Younger Generation

HC Deb 15 July 1983 vol 45 cc1103-50 9.34 am

Mr. Ron Leighton (Newham, North-East)

I beg to move, That this House calls upon society to recognise the plight of the younger generation; and urges that positive action be taken to provide a secure future through education and employment to give them hope and confidence for their future in the United Kingdom and to recognise that without such action grave damage to the nation will result. I can think of nothing more important for the House to consider, especially before rising for the summer recess, than the plight and future of the younger generation, by which I mean all those under the age of 25. I have three sons: two are adopted and one is fostered. I meet their friends and I meet young constituents and I compare and contrast their position with mine, when I left school.

At that time, there was full employment and there was no doubt about getting a job. Perhaps there was a question whether it would be a good job, but at least one could find a job. I started at 22s 6d a week. It was not much, but we knew that we would receive an annual increase and there was hope and confidence in the future. In those days, we believed in progress. We thought that things would get better each year. We were told about something called Keynesian economics, which had ironed out the booms and slumps that our parents had told us about.

I remember a speech by R. A. Butler, in which he said that the standard of living would double in 25 years. The situation is very different now. One of my sons recently got married. He took out a mortgage on a small home in Gravesend and worked in the building industry. However, he tells me that he has been made redundant, and he obviously now has problems with paying the mortgage. But is anyone going to tell me that we do not need housing or construction work? In my borough the waiting list is 6,000. I hope that no one is going to tell me that such young people do not want to work. My son certainly does, but the jobs just are not there.

We only live once and we are only young once. We are witnessing the blight and waste of a whole generation. Our youth are our future and the future of the nation. If we damage them, we damage ourselves and the country's future, and our society is committing a crime against today's younger generation. That is why I wish to focus attention on a major crisis and tragedy.

The first area to consider is that of employment, or the lack of it. The prospect of jobs is being torn from thousands by the insane policies that have already destroyed one fifth of our manufacturing industry. A few days ago, on 5 July, an article appeared in The Times written by Sir Terence Beckett. His opening sentence encapsulates the problem: Of the 400,000 children leaving school this month, only about a quarter will soon find a job. Youth unemployment is increasing much faster than adult unemployment. About 1.3 million of the under-25s are registered unemployed. About 250,000 are on the youth opportunities programme. However, even those figures do not tell the whole grim story. Yesterday's unemployed school leavers become today's long-term unemployed in the 18 to 25-year-old group. Some 350,000 under-25s have been unemployed for more than a year.

I am told in a letter from Mr. Ray Hurst, the honorary secretary of the Institute of Careers Officers, that if the special schemes are excluded, 750,000 of the under-25s have never had a real job. Long-term unemployment is growing fastest among young people who have been brought up in a jobless, no-work society. 38 per cent. of the unemployed are under 25. In Newcastle, 432 people are chasing each job vacancy.

A society that condemns its young people to a life of uselessness and misery is irresponsible and immoral. We are talking of a moral rather than a mere economic question. The Government are creating long-term social violence by withholding educational and spiritual self-fulfilment from large sections of our community, especially among young people, by limiting their human potential when advantages are abundantly and conspicuously enjoyed by others. Young people want the status, the pay packet and the independence that go with a real job.

There can be no freedom without the right to work and the right to a living wage and economic security. They are the fundamentals of liberty. Freedom to work is as important as freedom of speech. Indeed, the latter is meaningless without the former.

I have no doubt that I shall be told that the Government are doing their best through the youth training scheme. That is not a satisfactory or adequate response. We are told that £1 billion is to be spent on the training scheme, but not much of that is new money. About £800 million is already being spent on the youth opportunities programme so not much more has been provided for the youth training scheme which was set up hurriedly without adequate preparation. In my borough, few places have been accepted.

I accept that the scheme is better than nothing, but I do that with no enthusiasm or satisfaction. There are widespread fears that it is being used for cheap labour, that it exploits the young people whom it purports to help, that it is being used to depress youth wages generally and to reduce the standard of wages generally. The fear is that it will leave young people without employment protection, that it will provide not only cheap but removable labour and will lead to job substitution. The evidence is that many firms, instead of taking on a couple of school leavers, are using the training scheme.

The training content of the scheme is also questionable. I do not know how all the training can be packed into 13 weeks. We are told that young people are to be given skills in numeracy and literacy as they apply to the work place, taught to use basic tools and introduced to computer technology and a variety of basic skills relevant to a variety of industries. How many employers can provide that broad base and how can it all be done in 13 weeks?

We have some experience because the scheme has operated in Northern Ireland for 12 months. Already the drop-out rate is 25 per cent. Young people on the scheme receive an allowance of £25 a week. It was introduced in 1979, so to keep pace with inflation the allowance should be £30. Young people have pride. They want to think that some value is set on them, but the value that we set on them is £25.

The widespread view is that the scheme is merely a way of keeping some youngsters off the streets and reducing the unemployment statistics; that the whole thing is merely a cosmetic device to buy time for the Government. The scheme may alleviate the position, but it will not create one new job. It might create opportunities to apply for jobs, but the so-called training will not create one job. It will increase the competitiveness for the few jobs available. It will open doors which lead nowhere.

If the economic recovery does not come during the YTS year—there is no sign that it will—what happens at the end? The certificates that the young people will receive will take them straight to the dole. After all, there is no shortage of young people with bits of paper, 0-levels, A-levels and university degrees. Now young people may have YTS certificates but no jobs. One can imagine the disillusion and despair if nothing comes of a year of YTS.

The credibility of all training depends on whether there is a job at the end. If there is not, the scheme will be seen as a cynical confidence trick to postpone the inevitable unemployment. If people expect a job at the end, only to be thrown on the scrap heap, one can imagine the trouble we will create.

We have not done very well so far. No Minister or Department is specifically responsible and no attempt has been made by the House to grasp what it is like to be an under-privileged adult in today's Britain. Our parliamentary institutions have failed to represent the interests of a significant section of our population—the young.

I wonder if hon. Members have any idea what it is like to live on £25 a week. On average youngsters give their parents about £10 a week for their keep. After they have paid their fares, there is almost nothing left. At age 18 an unemployed person receives £20.55. A person under 18 receives £5 less. Since April this year, a person under 18 living at home has lost £3.10 a week in supplementary benefit, so if he gives his parents £10 he is left with £5.80.

Such young people are completely shut out of our consumer society. While the unemployed youngsters tramp the streets with no money in their pockets, humbled by the dole, they see others enjoying the good things, the material fruits of our consumer society. They see houses packed with consumer durables. They see traffic jams of expensive motor cars. They see shops stuffed with luxuries and west end hotels doing a roaring trade. Is it any wonder that many feel anger and resentment? Is it any wonder that they feel disillusioned, shut out and rejected? Is it any wonder that frustration leads to a desire to hit back at a society which offers them nothing but the dole? The problem is not the young unemployed. The problem is a society which offers its young people nothing but soul-destroying unemployment.

Newham has the largest proportion of unemployed school leavers in London, with the exception of Lambeth. Kenneth Boyce, the director of social services for Newham, said in a letter: "It is worth mentioning that there is a temptation to believe that those who are unemployed are those who have underachieved at school and are without qualifications. The number of young graduates applying to London local authorities is quite frightening. In Newham recently there were 120 qualified applicants for a post attracting a gross salary of £6,000 per year, many of whom had qualifications greatly in excess of those required, the vast majority of whom were not only unemployed but had not had any paid work since leaving higher education. Mr. Boyce explained to me that one of the major problems is that whenever he advertised a job it generated an enormous amount of paperwork because he had to reply to all the applicants explaining why he could not employ them. He spoke of the degree of depression exhibited, especially by those who have benefited from higher education, but not been able to obtain employment … and the loss of morale and self-esteem which accompanies the inability to obtain a job, money and therefore a place in the mainstream of society. We all know that there has been a growth of clinical depression among young people. What happens after a young person gets up in the morning, looks for and applies for a job and is rejected—10, 20, 30, 40 or 50 times? He wonders what the point is of getting up at all. Some will be angry. Others, perhaps feeling it is their fault, sink into apathy and boredom, lie in bed all day or sit in a trance in front of the television. Why should we be surprised if there is a growth in alcoholism and drug abuse—the number of drug addicts has doubled since 1981 —solvent abuse and vandalism? If society puts no value on an individual, he has no self-respect. Why, then, should he respect other people and their property?

There is a growth of vandalism and out of work subcultures, such as punk culture and Rastafarianism, and behaviour often beyond the comprehension of parents. One of the saddest aspects of that phenomenon is the rapid deterioration of relationships within a family and the unbearable strains among its members. There is no respect for the authority, standards, attitudes or values of a society that offers nothing but the dole.

We are alienating a generation who have never had a job and have never been members of a trade union. The majority probably did not vote at the last general election. If we asked them what they thought about our wonderful democratic system, our wonderful western society, our wonderful western values and the wonderful freedoms and liberties they enjoy under our system, they would look at us with bewilderment and incredulity.

If we asked our youngsters what they thought about this wonderful institution, the mother of Parliaments, we would probably hear a horse laugh or worse. Why should they have any allegiance to or belief in institutions that have failed them and abandoned them? If we do nothing for them, will our democratic institutions survive? Do they deserve to survive if they cannot cater for the needs of our people? Can we visualise what sort of citizens youngsters who have never had a job will become? Within a decade, they will be the parents of the new families and, within two decades, they will be the nation. What sort of nation will it be? What sort of future as a country do we have if we allow this to continue?

If our society and system cannot find work, a purpose, a use and a decent future for the young generation, we shall create a time bomb with devastating effects. There have already been extensive riots in our cities — at Brixton, Toxteth, Bristol and elsewhere. Martin Luther King said that riots were the voices of the unheard. Lord Scarman said in his report that to secure stability there would be a long-term need to provide useful, gainful employment and suitable educational, recreational and leisure opportunities for youngsters. He said: Unemployment remains … an evil that touches all of the community … There can be no doubt than it was a major factor in the complex pattern of conditions which lies at the root of the disorders in Brixton and elsewhere. We are talking about the despair that breeds violence and the desperation that turns into riot and disorder.

The Government have done nothing to dispel those conditions. Youth unemployment in Brixton is more than 50 per cent. higher now than it was at the time of the riots, and especially among young blacks. If the disorders break out again, no one can say that we have not been warned.

The time bomb is also exploding in crime. We all know that crime goes hand in hand with unemployment. In his letter, Kenneth Boyce said: Incidence of juvenile crime for 'K' Division shows Newham at the top of the league. We are fearful of the consequences which will arise in a society which appears not to care for its young people. If Society fails to care for its young why should the young obey the rules of Society? Should we be surprised, therefore, if young people without the opportunity to work become alienated to Society and consider anti-social measures of obtaining their share of the material things which are available to the working majority? We know that burglary is the fastest-growing area of crime. Who commits that crime? It is our teenagers. A report on a survey of 11,000 households published in The Times on 8 July said: A typical burglar is likely to be a teenager … His primary motive is material gain, or perhaps excitement, rather than malice. In his own mind, he will probably try to discount the distress that he causes. He will either argue that 'they can afford it' or that 'they are insured'. That is the sort of thing that we are breeding.

There is an institution in my constituency known as the Mayflower family centre. It was set up by the Rev. David Sheppard. I was recently in contact with Mr. Pip Wilson, a dedicated senior youth worker at the centre. He talks of feelings of powerlessness, insignificance, frustration and despair—fearfulness of the future—low health expectation—inadequate money, unemployment—insufficient money—poor provision for education—higher rate of crime—political turmoil. He says that, of the youngsters in the East End of London in Canning Town who go to the centre, four out of every five have been before the courts.

Our free market economy is creating unfairness, injustice, glaring inequality, hopelessness and despair. We have a society in which the strong get stronger and devil take the hindmost. It is a thoroughly immoral society, leaving our young unemployed and their souls to rot on the dole. It will be no surprise to the House to learn that I want to see a Socialist society based on completely different values; but the Government have the responsibility. I want to hear today what they will do before irreparable damage is done to the nation. The time to act is now.

10.1 am

Mr. Peter Bottomley (Eltham)

I congratulate the hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton) on introducing this subject to the House today. I share his basic concern. I should like to put forward arguments that go beyond his, and I hope that he will allow me to start by referring to the point that he made about the Mayflower family centre and David Sheppard. I strongly agree with what David Sheppard said in his most recent book and also his earlier one about what can be done by society and parts of society. I also feel strongly that David Sheppard was right when he said recently that man's spiritual needs and the power of Christ to change people from the inside out is as important.

We do the young unemployed and the families in which they live a great disservice if we do not also discuss how families should function, whether the children or the parents are in or out of work. One should always accept the power within people, even in the most adverse circumstances, to live as most of them try to live—and many of them succeed—by having nothing to do with drugs or crime and by having a great deal to do with finding useful activities, even if they appear to be rejected by economic society as we know it at present. I am not saying that I disagree with all that the hon. Gentleman said, but that point must be made.

I remember a powerful speech by George Cunningham, the former Member for Islington, South and Finsbury, on the subject of juvenile crime. He reminded us that there was no excuse for parents allowing their 12, 13 or 14-yearold children to take and drive away other people's cars. At the age of 12, 13 or 14, the issue of youth unemployment is not relevant. The issue is straigthforward behaviour. One needs to consider the degree of supervision, care and chaperoning of young people.

The same applies to truancy. In the early 1970s, before juvenile unemployment became such a horrendous problem, I was involved with a school in Lambeth where attendance in the fourth and fifth years was about 75 per cent. If 25 per cent. of children are not in school day after day — the overall figure is probably 40 per cent., because some might come for a few days—when a 95 per cent. attendance figure would normally be acceptable, and children are choosing for themselves whether to come to school, there is a failure, first, on the part of the children, secondly, on the part of the parents and, thirdly, on the part of the school. The consequence is that young people get into habits that are almost incompatible with obtaining a job or holding it both in terms of behaviour and the acquisition of skills, knowledge and experience. We owe it to ourselves to say these things bluntly.

Outside the House, I am chairman of the Church of England Children's Society, which does innovative and immensely valuable work with young people. The problems to which the hon. Member referred have been with us for many years. Prebendary Edward Rudolf, who 102 years ago founded the Waifs and Strays which later became the Church of England Children's Society, was a Sunday school teacher in Lambeth. He went out of his way to find two children who had not turned up at Sunday school. He found them behind a gasworks and after he looked into the experiences of their lives he brought in a Member of Parliament, a man called Beaufoy — this may have had an effect on the House—and took the responsibility on himself to build up worthwhile family circumstances for children, discovered a pressing need and went further. Much of the innovation over the past 100 years and before has come from those who have taken responsibility on themselves to do things and then have come to Parliament to say that the statutory services should be built up as well.

Let us consider what has happened over the past 30 years. The hon. Member mentioned Rab Butler, who talked about doubling the standard of living in 25 years. The standard of living has doubled during the 25 years that have followed Rab Butler's remarks.

Mr. Leighton

It is going back.

Mr. Bottomley

During those 25 years there was a dramatic improvement in the general standard of living, which was shared by pensioners, people at work and by young people, until about five years ago, but it was not shared appropriately in the family life cycle. I would argue—although I shall not do so at length today because of a position that I may still hold—that this was not shared by families looking after young children at the time they were looking after them because there was not sufficient appreciation of the importance of the family life cycle.

The greatest fall in the family standard of living occurs after the birth of the first child. The family often goes from having two incomes and two mouths to feed to one income and three mouths to feed. The issue was sadly ignored by successive Governments and until recent times has been ignored—not completely ignored—by the trade union movement and by employers. One of the consequences of ignoring that fact, which is staring us in the face, had been the explosion in pay settlements. I congratulate the Government on what they did in the last Parliament for child benefit. It helped to meet some of the material needs of people caring for young children.

I should like to refer to how much young people should be paid. I asked the GLC and the ILEA one and a half years ago what they would pay a 16-year-old school leaver who was taken on in a job which, presumably, would have a good training element, but which in terms of actual functions fulfilled by the person taken on would not require a great deal of skill and experience—an initial job. The answer was about £4,000 a year or £80 a week. I asked myself then, and I ask myself now, whether it is sensible, even for a so-called progressive employer, to pay a small number of people what I regard as a high income, or whether it is better to bring more people in to gain basic experience and to start acquiring skills at a substantially lower income.

I tend not to talk a great deal about my family life, but I have a 15-year-old son who is coming up to 16 years old. I have to face the issue of what income he should have. I hope that he will stay on at school for another two years or so and then move on to higher education. If I believe that he should have an income of £10 or £15 a week I should be a different sort of person from the one I am, because I do not believe that he should expect to join the full consumer society at a time when we are having to delay adulthood. In considering someone who probably wants to stay on in education or to acquire vocational skills up to 18 or 21, should we decide to give that person a discretionary income, after travelling expenses, of £10 to £15 a week—sometimes even at the age of 16, 17 or 18? I believe that the answer is no.

We can joke and say that adolescence is that uncertain period between the innocence of childhood and the pleasures of adulthood, but we should try to hold down the expectations that people can have everything they want at an early age, when most of us would expect young people to be continuing with education, training or work experience.

It might be suggested that young people's ideas are influenced by seeing others with video recorders and colour television sets which are now commonplace—they were not 10 years ago—so that they feel that they should be able to have such things just after leaving school, at the minimum school leaving age. I believe that that is the wrong kind of exhortation, the wrong kind of example and the wrong kind of experience, because it leads to the concept of instant gratification of almost every whim.

In considering juvenile crime, we should pay far more attention to the early signs of bad behaviour. Those signs are picked up by some parents and noticed by many teachers, and even by social workers. We should talk explicity with families about what is worrying them or—it is usually "and"—what is worrying the outsiders. We have a duty not to concentrate nearly all our resources on the massive fire brigade services which are used when things have gone dramatically wrong; instead, we should try to talk about signs which are obvious early on, because those signs often lead to the sort of life that is a disaster to those concerned and has expensive and nasty consequences for the people around them.

It would be interesting to consider the life experience of people who are now 25 and who are part of the 25 per cent. of juvenile delinquents who went on to serious crime in adult life. We should ask them about their life history and discuss with them the stage at which they realised that they were going seriously astray. Usually, such people have had a lack of proper supervision in early childhood and a lack of worthwhile activity in general.

I stand four square with the hon. Gentleman in saying that we owe our young people the opportunity to enjoy worthwhile activities, extending over a reasonable time, so that there are adequate opportunities of employment for those who choose it at an early stage, and certainly for all those coming out of higher education, work experience or job training.

The explosion in youth training opportunities in France and West Germany was the result of pressure from the family movements in those countries. It came from parents who said, "We will not accept having our children on the scrap heap. We believe that lack of education will be disastrous for them." In France and Germany the Governments have gone a great deal further than our own Government in that respect.

In West Germany it is possible for a young person to serve an apprenticeship or to get work experience with a one-man business. In Britain there still has to be sufficient overlap and duplication among management, supervisors and trainers so that when people go on holiday there is someone left to provide supervision. What is wrong with a one-man business taking on a school leaver to provide work experience and training? We seem to be stuck with our bureaucratic ideas that big brother knows best, and for that reason we have almost to duplicate a college of further education.

There was a European Community survey in 1977 on the question, "What leads to poverty?" In West Germany the major causes were found to be deprived childhood, ill health and lack of education. In France the major cause was found to be old age and loneliness, followed by deprived childhood and ill health. In the United Kingdom the causes were found to be laziness, chronic unemployment and drink. The West Germans and the French were right in concluding that the major causes were deprived childhood and lack of education.

In Britain, of course, unemployment is a disaster, just as inflation was a disaster at an earlier period. Whatever we say in other debates about economic policy, there should be common agreement throughout the House that what the hon. Gentleman said about getting rid of youth unemployment is absolutely right. That must be one of the most significant targets, so that people have something to aim for, but it must not be delivered just by professionals or politicians.

The hon. Gentleman talked about unemployment in Newham. I live in Lambeth, where the hon. Gentleman said that youth unemployment was higher. The cost to an employer of an employee is about twice what the employee receives in his pay packet. There are deductions of tax, the employee's national insurance contribution and the employer's national insurance contribution. Adding them all together, the cost to the employer is double what the employee receives in his pay packet. If a person of 18 receives £50 a week, the cost to the employer will be £100 a week. In effect, it is a tax on employment of 50 per cent., but that is only the direct cost.

About 10 days ago I asked my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister what was the average rate burden per job across the country, taking into account the rates on industrial and commercial premises and dividing that figure by the number of employees. The answer across the country is £300. That is an extra £6 per week per job.

In Lambeth, where I live and pay my rates, the rates burden per job is probably about £1,000 a year on average —three times as high as in the country as a whole. During the years since the administration at the GLC last changed, the rates burden or precept from the GLC has risen dramatically faster than other costs.

In referring to Lambeth council, I mention in passing the person who was elected for the Social Democratic party and then decided to put Labour back into control, so that the rates, instead of going down, went up by another 26 per cent. for the Lambeth element. The same thing happened to rates in the borough of Greenwich. Local council rates have gone up by 20 or 30 per cent. in a year, having gone up by about the same amount in the previous year. Such increases obviously add to the rates burden on employment in the stress areas of Lambeth and Newham. At the same time, they provide a false argument for the local councils and the GLC to require even more ratepayer's money to set up employment units and employment promotion, without considering the position of employers or asking, "What is an extra employee worth to you as an employer?"

It would be interesting if the hon. Gentleman and I were to go together to employers in my constituency or his and to ask, "What is a young school leaver worth to you as an employee?" The answer might be, "About £30 a week to begin with." Of that £30, a good proportion goes in rates and a good proportion may go in the employer's national insurance contribution. Some of it ends up in the gross pay of the employee, and some of it might be taken in tax, although not at the levels that we have talked about earlier. We always need to consider what is the benefit to the employer as well as the cost to the Government and the benefit to the employee.

Mr. Leighton

I take it that the hon. Gentleman is not suggesting that if a firm takes on two or three more workers its rates burden will increase. Surely the rate burden will remain static. If the rate burden is divided by the number of people within the work force and the work force increases the burden will decrease.

Mr. Bottomley

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. My economics degree is not a very good one, but I had to do a bit of arithmetic to get into university and I learnt a fair amount about average and marginal costs while I was there. In the days when Greenwich rates were not rising quickly and Lambeth rates were, employers moved their businesses from Lambeth to Greenwich. They are now moving their businesses from Greenwich to areas outside inner London. This is happening because of Greenwich rates, the ILEA precept and the GLC precept.

Scottish examination boards have made the useful proposal that we should try to set shorter time horizons and more appropriate ones for more children. In England and Wales we say to 40 per cent. of those entering secondary schools, "In five years time there are sets of public examinations called GCE 0-levels and CSE examinations. They are designed not for you but for the top 60 per cent. The top 40 per cent. will take 0-levels and CSEs will be taken by the 20 per cent. below them." In effect, we are saying to the less able, "Hang around here for five years. You will not get a great deal out of it that you will notice. There are no targets that you and your parents will recognise. For everything other than academic or normal school subjects we shall give you shorter time horizons with graded proficiency tests. In music you will start at grade 1 and move up. For swimming and life-saving you will start at bronze level and work up through silver and gold and on to other standards."

In the scouts, the brownies and the cubs, and even probably the woodcraft folk, one starts accumulating the results of little proficiency tests. Those who join those organisations know what their target will be. Whether those targets are achieved in six weeks or six months is not material. Each member knows what he is striving for and knows when he has achieved it. Everyone knows what is going on. That applies in almost every area of life except straightforward education at school, and that is stupid. This has been allowed to continue because too many of the decisions have been made by professionals as professionals and not by professionals looking at the system through the eyes and experience of ordinary families.

There are schools where a different approach has been adopted. One of the best primary schools in my constituency is called Alderwood, which is one of the larger primary schools left in London. It attracts many children from outside its normal catchment area because it is a good structured school. I remember being told that each year each child was considered in three different ways—teacher assessment, reading age and IQ. If a discrepancy is found between these three necessarily imprecise measuring yardsticks, a conference is held in which consideration is given to how to raise the child's performance in the other two areas to the highest level.

The school is trying to build a structure that leads to improvement and to raised expectations, which is the main job of Parliament in considering the needs of young people. It is also the job of young people, their families and all others who have direct contact with them. I should like to see my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science considering graded proficiency tests more seriously. The tests should be taken throughout secondary education and possibly during primary education and should not be restricted to 15 plus or 16 plus.

One of my children attended a primary school which gave a hymn book to each child for use during school assembly when he or she had learnt to read. Virtually every child had a hymn book by the age of eight There was none of this business of not being able to read on leaving primary school. The expectation existed among the children as well as among the staff and the parents. There may have been some mild competiton which led to some children saying, "I got my hymn book when I was seven and a half and you had to wait until you were eight." That was preferable to having 15 per cent. of children leaving primary school unable to read. All these things are preparatory to being worth while as an employee and to developing the habits of success.

I learnt from a Church of England Children's Society family centre — this was duplicated by a superb organisation called ATD 4th World — that too many families never experience success. Members of Parliament may find difficulty in discussing this topic, as we were all successful about a month ago. We have all cleared a number of hurdles. We have failed occasionally, but on the whole we experience a fair amount of success. It is important for us to realise that many families do not, and accordingly we must build up opportunities for success and the experience of it.

Some time ago William Temple discussed the importance of intermediate organisations in his book entitled "Christianity and Social Order". He was concerned with trying to help people through their natural associations beyond the family. This is not purely a family responsibility and nor is it purely a state responsibility. Building up people's chances of success and achievement depends most on what takes place outside the family at the next level of organisation, which may be a school, a community association or a trade union. We need to talk far more about the contribution that these organisations can make. That is why I helped to create Family Forum, which was designed to improve the chances of success and achievement locally and nationally.

There are two contrasting attitudes on what parents should be doing with their children. George Bernard Shaw said that children should see their parents as they really are and that the first duty a parent owes his child is to avoid hypocrisy. Another person, whose name I forget, said that all parents try to bring up their children well but they face the problem that all children are natural mimics. We need to examine our own behaviour as much as the behaviour of the apparently younger generation, which so often causes trouble and which so often we fail.

I believe strongly in family experience and in gaining from the experience of others without having to go through all the troubles that faced previous generations. I believe strongly in example, which I think should be set for all those young people with whom we come into contact. All employers should take advantage of Government schemes designed to alleviate youth unemployment. Schools should set an example in trying to show that there is a natural progression towards useful employment, and I think that more could be done in that area.

Finally, I believe strongly in the value of exhortation. We should be able to come to the House, as the hon. Member for Newham, North-East has done, to say that what is going on is not satisfactory, that the House cannot ignore the problems and that it must return to them more and more often. We have the duty as well as the opportunity to say to families that they have control in many of the areas to which I have referred. We must put it to them that they have a duty to set a high standard of expectation as well as encouraging the children for whom they are caring.

10.28 am

Mr. Charles Kennedy (Ross, Cromarty and Skye)

Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for recognising me on this the occasion of my maiden speech. I think that the House, and especially the hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton), will agree that it is appropriate that I should deliver my maiden speech during a debate on the future of the younger generation. As fate would have it, I find myself the youngest Member of this distinguished House. I hope that the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) will find it interesting to witness a live specimen of today's subject matter.

Although the younger generation is a concern of the present and even more so of the future, as the new Member for the new constituency of Ross, Cromarty and Skye I find myself deeply aware and conscious of the past and of those who have preceded me in representing the old constituency of Ross and Cromarty. As many Liberal Members will be aware, it was represented from 1964 to 1970 by the late Alasdair Mackenzie, who was a distinguished and highly thought of Member of this place during his time in it.

From 1970 until this election it was represented by the Conservative Member, Mr. Hamish Gray. I congratulate him on his peerage and movement to another place. I congratulate him equally on his appointment as Minister of State at the Scottish Office. As many know, there was considerable interest and, indeed, controversy not just in the Highlands but in Scotland generally about his appointment. I am optimistic and encouraged by what happened to Lord Gray, and I hope that it sets a trend by the Government. I hope that 3 million people, many of whom lost their jobs largely as a result of Government policies, will shortly be placed, as a result of Prime Ministerial decision, in much better jobs.

One figure who is certainly not a name or force of the past but very much of the present, to the extent that he is sitting behind me, is my hon. Friend who was the hon. Member for Inverness—with the boundary changes parts of his constituency have been moved into Ross, Cromarty and Skye — and who is now the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn and Lochaber (Mr. Johnston). I pay tribute to him and promise that I will try to follow in his footsteps with the diligence that he has shown to the parts of his former constituency that I have inherited.

William Lyon Mackenzie King, who was Prime Minister of Canada, once said that the problem with that country was that it had too much geography and not enough history. The problem with my constituency is that it has more than its fair share of both. My constituency and the Highlands generally have had more than their fair share of a bad deal in recent years in their chances and opportunities, especially for the younger generation.

A perennial problem that has faced the Scottish Highlands is that, time and again, too many of the more talented young people have had to move elsewhere—even abroad — through a lack of opportunities that should have been available. In the 1960s we believed that there was a golden opportunity for that part of the country. However, under the previous Conservative Government's policies that golden opportunity has turned to dross, largely as a result of the Government's economic approach and social disregard. The pulp mill in Fort William has been closed. In my constituency, the Invergordon smelter closed and, more recently, there have been lost opportunities with the abandonment of the gas-gathering project, although there are still strong signs that that project should go ahead.

Despite their vast majority and the convincing lead, which they will have for the next four or five years, in the Division Lobbies, the Government must display greater sensitivity to the problems of the Highlands, and especially of its young people. I make that sincere plea on behalf of my constituents. The alliance will work constructively during this Parliament to assist and support, with any help that the Government can give, the Highlands and this group of its people. One example of a scheme that will provide job opportunities is the Ben Wyvis development. I hope that the Secretary of State for Scotland's comments on financial commitment will be supported and that we shall see a more pragmatic and less doctrinaire approach from the Government to the traditional concerns of the Highlands, such as farming, fishing and forestry.

In the few short weeks since I was elected the Forestry Commission has proposed to sell Ratagan forest in Glenelg. That is a product of the constraints that have been placed on the commission by the Government. There is considerable local opposition to the proposed sale, and I hope that the Government will rethink their attitude and take stock generally of the problems faced by the forestry, fishing and farming interests in the Highlands. Young people, hoping to enter those industries, have been discouraged. The hon. Member for Newham, North-East will agree that our subject for debate is extremely relevant to my constituency. It is fair to demand more pragmatism and constructive thinking of the Government.

I have two basic observations, which I formulated during my election campaign, on the attitudes of young people. I know that other right hon. and hon. Members reached the same conclusions during the constituency campaigns. First, there is a yawning gap in outlook between those who have a job and those who have not. Some Ministers are fond of talking about a return to Victorian values. We must realise that those Victorian values are being expressed by some of the younger people in this society in shameful and disturbing disregard for other members of their generation who are not as fortunate as they are in having a job. That is disturbing for a Government of any political complexion. The yawning gulf is becoming wider as, each month, the unemployment total increases. I hope that the Government will take cognisance of that during this Parliament.

My second observation is relevant to my party and the Liberal party. We have heard much from the Liberal and Social Democratic parties, and I do not doubt that we shall hear even more in future, about the iniquities of our electoral system. Under the present system many people are effectively disfranchised—the Whip will be pleased to know that I will not comment on that today. However, voluntary disfranchisement is also taking place. During my campaign people of my age and younger said consistently that they would not vote because their votes simply no longer matter and because no Government or Member of Parliament cared a whit about their problems and their striving for employment. That is disturbing for all of the parties and all hon. Members. Those who will contribute most to British democracy in the future are extricating themselves from the system already because they believe that it is no longer relevant. Part of the solution to that is electoral reform, but even more urgent is the need for a more tolerant, caring and compassionate Government. Sadly, we do not have that at the moment. I hope— I say this to the Minister in a constructive fashion—that we shall have it in due course.

To involve young people and make sure that the system is more relevant to them in Scotland, we have a clear obligation to implement a policy of home rule. Lord Home said not so many years ago that there was a genuine grass roots desire in Scotland for more decisions to be taken by the Scots. If that were implemented and the Government made a compromise or concession on that issue, young people in Scotland, and in the Highlands as much as anywhere else, would feel more affected by and therefore more involved in our political institutions. Home rule was supported by voters across a broad spectrum of parties in Scotland, which received significantly more support than the Conservative party. It is a legitimate demand, which is backed up in the ballot box. I hope that if the Government care about the younger generation they will see it as a way forward and a means to improve young people's involvement in our political institutions.

The hon. Member for Eltham alluded to this. Throughout Britain over the past few years there has been a considerable decline in our fortunes. There has been a considerable decline in manufacturing, matched by a lost generation of younger people who are now unemployed and who, in terms of training and skill, might be fated to be classed as unemployable. The great sadness about the economic policy of the past four years is that when the recession bottoms out and when the world economy begins to pick up, we shall not have a skilled work force of the right age group to take advantage of it. That, coupled with the manufacturing decline and the rundown and closing down of industry, will mean that we shall lack the right blend of manpower and machinery to capitalise, as we should, on the improvements in our economic fortunes.

Equally important is that there is surely a moral responsibility for any Government and any Parliament to try to represent legitimate interests. What interests could be more legitimate than the interests of the younger generation who represent the country's future? Yet, despite the best-laid plans of mice and even Ministers on youth training and youth opportunities, there is not enough for young people. That undermines the moral basis of government. It undermines respect for and participation in the democratic process. As a result of both those present tendencies, there is a disturbing implication for the country's social, political and economic future. I feel most strongly about that and I urge the Government sincerely to address their priorities to the matter during this Parliament.

I hope that the Government will take heed because, if they do not, many Opposition Members will continue to remind them of it. I hope that, as the leader of my party said in his recent speech in the House, the Government will succeed in their objectives because that is in all our interests. It is from that constructive position that we approach the whole issue and from which I give my wholehearted support to the motion of the hon. Member for Newham, North-East.

10.43 am

Sir Nicholas Bonsor (Upminster)

It gives me sincere pleasure to congratulate the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) on his maiden speech, which was an outstanding contribution to the debate. It showed a deep sincerity of purpose and was a well-balanced view of the problems that face this country. I cannot go along entirely with everything he said, particularly some of the less well-founded allegations against the Government—although I might have a word or two of criticism for them myself. None the less, what the hon. Gentleman said about the need for a close review of the employment opportunities for young people is well founded. He will discover when he has been in the House for a little longer that compassion and sincerity of feeling is not entirely confined to Opposition Benches and that many Conservative Members and Members of the Government have a deep concern about the unemployment trend that has been going on for so long.

The hon. Gentleman mentioned his noble predecessor. I hope that as his political philosophies mature he will find himself sitting next to me on the Conservative Benches and in due course sitting without me in the other place. As I have said, his speech was excellent. It had two somewhat unusual merits. It was brief and to the point, and it was entertaining. I shall probably proceed to demonstrate that that is not always so in speeches in the Chamber.

We need to consider employment problems in perspective. One of the most important aspects is to realise that the causes of high unemployment do not lie at the Government's door nor are directly and wholly the result of the recent recession. The problems are of greater standing. They have been with us since the second world war. When one considers the trend of unemployment during that period, one can divine the cause for the continuing and inexorable rise. The cause is not to be properly laid at the door of successive Governments presiding over this country while the rise has occurred, because it has been largely beyond their control. The fact that this country was the first into the industrial revolution and therefore relied more heavily than most other countries upon huge manufacturing plants with huge assembly line methods, which were highly demanding of manpower, contributed largely to the additional weight of the problem that this country has faced, compared with others.

Now that the technologies of manufacturing industries are changing so radically, I should like to draw hon. Members' attention to the comparative figures of the contribution to the economy of large firms compared to our European competitors. That is the underlying source of our present problem. In 1976, which is the latest statistical date that I managed to get my hands on at short notice, 77.4 per cent. of large firms contributed to employment, compared with 47.9 per cent. in Denmark, 52.7 per cent. in Italy, 52.2 per cent. in the Netherlands, 56.6 per cent. in Germany and 65.8 per cent. in France. Therefore, as a contributor to our national employment, the small business sector, which has been continuously run down over the years, cannot in percentage terms offer the employment opportunities that its counterparts in other countries offer. It is worth noting that in 1935 36 per cent. of employment was offered by small industries and by 1976 the figure had sunk to 22.6 per cent. That is a major factor in the slowness of the recovery in employment opportunities.

Against that background, how do we see the future of job opportunities to younger people? We shall have to take a radical and new approach to the problem of employment if we are to offer our citizens over the next three or four decades adequate job incentives and opportunities to have satisfying and fulfilling lives. Because of the large number of people in this country and because manufacturing trends change so much even when we come out of the recession, even when our industries are competitive and fully mobilised again and when the world markets pick up, we shall still not be able to offer enough full-time job opportunities to keep the majority of the population in full-time work.

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister and his colleagues at the Department of Employment will consider closely the position of the part-time employed. As the House is all too well aware, there is a large black economy of people drawing unemployment benefit and then popping round the corner to supplement their benefit by doing jobs that are not declared to the Revenue, thus achieving a better standard of living than they otherwise could. The black economy has two damaging effects. It is bad for the country because it deprives it of revenue to which it is entitled; and it encourages people to break the law. It is also bad for the people involved, as most of them are law-abiding citizens who do not like to break the law and who feel profound guilt about their actions.

A lady in my constituency wrote to me last week that, having earned about £8 per week in part-time employment in the past three years, she had just realised to her great dismay that she should have declared those earnings because they exceeded the amount that she was entitled to earn while still receiving supplementary benefit. Being honest and honourable, she wrote to the Department and declared those earnings. Not surprisingly, given the strict rules by which the bureaucracy of this country is run, she received a bill for £285 for back payments. Naturally, she did not have such a sum. Luckily, however, a member of her family came to her aid and made the repayment for her. Nevertheless, it is appalling that a person who earns such a modest amount in addition to supplementary benefit should be asked to repay such a sum, given the present great difficulty of finding full-time employment.

If people made redundant or otherwise rendered unemployed are to be encouraged to use their initiative to get out of the house and do something useful, it is surely wrong that the fiscal system should be geared against making it worth their while unless they can become fully employed. The possibilities for part-time employment should be thoroughly examined in the next few years, especially in the service industries where the greatest opportunities for new employment lie. The service industries employ 9 million out of the 21.5 million full-time employed and the number of declared part-time employed in that sector, excluding the black economy, is 3.75 million.

As many hon. Members have said, a major problem of unemployment is its effect on morale and self-respect. That is the most important element that the House must consider and the Government must face. It is wrong that people who, through no fault of their own, cannot find full-time employment should be forced by the state benefit system to remain entirely unoccupied. It is immensely debilitating and demoralising for the unemployed person, whatever his age, and for his family. I hope, therefore, that we shall try to find ways, through tax and other incentives, to encourage people who are made redundant, especially those over 45, to look to return to employment, not necessarily full-time employment in which their age and experience give them the edge and thus make it more difficult for young people to find employment. If older people are encouraged to take up part-time employment and their earnings are adequately topped up by the state benefit system, it may be possible to realign our society so that all its members have fulfilling and satisfying jobs—not necessarily full time—to help them look after their families and to give them a worthwhile reason for living. In other words, we must move horn the concept of full-time employment to a mixed economy of full-time and part-time employment.

The Government must also consider the incentives for the service industries. Many admirable steps that the Government have taken to assist manufacturing industry have not been extended to the service sector. In particular, industrial building allowances and many EC grants are available to manufacturing industry but not to the service sector where there are more opportunities to create jobs.

It is sad that young people in this country seem to have a block against seeking part-time or full-time employment in the service sector. When I visited the United States two years ago I was struck by the number of young people studying part time, often well advanced in medical, accountancy or legal courses, and working part time in restaurants and other leisure areas. That seldom happens here. I cannot recall when I was last served in a restaurant by a student earning money to help to pay for his studies.

Young people in this country seem reluctant to start at the bottom of an industry and to work their way to the top, and all too often they are encouraged in hat attitude by the Opposition. Far too much has been made of the need to pay full wages to young people doing jobs for which they are not qualified, in which they have no experience and which they do not intend to undertake full time.

I agreed with much of what the hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton) said, but he criticised the youth training scheme as a means of obtaining cheap labour. A 17-year-old with absolutely no experience receives a great deal of training. The employer must spend a great deal of time and, indirectly, money, and he does not receive full value for it. It is wrong to insist—here the trade unions have a great responsibility—that such young people should receive the same full-time wage as skilled employees.

We must recognise the need to train young people and to pay them wages that match their skill and contribution. Here, as elsewhere, the youth training scheme is useful. I commend what the Government are trying to achieve in this immensely difficult area. The youth opportunities scheme introduced in 1979, with subsequent amendments, was a venture into new territory. Naturally enough, some errors were made and false paths followed , but the scheme as a whole will give young people training and new skills and allow them to discover what real life and employment are all about after school, and to make up their minds what they want to do. My regret about the youth training scheme is that it has only a small element of military service.

Anyone who dares whisper the phrase "national service" is immediately accused of extreme Right-wing tendencies and blimpish desires. But it is worth saying that we are the only major European country without compulsory military training for its young men. We are also gravely under-staffed in our requirements for home defence. Most of our reserve Army forces are earmarked to go to Europe in the event of war as a backup for the regular Army. They would leave an entirely inadequate force at home to defend our main structures, to look after the needs of the civilian population, who not unnaturally by then would be in substantial disarray, and to provide a defence force against any invader.

A compulsory but part-time period of military service for our young men of 17 and 18 is desirable. It would have a substantial effect on the overall deterrent value of our defence system. It would also be extremely valuable in helping young people to adapt to a disciplined system of service to others. One of the main faults of our society is that the old family unit has been allowed to collapse. The discipline and respect which that unit and the schools which backed it up used to give by leading by example have been allowed to decay.

I have no doubt that the collapse of the family, the affection and the demonstration of love, the discipline and the guidance which naturally go with that affection are at the root of many of our problems. People used to be taught that each member of a family had rights but also duties to other members of the family, and that has decayed.

The feeling of belonging and the pride that people used to have in belonging to schools has largely gone. The leadership that was given by teachers is sadly lacking in many areas—though not in all; there are still many admirable schools. But in localities where crime rates are rising fast and in the areas of greatest deprivation lack of leadership at school and home is one of the main causes of the deprivation to which the hon. Member for Newham, North-East referred.

There is no doubt that deprivation is one of the main causes of the breakdown of law and order and the rising crime rate among the young. But it is deprivation of affection and guidance and not deprivation of the colour television, the fast car and the ability to take part in the consumer society which in my view is behind the collapse of law and order and respect for the society in which our younger generation live.

Military service can be extremely useful, not because of square-bashing, bullying or forcing people to take part in activities in which they have no interest, but in giving people, sometimes for the first time, the feeling of belonging and of pride in belonging.

I served on a voluntary basis, because I was too young to be part of our military forces compulsorily, in the Territorial Army. At one time I was in charge of my regiment's operations in Slough. One of our difficulties in setting up a new unit was enticing people to serve with us. In the company of my sergeants I used to go into local pubs trying to get young men to join us on a voluntary basis. Some of the young men who came into my office were fairly eccentric in military terms. Many of them wore heavily studded Hell's Angels jackets and had the irritating habit of putting their feet on my desk as they talked to me. Some had hair which nearly reached their waists. Many of them did not conform in any way to the kind of society that I wanted to see.

Mr. Frank Dobson (Holborn and St. Pancras)

And they were only the officers!

Sir Nicholas Bonsor

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman made that comment, because some of them became officers. When they were persuaded to join it was remarkable to see the change which came over them. For the first time they had an organisation to which they could be proud to belong. They had a uniform to wear and could identify themselves with it, as opposed to the studded jackets which were the unofficial uniform of the group which they had left. They conformed remarkably quickly to our system and to the rules and regulations which are a necessary part of any military unit. Some of those who looked most unlikely turned out to make the best soldiers in the unit.

There are enormous untapped resources for an expansion of military service on a part-time and preferably voluntary basis as part of the youth training scheme. I ask my hon. Friend and his fellow Ministers to look closely again at the possibility of introducing a much wider military training scheme as part of their youth training operations.

There seems to be a sad lack in many areas of any liaison between our education system and the industrial sector, in which I include service industries as well as manufacturing industries. About four or five years ago I talked to a seminar on the subject attended by teachers in the midlands. I was horrified to be told by the head teacher of a local school that he had written to 43 major local companies saying that he had some pupils of 16 and 17 who had finished their exams but were remaining at school for a year, that he had no suitable course for them and that he wanted advice from local industrialists about how those young people could be most usefully employed. To the 43 letters, he had two replies. The first said that education was the job of the teacher and had nothing to do with the industrialist. The other gave a little offer of help and advice. That was an appallingly low response to a very worthwhile effort.

Much can be done not only by direct Government intervention but by industrialists, individually or through their organisations, to guide schools into the areas where they can most usefully teach children skills likely to give them a better opportunity to get the jobs available when they leave school. Some steps have been taken in that direction, but much more can be done.

My hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) reminded us of the problems of numeracy and literacy, and I endorse what he said about the necessary standards of education. It can be some slight consolation to us to know that in America the standards of numeracy and literacy in most states are considerably worse than ours. But it is appalling that any child without obvious disability should be allowed to go from primary to secondary education without being able to read or do basic arithmetic. This is a great failing in our education system; the Minister should study it closely in the coming years to see what can be done to improve standards, both educational and moral, in our primary schools.

I do not despair. I am sure that we have a great future. But unless we look with new eyes at our employment problems and at the opportunities that we can give future generations we shall fail to provide the necessary incentives and structures for them so that they may enjoy the fruits of the nation's prosperity.

11.8 am

Mr. Tom Cox (Tooting)

I welcome this debate, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton) on introducing this subject. Without doubt, it is one of the major issues facing the country.

I speak this morning as a Member who represents an inner London constituency. I accept that young people throughout the United Kingdom have problems, but people in the inner cities face greater problems than those in other areas of the country. We often have a decaying infrastructure. We have no jobs. We often have poor housing and few, if any, amenities. That lack of provision has inevitable results.

Many hon. Members, irrespective of party, who represent city constituencies know from our discussions with young poeple that three issues quickly arise: employment and apprenticeships for youngsters so that they may learn a trade or profession; the lack of leisure amenities, whether football pitches, open spaces, clubs, meeting places, and so on; and racism. We in this House and people outside criticise youngsters. One has only to read the daily press to see the criticisms made by the older generation of youngsters. Until there is meaningful employment, youngsters will and certainly do feel totally neglected. They often feel let down by authority, and it is my opinion that they have been let down.

I accept what the hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) said in his interesting speech. Unfortunately, he is not in the Chamber. The role of family life is a matter on which he often talks in the House. I recall that towards the end of last year, on a Friday, he introduced a debate on that topic, and I too spoke on that occasion. I accept much of what he said about the role and obligations of families. He represents a London constituency. I am sure he will realise that, no matter how strong the family links, if the young members of a family cannot get work there is an enormous strain on the loyalty within that family. Mums and dads suffer terrible problems. They say to their youngsters, "Have patience. Things will improve", while their youngsters go out day after day, week after week, trying to find employment, without success.

For many years youngsters have been told the same thing. I am sure that we have all heard it. We have been to schools on prize days and speech days and heard either the head or the guest speaker saying to the youngsters there, "Work hard at school, pay attention, get good examination results, because that will be your base for meaningful, responsible and well-paid employment." We know that many youngsters are very committed to taking up the opportunities that modern education presents. They do that, only to find that after they leave school they have no job to go to.

Five or six years ago it was a rare event for parents to come to my advice service to ask whether there was any way in which I could possibly help their youngsters to find employment. Now it happens week after week, and I am certain that this evening mums and dads will come to my advice service and say, "My youngster has left school and we have been trying to get him a job. What can you as a local Member of Parliament do?" Sadly, there is very little that I can do. It is a problem that thousands of youngsters in every area of the country now face. We heard this morning that even youngsters with good academic results face enormous problems in finding employment, so what chance is there for the less able to get a job?

Youngsters do not accept the argument that we have heard from the Government during the past three or four years—"Well, there are serious economic problems. Although we would like to do more, we do not have the money." The youngsters do not accept that. Nor do they accept that we do not have the ability to create employment if we wish to do so. They see things in a simplistic way. They say to me, "You, as a Member of Parliament, whether or not you support Government policies, say that the Government cannot do more for us because of the economic problems that face the country, but where were the economic problems of this country a year ago when we were forced, virtually overnight, to find enormous sums of money to fight a war in the Falklands? Where was the money to assemble the military force that went to the Falklands? Where was the money that we are now having to find for the continuing costs?"

We have been told in the House recently about the costs of the airfield. We know about the costs of sending and keeping troops in the Falklands. We know about the costs of materials. The youngsters say to me— and I accept what they say— "We are told by the Government that they understand our problems and are doing all that they can to help us, but the economic problems are one reason why they cannot do more, yet at the same time, when they need to, they manage to find enormous sums of money." The problems that youngsters face in the areas where they live and the Government's efforts to try to resolve those problems do not square with the way that the Government tried to solve the problems that followed the invasion of the Falklands.

There is one matter that has not been mentioned this morning. Since the June election we have had a series of statements in the House, and the new Chancellor of the Exchequer has come to the Dispatch Box to tell us about further cutbacks. That means that the problems will get worse. I accept that the problems will affect all parts of the country, but I know that again the inner cities will suffer most from the cutbacks. Indeed, to judge from the comments in the press, this is only one stage in the Chancellor's cutbacks in public expenditure over the next year or so.

For young people, the situation is clear. They leave school and there is no work for them. At the same time, they get no help in the communities where they live to spend their leisure time as they would wish. I know, as I am sure many other hon. Members do, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-East said, that youngsters see no reason to get out of bed when there is no job to go to. Moreover, certainly in areas like mine, they have no centres where they can spend their leisure time in a meaningful way. I am told that the modern shopping centres often become the meeting place for unemployed youngsters, because there is nowhere else for them to spend their time. Nevertheless, certainly in south London, I know that unemployed youngsters are crying out for places where they can meet their friends and where they can either learn, develop hobbies, play music or just meet and chat with one another.

When, as has happened in my area, and I am sure in many others, application is made to local authorities for some grant-aid either to rent or adapt property or to provide equipment, they say that they do not have any money. Many of those who make such applications are local people with a commitment to help young people. The statements that we have heard in the House since the general election from the Chancellor of the Exchequer and other Ministers mean that such problems will worsen because there is not the money to provide the necessary facilities.

Wandsworth, the borough which I represent, has over 14,000 people out of work. The latest analysis of job availability at the local jobcentres shows that there are about 300 job vacancies. I do not have a breakdown of that figure of 14,000 into the various age groups, but I know, from questions that I have asked in the House, that 4,000 or 5,000 are young people. The point that I am making about lack of facilities for such young people is very relevant in areas such as mine.

I try to be realistic and say that, while people may complain about Wandsworth, many other hon. Members can complain equally about similar problems in their areas. Over the past four or five years London has lost 278,000 jobs. More than 500 factories have closed, leading not just to a loss of jobs, but to a loss of opportunities as well. Apprenticeships, particularly in the large cities, depend on large industry. As those factories have closed there has been a sad loss of apprenticeships for young people.

A GLC economic policy group recently suggested that by 1990 there could be 550,000 people out of work in Greater London. I hope that that is wrong, but we must be realistic. All hon. Members who represent London, whether Labour or Conservative, are seeing the continuing closure of factories and loss of employment in this capital city of ours. There are now 348,000 people out of work in Greater London and on the basis of that GLC report in another seven years, if the present trend continues, there could be another 200,000 out of work.

It is obvious that, as more and more people become unemployed, so the opportunity for young people to find meaningful work becomes more and more difficult. If the Minister visits areas such as that which I represent and meets people of all ages, especially young people, he will quickly hear of their utter despair. They will tell him, as they tell me, of the position in which they find themselves.

One can always criticise education. Sadly, because of the economic position and the lack of job opportunities, teachers now have an enormously difficult job in trying to maintain and create interest for youngsters in their schools. They often say that it is all right for me but that I should go and do their job and try to create interest among children who look at them and say, "That is all very well, but what are our chances of getting a job?" Few hon. Members would have thought, a few years ago, that it would become the schools' role to teach young people what to do when they left school, to make sure that they would be able to go to the right office to claim the right kind of benefit. What an indictment of our society that that is now happening. I give credit to schools for doing that, because if they did not, what a dilemma young people would find themselves in when they had to find out where to go to sign on and get their benefits.

It is easy to criticise schools, but since 1979 the Government's policies have not made the role of teachers any easier. The policies of the previous Government, the debate on the Queen's Speech and statements that have been made over the past month show that there will not be any major shift in Government policy on this crucial issue. This will create further despair for those who live in areas such as the one I represent and live in.

There are now hon. Members in the House who are still members of the Greater London council and we may start to hear a little about its achievements rather than the scandalous attacks that we have heard, week in and week out, over the past four or five years. The efforts of the GLC over the past two years have been praiseworthy. Not only has it kept factories open; it has created employment. It has invested over £ 1 million in 30 different industrial projects throughout London, which has created about 500 jobs.

In my area of south London, some 40 years since the last war, an old bomb site that was so small that no one believed it could be used for anything has been developed by the GLC for two small industrial workshop units. That has not created a great deal of employment, but it has created some. It has given hope to people, who can see that something constructive is taking place within their area. Derelict sites which had not been used for years are now being turned into small industrial projects for the benefit of those who live in the community. That is the sort of development that we need.

The Minister will know that, throughout London, there are enormous areas of unused derelict land. The sad thing is that many of them are now being snapped up by developers, and I am sure that the Government will help those people. The developments will consist of luxury accommodation or office blocks and the industrial development that much of London needs will not be carried out. The great problem for the GLC is that its commitment will be brought to an end because of a lack of finance and grant from central Government. That money is needed to allow the GLC to develop and extend the projects that it wishes to see carried out, and it is sad that that should be the Government's approach.

The Minister who initiated the debate last week on youth training is in the Chamber today. I read the report of that debate in Hansard with great interest and found that there was much to commend it. I accept that the one thing that we must have is modern and efficient training for people of all ages, and particularly for the young. However, at the end of that training there must be jobs. The bulk of the population still live in our cities, and, despite all the training that may have been made available to young people, we shall still lack jobs if there are no industrial projects there.

The Minister of State, Department of Employment (Mr. Peter Morrison)

The hon. Gentleman said that young people must have jobs at the end of their training. If he reads carefully the report of last Friday's debate, he will appreciate that I said that if we had a better-trained work force we would be more competitive and that there would be the likelihood of more jobs, because goods and services would be provided at a quality and cost that would make them attractive both to the hon. Gentleman and to me, and to many consumers. I hope that the hon. Gentleman understands— although I do not think that the leader of the GLC does — that the only way to provide jobs is by selling goods and services.

Mr. Cox

I thank the Minister for those remarks and I do not disagree with many of them. As a member of the London group, I meet the leader of the GLC, and the Minister should not believe all that he reads in the press about Mr. Livingstone's views. My point is that the GLC is actively trying to create employment in London. That development is being hampered by a lack of finance as a result of the cuts inflicted by the Government on the GLC and many other authorities. I am sure that the leader of the GLC would make that point even more forcefully than I have done to the Minister.

Perhaps I can illustrate the point that I am trying to make as a Member of Parliament for inner London by referring to the comments in the Scarman report. Lord Scarman investigated the civil disorders in Brixton and in his report he said, among other important and interesting things, that in a deprived inner city area where unemployment, especially among the young, was high, and hopes were low, that the social problem was that of the difficulties, both social and economic, which beset communities which lived and worked in our inner city areas.

Those comments do more to highlight the disastrous Government policies that London Members of Parliament have to suffer from— such as the cuts announced in Parliament only recently— than anything we could say. None will suffer more than the young, and that is why it is important to make that point time and again.

In the past couple of weeks, those hon. Members who have been in Parliament for some years have seen far more activity than ever before. Great effort was put into Wednesday's debate on capital punishment by both the Government and hon. Members. I do not decry the importance of debating that subject, but I wish that as much effort was put into tackling the issue before us today. If more effort were exerted, we could perhaps be more confident about the future.

I do not believe that any hon. Member or member of the public should forget the civil disorders of 1981. They were only a couple of years ago, but I often think that people have already forgotten them. A few months after the disorders the then Secretary of State for the Environment ran all around the country promising great hope for the inner city areas of, for example, Liverpool and London. The Government are no longer committed to or interested in that. I come from south London, and I know that if we continue to ignore the calls for help from people of all ages, and particularly from the young— because they were led to believe that there was a code for them to follow that was likely to ensure them a future— we should not be surprised if they start to rebel. They believe that the authorities— whether Parliament or local government— have forgotten them and have neglected their responsibilities towards them.

A debate such as this gives us a chance to draw the attention of the Ministers responsible to the deep concern that exists. Indeed, that concern has already been expressed today. I therefore hope that there will be some meaningful response from the Government in the near future. We now have the chance to avoid further civil disorders, and if we do not take it we shall have to clear up the destruction that they will sadly and tragically bring about. That is the choice facing Parliament. I hope that the Government will respond quickly to the problems and difficulties that have been related in this debate by hon. Members on both sides of the House.

11.38 am

Mr. Roger Gale (Thanet, North)

I have listened to the debate with growing incredulity. The hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton) asked what allegiance young people would owe to the mother of Parliaments. Any who witness this debate, who hear excerpts broadcast or who, by chance, read it in Hansard, will gain the impression of a Phyllosan generation at its most patronising. By that I do not mean to be offensive because I shall join the Phyllosan generation next week. Listening to the debate one would think that out there is a depressed, deprived, depraved subculture called the younger generation. I do not believe that to be true. The debate has lacked any sense of proportion.

I have been fortunate in the last five or six years to spend most of my time working professionally with young people. I have visited every further education establishment, all the major youth clubs, many work experience schemes and day centres in Greater London, in the 10 home counties and in inner London. I have also visited Liverpool and Glasgow and some areas of the west country that might be described by some as deprived. I have been fortunate to experience and witness life, vitality, enthusiasm and an enormous capacity for enjoyment and for making the best of whatever circumstances are going.

I am not making light of some of the serious concerns to which young people address themselves. The hon. Member for Tooting (Mr. Cox) said that the prime topics of conversation of young people he met were employment, leisure — and the lack of provision of either — and racism. I do not want to introduce too much levity into the debate, but, to bowdlerise Ian Duty, my experience is that the prime topics of conversation among young people are sex, films and rock and roll. That priority, in context, is right.

Young people have enormous enthusiasm, a sense of competition and a desire to get on and do something. No hon. Member this morning has said that there is not a depressed, depraved or deprived minority out there, but hundreds of thousands of young people, some of whom are unemployed, in further education or in jobs, but most of whom—including many of the unemployed— are getting on and doing worthwhile things.

When I started making the programmes that I was lucky enough to make for young people, I conducted a survey on a proper market research basis and discovered that advice was the thing which was most lacking and for which there was most demand among this special class of humans. That was what they wanted most from the media. I found that sad. The real lack of advice begins in the home. My hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor) mentioned that earlier. There has been a breakdown in family support in recent years. Young people have substituted various forms of less than satisfactory advice from the schools.

One of the most severe criticisms of the education system is the standard of careers advice. The job prospects for young people are not as good in some areas as they might be, but many of the kids to whom I have been privileged to talk do not even know where they want to go. At far too late an age they are given far too little advice, usually by the wrong people.

There are some honourable exceptions— it would be wrong to make a universal criticism— but in far too many establishments the advice is too little, too late. It is little use suggesting to a 15 or 16-year-old who is about to embark on a career that he has taken the wrong exams. We must address ourselves to that problem. If we are to talk seriously about job prospects we must talk about preparing young people for the jobs that they may want.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster said, young people should be encouraged to enter the service industries. In America and other countries service is not frowned upon and to be a mechanic or a waiter in a restaurant is not considered demeaning. The waiter in a restaurant today may own the restaurant tomorrow and a chain of restaurants the day after. That is seen as proper, but in Britain it is not.

Mr. Dobson

Is the hon. Gentleman really saying that every young American has a Howard Johnson wallet in his pocket? That is an absurd idea.

Mr. Gale

I am saying that many young British people are achievers who believe in getting out and doing things, who are running their own businesses, who wish to own their own homes and who are going about it without state help. They are not sitting at home and crying, "No one is giving me a job." They are going out and creating jobs for themselves. That is right.

The Government should give young people encouragement to do that. One will find jobs in any jobcentre, but there will be no advice on how to employ oneself, how to set up a service industry. If a young person wants to set himself up in business, the prospect is daunting. It involves red tape but little advice is readily available. The advice is there, but it has to be winkled out. No one can tell me that large numbers of young people are not going out and doing just that. A great deal more of it can and should be done, with our encouragement. Hon. Members on both sides should consider ways of offering that encouragement, instead of scoffing.

Mr. Peter Morrison

I am sure that my hon Friend is aware of the enterprise allowance scheme which starts at the beginning of August on a nation-wide basis, after the success of pilot projects. That scheme will cover young people as well as middle-aged people not least because the small firms unit in the Department of Industry will be able to give exactly the advice that we should like young people to have.

Mr. Gale

That is the type of scheme that I was thinking about. In my experience, advice is lacking. It is all very well to have a scheme but unless we sell it, publicise it and make it easy to understand, however good the scheme, it will not be used. Properly publicised, the scheme will succeed.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-East chose to rubbish the youth training scheme. We should be supporting that type of broad apprenticeship. For too long, apprenticeship in Britain has meant a long indenture. Unlike our competitors, for far too long we have not had any real job training, on a lower level and broader base than the traditional apprenticeship. We have been hidebound, as much of today's argument has been.

It is encouraging that a broader range of opportunities is being brought into proper training and that it is possible to have an apprenticeship in something fairly mundane. There is no shame in that. An employer can ask a youngster about his work experience. I do not mean that in a derogatory sense; I refer to the experience of getting up in the morning, going to work, arriving by a certain time, doing something all day, leaving at the end of the day and so on. Such work also provides the opportunity to appreciate leisure. Rather than knocking the youth training scheme, Opposition Members should have the wit and the courage to support it.

There has been a request for a Minister with responsibility for youth. We do not need a Ministry to cater for our young. We must address ourselves to specific concerns such as advice. When advice is not available in the home, it must be provided by the schools. As I said earlier, that advice is often too little and too late. It is also available in a broader area, such as youth clubs, and there is much more that we can do there. Youngsters want to know about the mundane day-by-day matters, and we must provide that information.

I was fortunate enough to be involved in a television series called "Crying Out Loud". It dealt with that issue and was geared towards youngsters and their parents. We hoped that they would watch together, and many of them did. Subject by subject, at a matter-of-fact level, we covered some of the concerns. There are no panaceas for unemployment. I am not trying to pretend that by giving advice we will make everything in the garden lovely, but we must seize on and encourage the enthusiasm and energy of our youngsters.

Certain buzz phrases are going around the business. One which emanated from this place—the pupil-teacher ratio—has become some kind of god. This year it is all-important, next year something will take its place. I am not saying that large classes are necessarily desirable, but a good teacher with a class of 36 children teaching mathematics in a jungle clearing with a box of matches, and doing it with affection, will have more effect than a bad teacher teaching a class of 12 in a public school with the aid of all sorts of machines. We have discussed many matters this morning, but it was not until my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster spoke that we heard the word "affection". That word is used too seldom in education. My experience of youngsters during the past four or five years persuades me that, given the right lead, they are unbeatable.

I have a higher than usual proportion of elderly in my constituency, which is a desirable seaside retirement area. They desperately need the young around them. I want my constituency to retain its young and will do my best to help to provide them with opportunities for the future. That may mean jobs; it most certainly means giving them something worthwhile to do. The best help I can give is to offer encouragement, and not stand here today saying that our youngsters are depressed and need state handouts. They do not. They need a lead in the right direction, and that can be achieved through hard work and affection.

Industry must take the lead. If some of our industrialists had half the courage of the youngsters who beat on their doors, and gave them employment, more progress would be made more quickly. There is already a shift in that direction, but we must hasten the process.

We must encourage example by parents. We should not stand here talking about the small minority of Channel 4 stereotype street-corner kids, involved in crime and mugging, who are genuine drop-outs. Rather than continually harping on those youngsters we should talk more about the achievements of the hundreds of thousands of kids who are doing well not only for themselves but for those they care about. We must encourage them rather than concentrating on the street-corner kids.

One of my constituents, Geoff Parsons, is 18. I very much hope that when he is 19 he will become another Olympic gold medallist. With any luck, he will become the first man in the world to jump 8 ft. We must encourage our youth to look at our good cricketers and footballers. They do not need much encouragement in that direction. Anybody who believes that a teenager only sits down and watches television is wrong. They have far better things to do. We must encourage by example rather than showing depression. We must give the advice that is needed, when it is needed, rather than giving too little, too late. We must encourage industry and industrial courage. If we do all that, it is obvious that for our young people the future is bright indeed.

11.56 pm

Sir Hector Monro (Dumfries)

I am glad to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, North (Mr. Gale). He recently made a first-class maiden speech, and followed it today with an excellent second innings. He spoke from great experience and I am sure that what he said will go to the hearts of many people. His theme of leadership and encouragement is one that I shall take up.

I was glad to be in the Chamber when the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) made his notable maiden speech. He delivered it exceptionally well. I was especially interested as the Monro clan has its country in the heart of the hon. Gentleman's constituency. However, I disagree with some of his comments on why he won his seat. I am sure that all hon. Members have the highest regard for the previous representative of that constituency, Lord Gray, and for his splendid work for his constituency for many years. I doubt that anyone representing such a wide and remote area could have covered it from end to end in the way that Lord Gray did.

The paradox is that that area of the Highlands receives greater incentives and financial assistance from the Government than any other in the country — not only industrially through the Highlands and Islands Development Board, the Scottish Development Agency and the Scottish Economic Planning Department, but through grants to agriculture in remote areas, the building from scratch of fine new roads from central Scotland into the heart of Ross and Cromarty and a new bridge over the Kessock Ferry. All that shows that no Government could have done more to help that area. Yet the thanks that Lord Gray received was the loss of his seat. I find it difficult to follow the logic of those who voted against him.

The primary theme of the debate has been unemployment. We all wish to eradicate youth unemployment as soon as possible. I warmly congratulate the Government on the exceptional steps they have taken to do so through the new youth training scheme—with its emphasis on training for skills — the Manpower Services Commission and the special programme provision. Regional authorities have also provided help to alleviate unemployment in their areas. A great deal is being done to help and it is right that the Government should devote enormous resources to that end. Nevertheless, we want permanent jobs as soon as possible for those who are presently unemployed or shortly to leave school or who have left school in the past two months. But that can come about only when the general economy picks up. The steps that the Government have taken, through their encouragement to industry and through lowering interest rates and inflation, are most likely to achieve that.

Other hon. Members have concentrated in great detail on youth unemployment. I share their great concern but I do not want to go over that issue again in too much detail. While a secure job is an essential base for fulfilment in life, the opportunity to have a fuller life in other respects grows year by year as opportunities develop. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have rightly stressed the importance of the family, of direct leadership by father and mother, and of family co-operation to get immense enjoyment out of life. It is perhaps a lack of support and leadership over the past 20 or 30 years that has led to some of the problems facing us today.

Schools too have been rightly emphasised. The wide choice of courses is highly commendable. I was glad that the Scottish Education Department received praise for its enlightened attitude to new courses and new examinations. The importance of advice by careers teachers was rightly stressed. It is vital that youngsters should be directed towards the right type of courses and jobs if they are to obtain permanent positions in the long run. It is right to stress the quality of teaching and discipline in schools. Those factors contribute to improving the skill and quality of the individual when he comes to obtain a post in the future.

It is important when discussing youngsters not to forget handicapped children. We must maintain our special schools and it is not as easy as some reports suggest to integrate mentally handicapped children into normal schools. If they are to get the best out of life, there must be special schools for them.

We must also maintain the rural schools as much as possible. Too often they are shut for economic reasons. Authorities fail to value their importance within the rural community. The village school is as important as the village hall and the church in helping youngsters to grow up and enjoy their lives.

I should like to concentrate much more on the opportunities that are available and the failure of so many youngsters to take those chances and use them valuably and constructively. I wish to praise the voluntary organisations that give youngsters the chance to participate in a host of activities in the modern world. Although I am not sure that one would class it as a voluntary organisation, I start at the top with the Church.

The leaders of the Church and the many organisations attached to it give fine leadership—I give praise to them — but volunteers in a host of governing bodies and organisations also deserve our praise for what they are doing and what I hope that they will do even more in the years ahead through the provision of leadership and facilities. I refer to the scouts, the guides, the YMCA, the YWCA, the Boys' Brigade in its great year of celebration in Scotland, the service organisations—the Army cadet force, the sea cadets and the air training corps —the young farmers and other organisations. We have an action centre in Dumfries to help to bring together the young unemployed to give them ideas for the future. The list and the opportunities are endless.

My hon. Friend the Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor) raised an important point about the services — the Territorial Army, the Royal Naval Voluntary Reserve, and the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, in which I am intimately involved. A large number of young people between the ages of 18 and 25 are joining those organisations because they enjoy the fellowship, the opportunity to go abroad and the involvement in activities that are exciting to youth but offer a high standard of discipline. We should commend young people to join as volunteers the Territorial Army and other services which offer a rewarding experience.

We should stress the value of the Duke of Edinburgh's award scheme. Hundreds of youngsters enter for the award year in, year out, and fulfil remarkable objectives in achieving gold awards or the grades below it. We should pay tribute not only to the youngsters who take part in the scheme but to his Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh for initiating the idea, which has had such a remarkable success. An immense amount can be done in the development of character and leadership through sport and recreation, through discipline on the games field, through obeying without question the referee or umpire. I hope that that might be translated at some time to the higher echelons of sport and set an example to spectators.

I want Outward Bound activities to be developed as much as possible. There are wonderful schools throughout the country at which one can participate under correct supervision in the most extreme forms of physical activity. One must realise—it is part of the reason for going to an Outward Bound school— that enthusiasm must be tempered by a recognition of what is foolhardy. One should not overdo it. Sadly, one hears of tragedies year after year in the hills and mountains. One must not overstep the mark by going into an area of danger.

It is important to push people to the limit. Many people go much further than they ever thought possible in terms of physical ability or mental enthusiasm to complete a task. It is right to push people to the limit, to get the best out of human enthusiasm for leadership and discipline and to make them realise what they can achieve. We must encourage young people to take such courses, which will benefit them immensely when they achieve something that they had not thought possible.

The development of sport and recreation for young people in the past 20 years or so has been dramatic. The number of sports centres has increased tenfold. Local authorities, the Sports Council and the Government have provided facilities of tremendous quality at which youngsters can enjoy themselves, get fit, gain fellowship and chat over a cup of tea about what they have been doing that morning in the sports centre. Yet not enough youngsters do so, and that is one of the messages that should go out from this debate. One must use one's own initiative to participate in the available activities and not sit back and moan and groan that nothing has been provided.

A Conservative Government set up the Sports Council in 1971. Since then Governments—including the Labour Government between 1974 and 1979 — have substantially funded the Sports Councils of England, Scotland and Wales and Northern Ireland, so that facilities may be provided for sport and recreation. I give great credit to the chairmen, directors and members of the Sports Councils, who have put their hearts and souls into doing the best they can with the available resources. They have great support in England from the Central Council of Physical Recreation, which has a very close association with all the governing bodies of sport and with those who are involved in the sponsorship of sport, and has given huge sums of money for developing facilities and helping with training and with the cost of teams going abroad, and so on.

The Sports Council has made a significant contribution to the facilities now available to enable young people to enjoy themselves, to participate in team sports and individual sports, and to achieve the development of character that comes from those opportunities.

Although there are thousands of specific cases where there is a dual use of school sports facilities by pupils and the local community, far too often those facilities are not shared. The initiative has to come from the education authorities. I know that there are problems with caretakers' overtime and concern about vandalism of schools, but I believe that all those problems can be overcome if there is a will in the community to use the school playing fields, gymnasiums and swimming pools out of school hours and during school holidays. It is totally unacceptable that those splendid facilities should lie unused in some education authorities year after year when the schools are shut. I want to see them open. I want to see young people being given the opportunity to enjoy themselves in using those facilities—perhaps 24 hours a day if the arrangements can be made. I commend those authorities which have made the effort and I criticise those which have not.

Pleased though I am with the facilities that we have, I recognise that we have a long way to go. In that respect one returns naturally to the issue of national financial resources and how much the local authorities, the Sports Council and others can put into sport and recreation. Often it is the sport and recreation facilities which local authorities do not consider essential which are cut when budgeting is tight. I want the Government to make a particular effort to continue funding the Sports Council and the local authorities, and do everything possible to help, with the assistance of local sports bodies.

Many sportsmen ask why they cannot have the equivalent of Arts Council grants for sport. It must be said in defence of the Government and of sport generally—and of the arts, in which I am equally interested—that there is very little funding of the arts other than by the Arts Council, whereas local authorities, together with the Sports Council, put a tremendous amount into sport and recreation. That is why the total is substantially in favour of sport and recreation. Nevertheless, we should continue to put as much emphasis as we can on sport and recreation not only by continuing to make grants to the Sports Council, at the highest possible level, but by assisting local authorities through the rate support grant and capital allocations.

When I went to Brixton after the riots I looked at some of the sports facilities. I was disappointed to see that there were problems of finding £50 for a table tennis table, or £100 or £200 towards a grant for a billiards table in a youth club. Relatively small amounts of money can often do an immense amount of good.

There are facilities within the reach of almost everybody, except for the remoter rural areas. Our task is to encourage youngsters to use what is available. We have heard this morning of unemployed youngsters who sit around feeling depressed. They could be doing a great deal for themselves by spending part of their day at a sports centre, getting fit, and talking constructively about how best they might get a job. Instead of becoming depressed, they should be looking to the future and making use of the chances that are available. One would like to see many youngsters taking that approach rather than feeling that all is lost.

There have been a multitude of reports by those interested in sport and recreation, and there will be many more in the future, but ultimately it is leadership that counts. We need to lead people into the sports centres so that they may enjoy the facilities that the Government, the local authorities and the individual sports governing bodies have all helped to provide. Naturally there needs to be more co-ordination.

I was delighted to hear my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, North talking of success at the top. We have the Sports Aid Foundation, which gives money to really promising youngsters so that they can continue training for their sport to achieve perhaps national and international honours. It is an immense fillip to young people to see British sportsmen doing well at the top. Many young people have a desire to emulate those sportsmen, and that in itself is an aim that we must commend. We want excellence in sport because people all over the country, particularly the youngsters, follow the activities of our cricket, football and rugby teams day by day and watch the results with the greatest of interest.

Youngsters have the chance to develop their characters and to learn initiative and leadership through sport and recreation, provided that club leaders and facilities are there to help them achieve their objective. We should not be too depressed about the future. My hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, North was right in that respect. We must do all we can to provide employment for young people. We are already doing a great deal to provide the necessary sport and recreation facilities. Britain really does care about its youngsters. That is why the Government are putting so much thought into employment, and into making possible a worthwhile, constructive and happy future for them.

12.18 pm

Mr. Frank Dobson (Holborn and St. Pancras)

When I talk to people—or even on the odd occasions when they talk to me—it is my experience that they think we are a pretty boring lot. I am sure that if they had had to sit here throughout this morning and listen to the speeches, including my own, their views would have been confirmed. We are a pretty boring lot, even when talking about youth.

I compliment the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy) on his excellent maiden speech, in which he put his views clearly and succinctly. I think that we should restrain him a little. He seems to think that he is doing rather well, getting into the House of Commons at the age of 23. To help the hon. Gentleman get things into perspective, I remind him that William Pitt was Prime Minister at 23, so the hon. Gentleman still has a little way to go. I find it rather patronising having to compliment anyone on a maiden speech, because it does not seem long since I made a rather trembling one myself.

I shall not refer to the speeches of Conservative Members. It seems that those who inhabit the Conservative Benches amount to a combination of Dr. Pangloss and Polyanna. Most of them seem not to have noticed that there are substantial problems for the younger generation.

It is commonplace in literature, art, music and everyday life to contrast the joys of youth with the cares of age. That has always been only partly true. Those of us who can recall being young can remember that youth was a period of infinite embarrassment, disappointment, shock, horror and unpleasantness. Many of us can remember our stomachs turning over at all the awful things that had happened during the day or at what might happen the next day. Being young has never been all that joyful. It has never been a period of unalloyed joy.

I find it difficult to think of a time when young people in Britain have had less reason to be full of joy. It is extremely unlikely that any of them will follow Wordsworth and say: Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very heaven! With the exception of a limited number of privileged young people, it is not "very heaven" being young now. They are faced with record levels of unemployment.

There are many who seem not to appreciate the scale of the problem. They seem not to understand how young people's prospects have changed. With the Government fiddling all the unemployment figures, it is difficult to get a proper and comparable run of figures even over a decade. So long as the Secretary of State for Employment remains at the Department, I suppose that we shall never be able to get an honest run of figures. The best figures that I can find show that in 1973–74, which is only 10 years ago, 60 per cent. of 16-year-olds had jobs and only 4 per cent. were unemployed. Nowadays, only 24 per cent. of 16-year-olds are employed and 33 per cent. are either unemployed or on schemes that have been produced by the Government to provide what the Prime Minister, when she was Leader of the Opposition, used to call non-jobs. There has been a move from 60 per cent. employment to 24 per cent. in a decade, and a move from 4 per cent. unemployed to 33 per cent. For every 16-year-old who was out of work 10 years ago, there are eight today. That is a dramatic and debilitating change for our young people and their parents.

There have been other massive changes downwards. The chances of going on to higher education have diminished. It is estimated by many organisations that over the past three years between 30,000 and 40,000 young people who believed themselves to be qualified to go on to higher education were not able to do so because the places were not available.

In another category there has been a dramatic decline in opportunities for young people to do something after finishing their education. In 1979, 100,000 young people entered into apprenticeships but last year only 45,000 did so. Britain is supposed to be competing industrially and is reckoning on having a trained industrial work force. That has to be contrasted with 45,000 apprenticeships last year.

Many young people are debilitated by care, worry and concern about their future. That is something that they feel whether they are in work or out of it. One of the characteristics of our society which did not prevail 10 or 20 years ago is that much of the enjoyment is going out of education and training. Most people quite enjoyed the later stages of their education or training process and life could be fairly lighthearted. Most undergraduates at British universities 10 years ago reckoned on having about one year of doing very little other than enjoying themselves. In a sense, that was one of the objects of going on to higher education. It gave them the opportunity of a fairly carefree period. There were elements of that in the training and education of others.

I find that that carefree element is much diminished in our universities. Many young people are working themselves almost to death for three years at university or at a polytechnic. They are desperately fearful that if they do not get a good degree, or fail to get one at all, they will find themselves on a very superior scrap heap. That trend is working back throughout the education system. Many young people should be enjoying a broader and enlivening curriculum in sixth forms in schools, but many of them are faced instead with immense pressure to concentrate on one, two or three examination subjects and to dc nothing else. Again, they are fearful that if they interest themselves in anything else they will not get the qualifications that they require to enable them to go on to higher education, especially as higher education opportunities have been reduced.

There are many young people who are faced with some of the most dubious training schemes that have ever been made available in our history. The youth opportunities programme brought itself into disrepute and now we have the youth training scheme, which is endorsed by the employers, the TUC and education authorities. There is much concern among those who are trying to bring the scheme into operation. They approached the scheme with good will, but they are concerned that guarantees that they thought had been written into the system are now being watered down so that the YTS is becoming the YOP all over again, with all its unsatisfactory features.

Even if the YOP had been a good scheme, and even if the YTS proves to be a good scheme, what will happen at the end of the scheme? I quote a passage from a memorandum issued by the Comptroller and Auditor General, who is not, of course, a Socialist politician. He said: When YOP began it was expected that most young people taking part would find a normal job before or at the end of their scheme. In 1980 MSC informed PAC that, in … 1978, 70 per cent. of YOP participants went on to normal employment while a further 10 per cent. went on to another training opportunity. That represents 80 per cent. of those who entered the YOP scheme. He continued: By 1981–82 … the proportion of young people entering work in the autumn of 1980 had fallen to around 50 per cent. with 10 per cent. entering another scheme. The Comptroller and Auditor General said that his staff found that the placement rate varied according to the type of scheme—for Community Projects, it had fallen to 21 per cent. and for Training Workshops it had fallen to 28 per cent. No evidence has been produced by any of those who sing the praises of the youth training scheme that job opportunities will be better at the completion of those schemes than they were during the last year of the YOP scheme. That is debilitating for the people on those schemes and those who are trying to run them and put some decent content in them.

All those elements are working their way back down to the school system. My hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Mr. Cox) referred to one such matter. Our schooling system has always been based on either an explicit or implicit promise that if youngsters work hard at school some might get academic qualifications. Those who do not might be able to enter an apprenticeship; if not, at least they would receive a good report from school and could get a job. That has been one carrot that the teaching profession has offered to young people in secondary schools. For honest teachers in many parts of the country this carrot has now been removed, because youngsters and teachers know that, however well behaved or keen many young people are at school, they will not be able to get a job when they leave. That has damaged the education system.

I note that the hon. Member for Thanet, North (Mr. Gale) is not in the House, but I accept that not everything is misery for our young people. The capacity of human beings to enjoy themselves, especially when with people of the same age, is remarkable. Humanity's capacity for self-enjoyment cannot be stifled by any Government. It is so strong that young people in Nazi-occupied Europe managed to enjoy themselves, but this ability was not stimulated by the Government, and it is certainly not stimulated by this Government.

It bothers me that some of the periods of pleasantness serve to show how unpleasant and unenjoyable are the rest of the lives of many of these young people. It is absurd to talk about our young people as one category. Nevertheless, legions of youngsters are becoming more and more alienated from society. It is in the nature of young people to be alienated from society, but we are creating a society that alienates them even more. Many young people are sullen and do not wish to participate in anything. They are uninterested and believe that their views and problems are unheeded by those in authority. It is a bad formula for the future not to set out to do more to resolve their problems.

In some respects the alienated part of this generation is not different from other parts of our society. They have been brought up in a consumer society which constantly displays its wares on television, through the radio and in the newspapers and colour supplements. Our society, with its emphasis on material possessions, keeps bashing away at them, even if they have no money and prospects, saying that material possessions are the thing. Our society, especially that part associated with the clothing industry, records and such items, bashes away, saying that fashion is important, even if many of our youngsters do not have the money to indulge in those fashions.

We cannot expect people, even if they have no money or are alienated, not to want to achieve some benefits from our consumer society which they cannot afford. If we do not provide at least some of those benefits, a large part of that generation will feel cheated by our society and by those who run it.

We face also the problem of young people going on the dole and growing up on it. In many ways, they will not be different from other people. People on the dole want the same things as those who are employed. In the 1930s a book called "Love on the Dole" was written. It is a distressing story. There will be love on the dole. People will expect to love and to marry. They will expect to have the opportunity to bring up children. They will expect to be able to love, to marry, to bring up children and to live in decent housing. However, they will not have the money to do it. The Daily Mail, John Junor in the Sunday Express and various Tory Members of Parliament portray their actions as imprudent, improvident and impertinent, but it will happen. If it happens, there will be yet more friction and factions in our society, which could destroy it.

We are talking, not about a small minority, but about a gigantic proportion of the current generation coming out of our schools and colleges, who have no stake in the country. The most distinguished politician to be born in my constituency was Benjamin Disraeli, who, apart from rightly describing the Tory party as organised hypocrisy, said that it was possible to have a sound society only if people had a stake in the country. At the moment we are creating a large part of a generation with little or no stake in the country.

Is this all the Government's fault? Much of it is. It would be foolish to say that all of it is. That would be to fall into the trap of the hon. Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson), who is still in the Government paying out the dole money as Minister for Social Security. When he was shadow spokesman on education for the Conservative party, speaking at a meeting in the Great Western hotel, Newquay, on 20 May 1978, he said: The level of juvenile unemployment in Socialist-governed Britain is a disgrace to a civilised country. It is, however, not just a product of an economic recession caused by a Labour Government. It is also an off-shoot of the decline in educational standards under a Labour Government. About three times as many juveniles are now unemployed, when the hon. Gentleman is part of the Government, as there were in 1978. I have not heard him explain that it is in any way the Government's fault. It is not wholly the Government's fault.

Even if the hon. Gentleman goes round, as he has always done, blaming somebody other than the Government, we should not entirely follow his example, but accept that there are things that are wrong with our society that are not the immediate fault of the Government. If we are to cope with a daunting future, not only for the people whom we call the younger generation, but for the older generation and those who are now young children, we need a wholly new approach—to work, to leisure and to the distribution of wealth and other resources.

I am speaking personally. To the best of my knowledge, this is not the formal policy of the Labour party. It is clear that large numbers of jobs need to be done, such as improvements in housing, roads, schools and railways. People out of work could do that. If we had a sensible society we would bring the people out of work to the work that needs to be done, put the two together, create work and provide services and jobs at the same time. However, that will not resolve all the problems of our society and industrial change.

It is worth noting that in June 1970 22.5 million people were in employment. That was 70 per cent. of the adult population. In June 1979 the figure had increased to 22.9 million but that was a decline to 69 per cent. of the adult population. In December 1982, only 20.7 million people were in employment. In 12 years the proportion of the adult population in work had declined from 70 to 62 per cent.

That dramatic decline was not entirely the result of Government policy. It was partly due to industrial change. A major aspect of industrial change is that there will be more spare time for human beings. We therefore have an option. We can choose which people take the spare time, when they have it and whether they can enjoy it. If we continue as we are, a large number of people will get all the spare time that exists when they do not want it and cannot enjoy it. That is called being on the dole. Ignoring the fiddled figures, roughly 4 million people are now on the dole. If present policies continue, it could be 5 million. When one includes dependants, that means that 10 million, 12 million or 14 million people will be impoverished by unemployment and the gigantic piece of spare time known as the dole.

We hear much about the Victorians from the Prime Minister. They used to talk about the poverty-stricken, humiliated, submerged tenth. If our country continues on its present course, we are heading not for a submerged tenth but for a submerged fifth, quarter or even third of the population, with heads of households unemployed and the entire families and neighbourhoods impoverished as a result.

There is an alternative. We must recognise that spare time for most people — provided that they have the money and a decent standard of living to go with it, and provided also that they get the spare time when they want it — is enjoyable and welcome. I do not know of any Member of Parliament who does not welcome spare time and we are no different from anyone else. Again this is not official Labour party policy — although I hope that it will become so—but I hope that we shall press much harder for earlier retirement, for much longer holidays, for people staying in education and training longer and, above all, for a considerably shorter working week for everyone.

Some people say that that is all moonshine and pie in the sky and cannot be achieved, but I believe that we should aim for a working week of 30 hours. I do not think that that is any more pie in the sky or moonshine than it was when the great Clydesdale strike took place in 1919 and the idea of a 40-hour week was formulated for the first time in this country. The average working week was then 60 hours. Over a long period, as a result of pressure from the trade union movement and virtually no one else, about 20 hours were lopped off the average working week. That was a great step forward for most of the people involved. I believe that we should now aim for a further substantial reduction.

If we do that, we must ensure that all the benefits are shared — not only the benefit of increased production which follows from shorter hours, as it almost always does despite what Victorian ironmasters used to say. The benefits of the new technology must also accrue to everyone. We must ensure that pay is more evenly shared and that the spare time is more evenly shared. If we are to do that, we shall need a great deal more equality in society.

Those whom we describe as the younger generation —teenagers and people in their early 20s—and children who are even younger face an infinitely more complicated and interrelated world than even we face. Life in the future, locally, regionally and nationally, will become even more interdependent. We shall depend more and more on each other as more and more industrial change occurs. We also face a period of very rapid industrial and social change which no one can stop. The question is whether we harness it for the benefit of everyone or allow a few well-off people to exploit it for themselves.

We must ask ourselves how we are equipping the forthcoming younger generation—not those who are in crisis at the moment as they come out of our schools and colleges, but those who are even younger—to cope with the difficult demands of our future society. I have in mind the 11 million children at present under the age of 16. Are we giving them equal resources? Will they all have equal education opportunities? The answer to both questions is no.

The old Etonian hon. Member for Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor) upbraids some teachers in state schools for not providing the education that he would like to see. However, most of them are doing their best with the money that the state gives them. If they were given per pupil the money that the parents of children at Eton provide, I have no doubt that our education system would be more successful than it is.

The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science (Mr. Bob Dunn)

It is comprehensive.

Mr. Dobson

The Minister tells me that Eton is comprehensive. It is comprehensive, but of course it has to be comprehended by handing over a big wad of money, otherwise no pupil has access to it.

Are we giving an equal chance in life to these 11 million children? Again it is difficult to sort out the figures, but child benefit is paid in respect of about 13 million children, and that figure includes some who are above the age of 16. Of those 13 million, no fewer than 2 million conic from families who are in receipt of supplementary benefit and are impoverished as a result. There are various estimates, depending on whether those who compile them work for one of the poverty lobbies or are employed by Dr. Gradgrind, of how many other children are in poverty in addition to those from families on supplementary benefit. By most people's definition, however, there may be another 2 million children in poverty because their families do not have enough money. That gives us a total of 4 million children out of 13 million who are living in poverty.

If hon. Members think that that has no effect, I refer them to the joint DHSS-SSRC report entitled "Despite the Welfare State", which said: It is impossible to resist a reiteration of the general conclusion from much of the work that benefit rates, particularly of supplementary benefit and child benefit, are simply too low at present for some families to avoid real hardship and damaging consequences to the health and other life chances of their children. That may apply to as many as 4 million children.

I have an obsession with school meals. Being fat, I have an obsession with food, anyway, and I know that it is shared by certain chubby hon. Members on the Government Benches. In a country where child impoverishment is undoubtedly increasing, by any standard that one cares to measure it, one would imagine that the number of school meals consumed would increase. One would think that the natural response in a sensible society would be to provide more school meals if children's nutrition was declining. However, that has riot happened. When the Government came to power in 1979, 66 per cent. — that is two thirds—of the children in schools had school meals. Now the figure is less than .50 per cent.

In talking about the children now at school who will later become the younger generation, and then adult, we should bear in mind that one of the determinants in whether a young woman can safely bear children, and bear children who are not handicapped, is the standard of nutrition that she received in her early teens. All the figures show that there are many impoverished working-class girls in their early teens whose nutrition is unsatisfactory. As a result of the Government's meanness on benefits and their attack on school meals, which still continues, we shall reap a bitter harvest in, perhaps, 10 years' time. That bitter harvest will be reaped in the maternity wards of the hospitals that serve the poor areas of this country. Women will have difficulties in childbirth that could have been avoided had they had a decent diet earlier, and they will produce children that are malformed as a result of the poor diet. That is not much credit to our society.

Mr. Bottomley

I totally disagree with the hon. Gentleman. In my opinion, money is much better spent on families, not on school meals. However, will the hon. Gentleman tell us which other European country, with better or worse perinatal mortality figures than ours, or better or worse birth rate figures, supplies its children with school meals?

Mr. Dobson

I cannot give the figures. One of the problems in comparing this country with Europe is that we are comparing one complex society with other complex societies. One of our problems is that until we entered the Common Market we were a low-cost food society. That is no longer true. One result of joining the EC, and staying in it— again, that has damaged working-class people more than other members of our society — is the disproportionate rise in food prices, which has had an adverse effect on the nutrition of working-class families. One cannot separate those things. When a society which has always had one approach to food changes that approach, problems of many kinds follow, and I believe that there will be substantial problems.

The hon. Member for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley) said that he did not agree with me. These are not just my assertions. What I say is supported by people who know more about paediatrics than I do—people who certainly speak with more expertise than I do.

Let us consider the children who are now below school age. I am told by experts—I am no expert—that most of us learn half of what we will ever know by the time we are five. Indeed, in some cases it finishes there. If most people learn half of what they know by the age of five, we should pay much more attention to the education of the under-fives. Instead, as the Minister will have to confirm, his Department's projections and those in the Government's White Paper on public expenditure show that the present level of nursery provision of about 40 per cent. will decline to about 35 per cent. as a result of the cuts. The Minister shakes his head. I invite him to look at the White Paper. Can he explain the figures in any other way?

Everyone on the Conservative Benches has said that it is shameful that children should be coming out of primary school and going into secondary school when they are not literate and numerate. That is true. The vital function of the primary school is to teach literacy and numeracy and also to help children to learn to live and co-operate with one another.

There are 3.5 million children in our primary schools. Her Majesty's inspectors of schools in their last annual report published in March 1982 — we await its equivalent for 1983 and look forward to it—said that if present financial policies continued in the nation's schools and education authorities, literacy and numeracy in our primary schools would be threatened. That was not the scaremongering of a Socialist politician, but the view of Her Majesty's inspectors of schools.

Our young people need to be equipped for a rapidly changing world, where the command of mathematics, design and technology and modern languages would be a great asset. However, in their report of 1982 Her Majesty's inspectors of schools say that those vital subjects are disappearing from our secondary schools because local authorities cannot afford to keep them in the curriculum. I do not know whether the Minister will announce that he has had a sneak preview of the latest report and that things are improving — I hope that they are — but there is nothing in the Government's record to suggest that they are doing anything to improve the capacity of children in our primary and secondary schools to cope with the difficulties that they will face as young people and adults.

The hon. Member for Eltham and others have said how important it is for children to achieve something and to have some sense of success. That is very true. As the hon. Gentleman said, some hon. Members are obsessed with their success—not all of us; it would be unfair to apply that to the hon. Gentleman. However, we know what success is and so do many others. If one talks to concerned teachers anywhere in Britain, they will say that for those who do not have an academic bent some success in drama, music or sport can be vital in giving them some sense of self-achievement which is so beneficial to them, some sense that they can succeed.

In addition to vital subjects such as mathematics, English, design and technology and modern languages disappearing from the curriculum, cuts mean that drama, music, swimming and other sports are also disappearing simply because authorities cannot afford to provide them. That shows that the Government are doing nothing to equip what might be described as the next younger generation—those who are still in school and who can all reasonably be described as children. They are not equipping them to do well in any society; least of all are they equipping them to do well in the complicated society that they undoubtedly face.

Finally — a point which springs entirely from my political philosophy —I believe that the Government's emphasis on individual achievement and competition is extremely damaging in our society. As I have said before, our society is becoming increasingly interdependent rather than independent. I recognise that there are some things that we can do only as individuals and that some aspects of the way in which society works are geared to the reward of individuals and to people performing as individuals. However, most of the things that we do in life —whether we are five, 15 or 50—are done collectively and in co-operation with others.

One of the main shortcomings of society and of our education system is the emphasis that is placed on individualism instead of on the group or on a collective approach. In the next few years our education system should do much more to develop a collective approach towards the resolution of problems. Very few people solve their problems by themselves. Most of us are dependent on the help and co-operation of others. Most of society's problems are solved in that way, but one would never guess that from the political philosophy expressed by Conservative Members, the newspapers that support them and indeed most of the media.

We need a new emphasis. If we had that new emphasis we could rely on the younger generation— as we so patronisingly call it—to respond. Whether young people are sullen, riotous, discontented or in some senses working too hard, they recognise that our present competitive society has let them down and does not offer them a decent future.

1.1 pm

The Under-Secretary of State for Education and Science (Mr. Bob Dunn)

The House always likes to listen to the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), because it is rather like a game of snakes and ladders. We start off with an objective but we are never quite sure where we shall end up. The hon. Gentleman spent his time at the Dispatch Box telling us what he thought Labour party policy should be, and what was not Labour party policy. Very little reference was made to Labour party policy itself.

The hon. Gentleman should also be congratulated on entirely ignoring the terms of the motion so ably moved by the hon. Member for Newham, North-East (Mr. Leighton). It calls for positive action and for a secure future through education for our young people, but the hon. Gentleman gave us a rambling discourse about the problems as he sees them, and very little by way of solutions or positive help.

My hon. Friends the Members for Eltham (Mr. Bottomley), Upminster (Sir N. Bonsor), Thanet, North (Mr. Gale) and Dumfries (Sir H. Monro) all contributed to the debate. In addition to the hon. Member for Newham, North-East, we also heard from the hon. Members for Tooting (Mr. Cox) and Ross, Cromarty and Skye (Mr. Kennedy). The latter made an excellent maiden speech. Like the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras, I remember my own timid efforts some four years ago. The difference between me and the hon. Member for Ross, Cromarty and Skye is that I was nervous where he clearly was not, that he was confident where I clearly was not, and that he did not obviously use notes as I most certainly did. The House was particularly pleased with the references that he made to his predecessors, both the former Liberal Member of Parliament, Alasdair Mackenzie, and Lord Gray. I look forward to hearing the hon. Gentleman often in future, and I can sense the pride that he and his family obviously feel today.

The motion meant that there was clearly going to be an input on employment, industry and training, and education. In response to the speeches made, I shall consider that part of the motion which states: and urges that positive action be taken to provide a secure future through education". Other matters, of course, impinge on the rest of the motion. I listened to the debate with great interest, and it is the first such major debate that I have attended. I am sure that the hon. Member for Newham, North-East will be pleased to know that the Government do not oppose the motion. However, I am equally sure that he would not expect me to agree with all that he said, although I recognise the sincerity and verve with which he spoke.

Opposition Members referred to the 1981 civil disorders as a warning for the future. I do not believe that the young people who took part in the disturbances were typical of their generation. Whatever the problems facing young people, I am sure that the majority condemn resort to the streets in the way that that occurred in 1981.

I make a more general observation about those who hold office in the Department of Education. We accept that 95 per cent. of our children are educated under the local authority education system. Whatever the implications of any other considerations, it is incumbent upon us to ensure that improvements take place in the variety, range and nature of school and the choice available to parents and children.

I come now to the school curriculum. Our determination to seek improvements is known. The school curriculum is important because the foundations for the future capabilities of the younger generation must be laid in the schools. The schools understandably face many conflicting pressures in preparing young people for a changing world, and I pay tribute to the dedication and commitment that some teachers display in approaching their task.

But no one, least of all the teachers, would claim that further developments in the schools are not needed. The Government have set out their views clearly. We have made it plain that we see the job of the schools as encompassing the many different aims of education, including the major aim of preparing children and young people for all aspects of adult life.

There must be a partnership between central and local government, the schools themselves and the wider community in finding ways of meeting those aims more effectively. The Government stand ready and willing to play their full part in that partnership.

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has, for example, drawn attention only today, in a wide-ranging speech to the Council of Local Education Authorities about the agenda for that partnership, to the steps which the Government are taking to encourage LEAs to define and implement their own policies for the curricula in the schools in their areas. We believe that it is right that the schools should operate within a locally defined framework in this way. Later this year we shall be asking the local education authorities to report on the progress which they have made in this area.

In addition to this initiative on the general approach to the curriculum, the Government have been taking action in a number of specific ways designed to help the schools to make their curriculums more practical and better suited to the needs of young people of all abilities and aptitudes.

Mr. Nigel Spearing (Newham, South)

Does the Minister agree that continuing CSE, O-level and A-level in their present forms does not fulfil the criteria that he has just mentioned because, by definition, it will create a large number of people who will be deemed to have failed? In a democratic society we cannot tolerate that for long in an education system which is meant to be effective and responsible.

Mr. Dunn

The hon. Gentleman must have insight since he has anticipated my next paragraph.

We have, for example, been following up actively the important Cockcroft report on the teaching of mathematics. We have given financial support to an increased programme of in-service training for teachers of mathematics, which is now under way; we have funded a development project to put into practice some of the Cockcroft proposals for a foundation list of mathematics topics to be taught to pupils in our secondary schools; and we have funded two projects to look at the feasibility of graded tests in mathematics for pupils in their last couple of years of compulsory education. But those steps will not be enough on their own without the essential commitment by our partners in local authorities and in the schools. I have no doubt at all that such commitment will be forthcoming, in that and other areas.

We have also made it clear that our concern is for all pupils, wherever their individual talents may lie. One aspect of that concern is for the most able among our young people, on whose achievements so much of the future success of the nation will depend. The schools have a vital role in nurturing those pupils, and in ensuring that their talents are fully indentified and fully engaged.

Our concern extends also to those pupils who are not so successful in academic terms, and who too often are fed a diluted academic diet that is not appropriate for their needs. I mention that because a number of initiatives are being taken by the Government to assist our young people as they make the transition from school to adult and working life.

The Government are, of course, committed to meeting the needs of all young people whatever their ability. The technical and vocational education initiative and the microelectronics education programme are examples of that. But the Government are also deeply conscious that certain young people are particularly vulnerable and therefore require special attention. I refer to those young people — the lower attainers — for whom public examinations at 16-plus are not designed, and who are at risk of leaving school with a sense of failure, having spent several years of compulsory education pursuing studies that were less than well attuned to their own needs, abilities and perspectives.

The Government believe that those young people, though less academic than others, none the less have a key role to play in the industrial and commercial world of tomorrow. The Government are therefore financing a development programme of pilot projects in 13 local education authority areas aimed at providing a more practical and effective curriculum. More than that, the programme will help to give confidence and self-respect to youngsters who otherwise might feel that they have little to offer.

The programme is due to start in September of this year. The projects that have been selected cover a wide variety of different approaches to the needs of the target group. They will focus attention on the development of useful skills; on imparting knowledge and attitudes relevant to adult and working life; on the development of links between schools and the local community, including local industry and commerce; and upon new methods of assessment that will give a positive view of the ability and achievements of the pupils concerned. The programme will also include appropriate in-service teacher training and development.

Two of the projects will be associated with the European Community's transition from school to work programme—a valuable link with our partners in the Community who are experiencing similar problems to our own.

Mr. Spearing

I am grateful to the Minister for his answer to the point that I raised. But does not what he said confirm my point—that the Government are maintaining that the norm, the expected and the hoped-for are the O and A-level rounds, and that those who do not achieve that are somehow different and are banned from further education? After nearly 40 years of secondary education we are now trying to do something about that. Should we not start from scratch and decide what we need for everybody?

Mr. Dunn

There is a great deal of truth in the hon. Gentleman's remarks. As one who was an 11-plus failure, I am fully aware of the problems. The Government took the initiative last year to highlight the problems of the lower attainers. We are taking on board the projects that I have mentioned. It is essential to monitor those and reach conclusions about them. However, I agree with the hon. Gentleman that it has taken 38 years to reach that stage.

The technical and vocational education initiative is another example of our commitment to ensuring that what the schools offer is relevant to the needs of young people themselves and the society in which they will become adults. The scheme has been warmly greeted by the majority of local education authorities, and the Government have recently asked the Manpower Services Commission to put forward proposals for extending it beyond the 14 areas at present chosen to participate.

The various projects will offer coherent four-year courses from the age of 14 onwards, containing an appropriate mix of general education, technical and vocational options, as well as work experience.

I must emphasise that our aim is to enrich the curriculum, not to restrict it, and to give young people during the transition years a chance to learn about and to perform a variety of occupational skills. In this way we believe we can develop motivation, enterprise and problem-solving skills right across the ability range.

I need hardly remind the House that we are also in the middle of a microelectronic revolution which, whilst offering enormous opportunities in so many areas of life, carries with it a number of challenges to social and economic adjustment. I believe that young people, with their optimism and adaptability, are, as my hon. Friend the Member for Thanet, North pointed out, particularly well suited to meet these challenges. The Government recognise that young people need help and preparation for this and that this should begin in the early years of compulsory education.

I am therefore particularly proud of what we are achieving both in our secondary and primary schools in acquainting pupils with microcomputers and their many uses. The "Micros in Schools" schemes run by the Department of Trade and Industry have been extremely successful in getting micros into schools and the "Microelectronics Education Programme", which is being financed by my Department, is paving the way—particularly through teacher training and software development—for the proper understanding, use and exploitation of microelectronic devices in future years. The House will be pleased to know that the Government have extended the programme to 1986 and are currently putting about £4.5 million per annum into a coherent strategy, the scale and character of which is well ahead of what is being done in other countries. I do not deny that there is still much to be done—and there are of course always problems to be overcome—but I hope the House will recognise the commitment and enthusiasm of the Government and the education service in this vital area.

Mr. Bottomley

Do not the developments, in terms of efficiency standards, vocational training and computers, provide the answer to those who complain about low morale in the teaching profession? Surely these are signs of the Government's commitment to what teachers are trying to achieve and provide greater unity between Government and teachers and therefore between families and children.

Mr. Dunn

My hon. Friend is right. Many homes today have access to modern technology in the form of video sets. Many children are happy and excited by them.

I come now briefly to some other resent initiatives the Government have made. It is clear that emphasis is being placed on the development of links between education and industry. The success of some of these initiatives will in part depend on the ability of the educational and industrial world to create new forms of co-operation, and to develop those links which already exist. The Government will continue to encourage such activities and my Department has written accordingly to chief education officers. We believe that school/industry links bring benefits to both sides. We also think that strong links will help to ensure that young people are more fully aware of the constraints of industrial and commercial life and those factors which inhibit or promote economic growth and stability.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-East and my hon. Friend the Member for Upminster referred to the youth training scheme. I must say to the hon. Member for Newham, North-East that the youth training scheme is not about unemployment—it is a training measure to help employed as well as unemployed youngsters. The purpose is not to take young persons off the employment register but to expose them to training. This is supported, as the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson) pointed out, by all parties, by the TUC and by the CBI.

A speech from me detailing the positive action that has been taken with regard to the younger generation would not be complete without a reference to the youth training scheme, which offers integrated education, training and work experience to 460,000 16 and 17-year-olds. It is one of the most positive actions undertaken by this or any Government for our younger generation. The scheme is of course the responsibility of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Employment, and was fully debated in the House on 8 July. I have little to add to what my hon. Friend the Minister of State, Department of Employment said on that occasion. I merely emphasise one or two points.

The scheme is intended to offer quality training for a broad range of employment opportunities. My Department and Her Majesty's inspectorate are involved at many levels in the counsels of the Manpower Services Commission. Local education authorities and colleges will play an important part in the delivery of the scheme. It is our intention that the scheme will develop in such a way as to enable more young people to progress to higher levels of vocational education and training. Effective monitoring and evaluation will be of the essence of the scheme. My Department is in dialogue with the MSC about all aspects of this, with an input from Her Majesty's inspectors.

The youth training scheme is intended to complement the contribution of full-time educational provision for 16 and 17-year-olds. Effective links are being forged with the joint board of the major examining bodies responsible for the full-time certificate of pre-vocational education. Increasing numbers are remaining in full-time education after 16, often seeking courses with a vocational bias.

It has been suggested that higher education opportunities have been limited by spending cuts, but restraints on higher education spending have not led to a decline of access across higher education as a whole. There are now about 50,000 more home full-time students in higher education than there were in 1979–80, and the higher education participation rate stands at 13.5 per cent., compared with 12.4 per cent. in 1979–80.

Whether demand for higher education will continue to be met in 1983–84 depends principally on decisions taken by local authority institutions as to how many students they believe they can reasonably admit within the resources available to them. For later years, the Government are discussing higher education student numbers with the organisations concerned, and I cannot yet comment on the results of those discussions.

All the initiatives to which I have referred for improved and varied education and training are in the context of meeting, as nearly as possible, the needs of each individual young person. It is not, and it never must be, a question of the politicians or the bureaucrats, or even the teachers, imposing any particular form of educational training. Rather it is a question of attempting to respond to the needs and the wishes of a great diversity of children and young people —and, of course, of their parents, who bear the prime responsibility for the education of their children.

Put another way, we should be seeking for our young people equality of opportunity, not equality of provision. Indeed, equality as such is the very opposite of equality of opportunity. Children have very varied abilities, aptitudes, enthusiasms and motivations. A highly academic education for one child might be wholly inappropriate for another; a demanding technical course for one might be impossible for another even to understand.

Equality of provision means providing the same kinds of schools and the same kind of course for each child, regardless of whether such meets the needs of that particular child. Equality of opportunity is the very reverse of that. It is providing a great variety in order to give each child what that particular child needs. It is providing the highly academic course for the highly intellectual child, highly technical for the child of that aptitude, and a special remedial course for the slow learner.

We need to develop each and every child to the very maximum of that child's own ability, whatever that is and wherever that ability lies, giving each child the maximum opportunity to develop his or her own potential to the full. No blanket, uniform, stereotyped provision can do that. No ideological imposition of only one type of school can do that.

In looking to the future and to the many initiatives that we have already taken for technical education, for practical content, for more work on computers, on mathematics, on language development and, of course, on widening parental choice still further, I welcome the gentle but purposeful evolution of our present comprehensive schools to become more responsive to parents' wishes and the children's needs. In particular, I would welcome the greater development of a technical curriculum. By "technical" I do not, of course, mean a spot of woodwork and a spot of metal work for the less intelligent. I mean electronics and computers, business studies and management skills. I mean technical in the modern sense, with a school demanding much of its pupils, as demanding of the most highly intelligent as of the less able child. Such variety of provision is even more possible and more desirable in the great conurbations, where there are many children to educate of greatly differing talents and many schools concentrated within a limited area able to cater for those children. There is no need for all those schools to be identical or almost identical and there is no need for them all to be comprehensives.

London is the largest conurbation in the United Kingdom. The ILEA spends vast sums of money and this year it will spend almost £1,000 million. It spends per child about twice the national average, yet no one can claim either that it achieves twice the results or that it has twice the problems of any other authority.

I am concerned at the poor academic results coming from the ILEA secondary schools when I compare them to other parts of the country. They are much poorer than so many other areas, even other inner city areas. I do not accept that London has such overwhelming social problems that they are on a scale different from those elsewhere. I do not accept that that would explain such poor results for such high expenditure.

I refuse to believe that there are not just as many bright girls and boys in inner London today as anywhere else in the country. In the old days, when there were over 40 grammar schools under the LCC, the bright children from the poorest homes achieved as much as their more fortunate brethren elsewhere. Some London schools achieve much today, but we do seem to be catering less well for all abilities than was once the case under a system of more specialised schools, including the grammar schools. The great pool of talent that is there in the coming generation of Londoners must be developed and exploited to the full, to the benefit of those young people themselves, of London, and of society as a whole.

Mr. Dobson

Does the Minister believe that education in inner London would be improved if we had grammar schools and secondary modern schools again?

Mr. Dunn

That is an argument that can be advanced legitimately.

Mr. Spearing

rose——

Mr. Dunn

Whatever problems London may have, we are clearly not doing as well by those children as we should. We have, however, by good chance, a great opportunity in the very near future to put matters right.

The Government are proposing to abolish the Greater London council, and there is therefore a necessity to replace the ILEA with some new form of administration for education in inner London. I shall not pre-empt discussion on that because I shall be involved in it in the House at a later date. As I said in the House only the other day, we shall be publishing a White Paper in the autumn on the subject, and we shall be inviting consultation. I trust that we will put aside any attempt at party political bickering or manoeuvring, and between us really try to devise the best way of administering education for inner London for the rest of this century and beyond. We owe it to the people of London to get it right. We owe it to them to devise a new body that will be responsive to the wishes of parents for their children, a body that will be truly politically and financially accountable to the people of London. I look forward to returning to this subject at a later date, but this, too, is a part of the whole process of making the best educational provision that we can for the coming generation.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Newham, North-East for affording us all this opportunity to debate this most important question of the education and training of the coming generations, and for giving me the opportunity to explain some of the initiatives that the Government have already taken. We must be prepared as a House and a Government to be both conservative and radical—conservative to conserve that which is best, radical to change that which needs changing.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved, That this House calls upon society to recognise the plight of the younger generation; and urges that positive action be taken to provide a secure future through education and employment to give them hope and confidence for their future in the United Kingdom and to recognise that without such action grave damage to the nation will result.