Training

HC Deb 19 October 1993 vol 230 cc138-40

10. Mr. Richards

To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what representations he has received since 28 May about apprenticeships and the provision of training for 16 to 19-year-olds.

Mr. David Hunt

Several, Madam Speaker.

Mr. Richards

Can my right hon. Friend confirm that the recently introduced general national vocational qualifications have been an outstanding success and that they are popular with 16 to 19-year-olds as well as with employers, who regard them as being especially relevant and important at the workplace?

Mr. Hunt

My hon. Friend is right that the pilot scheme for GNVQs was extremely popular, and it is hoped that by 1996 one in four 16-year-olds will participate in GNVQ courses. GNVQs or vocational A-levels will provide an excellent grounding for the place of work, and many of the students attaining those qualifications will be able to build up their skills by obtaining NVQs as they progress through a lifetime of work.

Mr. Grocott

Will the Minister cast his mind back to the heady days of the 1970s, when there was hardly a motor component maker or a motor manufacturer in the west midlands that did not have an engineering apprenticeship school? One of the privileges of being a west midlands Member of Parliament was to attend the annual award ceremonies at apprenticeship schools. Can he confirm that since the Conservatives have come to office those schools have progressively closed and that few now exist? When does he hope to give school leavers the kind of apprenticeship opportunities that they had in abundance in the 1970s?

Mr. Hunt

The hon. Gentleman must recognise that there are serious unemployment problems in the European Community, especially those of youth unemployment. Youth unemployment in this country is less than the European Community average. In, for example, Belgium, France and especially Spain, where youth unemployment is more than 30 per cent., there are some very serious problems. I have to recognise that I should like a return to the traditional form of apprenticeship and have said so on several occasions. I should very much like it to be based on learning rather than merely on time serving. The hon. Gentleman will know that we are considering various proposals. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and I are considering the subject at the moment.

Mr. Ian Bruce

First, may I say what a wonderful job the Dorset training and enterprise council is doing to encourage apprenticeships and skills training. Can my right hon. Friend tell the House whether he will vigorously defend his budget and that of the TECs, as there is worry that more money might be switched to the academic education of that age group rather than to vocational training, which I believe all hon. Members value?

Mr. Hunt

I recognise that there is a need to maintain a work-based vocational training scheme and readily accept what my hon. Friend has said. I join him in paying tribute to his TEC. I sometimes wish that Opposition Members would spend a little time, sit down with their TECs and give them the support that they need, in the way that my hon. Friend has said that he does.

Mr. Tony Lloyd

When the Government abolished the right for 16 and 17-year-olds to claim benefit, the previous Secretary of State said that young people would be guaranteed a training place. Since that time, 18,000 has been the highest figure that the Government have accepted for youth unemployment. The Department's labour force survey made it clear that more than 125,000 16 and 17-year-olds had no jobs and are not in educational training —they were the unemployed. Can the Secretary of State tell the House what happened to those 107,000 young people who were denied benefit, training and a job? Did he mislay them or simply fiddle the figures?

Mr. Hunt

The Opposition have to think seriously about the way in which they approach this serious subject. If the unemployment figures go up, they shout, "Bad news". When they go down, they shout, "Bad figures", which is a disgraceful imputation on the independent statisticians in my office. Every time that we hear that accusation I know that it greatly upsets those who work in my Department. They have invited the shadow spokesman to the Department of Employment so that he can hear the truth. As I understand it, that invitation had still not received a positive response from the hon. Gentleman before I came to the Chamber this afternoon.