways that perhaps we have not seen before out of wartime. I should make it clear that I have seen no evidence that either of the noble Baronesses looking after this Bill fall under that heading, and I am perfectly happy to do so Not to accept that these life skills are necessary in ensuring that there are as few local skills gaps as possible once the locals skills improvement partnerships are developed would be, at best, to leave the Ministers open to the charge that they do not attach sufficient importance to them. In reply, the Minister will no doubt say they are unnecessary, but I believe that what this Government regard as necessary does not correspond with what most people have a right to expect in a civilised, advanced society Sadly, yesterday provided the latest example of that, with proposals for severe cuts to arts and creative subjects in higher education confirmed by the Office for Students. The Government claim that they want to redirect funding for high-cost STEM subjects, as well as medicine and healthcare. Nobody is denying that these are important subjects—indeed, priority subjects—but that does not mean that arts and culture subjects are not important themselves. They should not be abandoned Almost one in eight businesses are creative businesses. Some 2 million jobs in the UK as a whole are in the creative sector, worth a staggering total of £111 billion a year to the economy, and yet this Government of philistines are prepared to ignore those huge numbers and to seriously undermine the creative industries, which include much more than the arts—themselves a form of social solidarity, of course. Yes, film, TV, animation, video games, children’s TV, theatres, museums and orchestras are all included, but so too are advertising and marketing, design, graphic products, fashion, architecture and much more. The damaging cuts will halve the high-cost funding subsidy for creative and arts university subjects—not next year but as soon as September this year, at the start of the new academic term. That is likely to threaten the viability of arts courses in universities and lead to possible closures, which may well be the Government’s ultimate aim. The universities most vulnerable are those with a higher number of less well-off students, so this will deny young people the kind of opportunities that my noble friend Lady Wilcox mentioned during the last debate The attack on culture seems to be just the latest example of the Government’s rather pathetic culture war strategy over recent months. I cannot imagine that the Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Penn, as someone who served at the heart of Theresa May’s Government, would countenance such deliberately divisive nonsense The Bill should oblige local skills improvement partnerships to consider the role played by the creative industries locally and ensure that they are central to skills development plans. Equally, they should cover the life skills specified in the amendment. For that reason, we are fully in support, and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s reply.