HC Deb 07 May 1998 vol 311 cc854-5
9. Mr. Barry Jones (Alyn and Deeside)

What steps the Government are taking to tackle skill shortages. [40041]

10. Dr. Alan Whitehead (Southampton, Test)

What steps the Government are taking to tackle skill shortages. [40042]

The Secretary of State for Education and Employment (Mr. David Blunkett)

We have established a national skills task force, incorporating all sides of industry and commerce and large and small enterprises. It will report in a couple of months on its findings from the seminars that it has held and its work with industry across the country. We shall have at our disposal the £100 million that the Chancellor allocated on 17 March specifically to tackle the skills needs of Britain in the years to come, and we shall build on the 55 national training organisations that have been accredited in the past 12 months.

Mr. Jones

Will my right hon. Friend ensure that the task force finds sufficient skilled labour for Britain's healthy aerospace industry? Is he aware that in my constituency British Aerospace casts its net far and wide to find skilled labour, while my unemployed, unskilled constituents find it hard to find real jobs? Will he ensure that the task force gets a grip on that wretched situation?

Mr. Blunkett

Matching the needs of the economy with people who have the talent and the will to be part of a labour force of high earners and high added value—an economy of the 21st century to match the best in the world—is a critical element in tackling the skills shortage and ensuring that we can have sustainable growth with low inflation.

Dr. Whitehead

I thank my right hon. Friend for his answer and join him in welcoming the establishment of the skills task force, which will give us the prospect of a genuine national skills strategy—in sharp contrast, rhetorical flourishes aside, with the previous Government's record. Will he ensure that the task force looks to the long term and tackles the immediate problems? How will it work alongside existing agencies such as training and enterprise councils?

Mr. Blunkett

Agencies such as training and enterprise councils are represented and the chairman of the task force, Chris Humphries, who has great experience in the field, will from July be the head of the Association of British Chambers of Commerce. The skills task force has already identified the fact that there is considerable need for information technology skills. If Opposition Members will forgive me for saying so, the notion that equipping the nation with the information skills of the future is being a nanny state is the kind of thinking that got us into the mess that we got into in the 1980s. It ill becomes those who have the greatest experience of nannies to deny it to anyone else.

Miss Anne McIntosh (Vale of York)

How have the skills shortages been perceived? Will there be a full, continuing audit of them?

Mr. Blunkett

The 55 national training organisations and the specific focus of industries working to develop a profile of their needs and to transmit it to both further education and private providers will be a crucial element in ensuring that we get it right. It is a bottom-up approach, with industry, commerce and services determining what is required, and the public services and private enterprise responding positively to those needs.