§ 3.29 p.m.
§ Lord Gregson rose to move, That this House takes note of the report of the Science and Technology Committee on Education and Training for New Technologies (2nd Report 1984–85, H.L. 48.).
§ The noble Lord said: My Lords, there is considerable public and institutional concern regarding all matters at this time relating to education, and there is a great deal of public debate in many forums. It was to be expected, therefore, that when your Lordships' Select Committee decided to inquire into this important subject concerning education and training there would be considerable interest from many quarters; and there was.
§ Evidence was received from nearly 200 organisations and individuals. On behalf of your Lordships' committee I must express our gratitude to those many people and organisations who helped with our inquiries, either by submitting written evidence or by coming along and giving oral evidence. I would also place on record the committee's gratitude to those many people in the USA and Japan who took so much trouble to help us with our inquiries. The committee is also grateful indeed to the special advisers for their wise counsel and assistance, and especially to the clerks for their valiant efforts.
§ I have no doubt that your Lordships are all aware that over the past two years this country had a negative balance in manufactured goods for the first time since what is known as the Industrial Revolution around the end of the 18th century; but I wonder how many of your Lordships are aware of the alarming rate of change from positive balance to negative balance. In 1981 we had a positive balance of £5 billion; in 1984 we had a negative balance of £4 billion. I would suggest that, for a trading nation that depends on its overseas trade to maintain the standard of living of its people, that must give rise to very considerable concern. In normal circumstances we would be in an extremely serious balance of payments crisis—more serious than anything we have experienced previously. The reason we are not in crisis is North Sea oil.
§ The decline in our manufacturing earnings abroad is almost exactly the reciprocal of the build-up of the sale abroad of the surplus of North Sea oil over and above our own needs. In other words, the total balance is slightly positive. It is generally accepted that the output of oil from the North Sea will reach its maximum over the next two years and will then start to decline. In the statement by the Treasury that accompanied last week's Budget, North Sea output is shown to peak this year and the decline to commence next year. It is certainly not going to disappear 775 overnight, and there is good reason to believe that we shall be dragging the dregs out of the North Sea well into the 21st century.
§ But whatever the rate of decline, since we are only just in balance we shall be forced once again to rely more and more on our exported goods and services to earn our living in the world. That means that if the Treasury are right—and on this occasion unfortunately I think they are—we are not only in negative balance in goods and services but we are also in negative time. Since the United Kingdom is not rich in physical resources other than energy, our ability to compete with our goods and services is entirely dependent on adding value to the materials and resources which we import from abroad. This means that we must rely primarily on the quality of our human resources—their skill, their enterprise and their versatility; in other words, technical knowledge and the intellectual capability to apply it.
§ Science and technology lie at the very root of our endeavours. To remain competitive on the world markets we must be at the forefront of a good many of the developing technologies, if we cannot be at the forefront of them all. I regret to say that I believe that the rapid deterioration in our overseas trade owes a lot to the possibility that we are not keeping up at the forefront of technology. In the world of rapid communication, it is now quite impossible to sell yesterday's technology. We are dropping behind in the race, and to falter in this race at this time could not be worse with North Sea oil output soon to start to decline.
§ A feature of the 20th century is the rapid emergence of new technologies, and the pace is accelerating. This appears to be a factor which we in this country have failed to realise. It takes more and more effort to keep up with the front runners. You cannot rest on your laurels or assume that the provisions we made yesterday to compete are sufficient for today, and certainly not for tomorrow.
§ Another feature of new technology is that it is all-pervasive. There is hardly an area of man's endeavour that is not affected and that will not become more and more affected as we follow technology up the exponential scale. Your committee's report clearly spells out that the country's economic future and its ability to ensure gainful employment for its people is dependent on coming to terms with the new technologies as they emerge.
§ The ability to be in the forefront (or, in the modern idiom, at the cutting edge) of new knowledge must depend on the pursuit of excellence. Unfortunately, and for many years, this has not been a popular course to recommend in this country, but we must understand that we shall never ever stay with the competition by levelling down. We have got to find a way to encourage the very best of our schoolchildren to opt for science and technology if we are to compete in the world's markets—and here I believe we have as a country a very serious and major handicap: that science, technology and industry are not the occupations for which our schoolchildren aim. This is not the case among our competitors.
§ This situation must be improved. If it is not, within it lie the seeds of our own destruction. One can 776 understand that spending wealth is much more pleasurable than earning it, but we must ensure that our schoolchildren understand that it is necessary to create wealth before we can spend it, or even shuffle it around.
§ All of this has been said before in many forums, and I realise we are not short of analysis or advice. We are short of action, and it will take a very considerable effort across the board—parents, teachers, industry, local and national government. We shall all have to do more. Changing the culture of a hundred years will not be easy, but it must be done. Special emphasis should be placed on developing and maintaining the interest of girls in science and technology. As long as scientists and technologists come, in effect, from only half the population, the manpower needs of new technologies will not be met.
§ The committee were particularly concerned that in the schools a more broadly based curriculum is needed. Pupils should be required to study mathematics, the sciences and the humanities up to the age of 16, and given some lessons in basic economics. Computers need to be integrated into the teaching of all subjects. Positive action is recommended designed to encourage the interest of girls in science and technology, especially at primary school and early in secondary school.
§
Good teaching is crucial at all levels, from primary to higher education:
The overall performance of existing teachers has to be improved, the best must be retained in the service, and additional good teachers must be found".
§ In order to attract the best candidates into teaching, the committee recommend the introduction of differential payments to teachers and lecturers in science and technology. The committee are also unhappy at the unsuitable qualifications of many science teachers, and recommend that secondary school teachers should be graduates in the subject they teach, while primary school teachers should be taught some mathematics and basic science. Initial training for all teachers should include an introduction to industry. All steps possible must be taken to raise the unsatisfactory levels of in-service training.
§ If we succeed in changing the attitudes within the schools and the best opt for science and technology in their further education, then we must provide the excellent to create excellence. We must ensure that our best are taught by the excellent, supported by the research which is absolutely necessary to keep up with the forefront of science and technology, and make certain that our places of learning are capable of developing the people so essential to earn our living in the world of today and tomorrow. It has been the perceived wisdom in this country for more than 100 years that you can compress into three short years of a first degree of science and technology all the learning that is necessary for the next 40 years of commercial, industrial or academic activity. This is a nonsense. The quantum of knowledge that exists today is vastly greater than that 40 years ago when I was receiving my initial education in technology, and it is expanding at an exponential rate. The doubling time for knowledge in computer science has recently been estimated to be 2.7 years, that is to say, half the knowledge we have today was not available three short years ago.
777§ The complexity of new technologies, and particularly their multidisciplinary nature, means that for technologists, traditional degree courses are no longer adequate. They will need to be supplemented by fourth and fifth years in higher education through taught masters' degrees, where students may start to develop the required specialisations. Our competitors have recognised this. In America and Japan a taught post-graduate degree of two years' duration has become the norm rather than the exception, and the requirement for research activity is a doctorate. In these countries, post-graduate education is the power house of their activities in technology. In this country, it appears to me to be almost fossilised, and in some technologies we are actually dismantling postgraduate degrees. I believe that for government and industry this is an area for urgent action.
§ One of the features of the educational scene in this country is that it is almost totally fragmented. There is no focus, and this makes it almost impossible to analyse problems, take the corrective actions and then monitor their fulfilment. Your committee believe that this is a major cause of the slow progress we in this country have made in keeping up with the rest of the world. Therefore, we have recommended that a group of people be brought together to provide that focus, to define the problem, to commission analyses, to recommend, to take action and to monitor results. We were strongly recommended to advise action on this basis by 14 of the leading high-tech companies in the United Kingdom.
§ While your committee was conducting the inquiry, the Government set up an inter-departmental committee under Mr. John Butcher, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, to consider the short-term serious shortage of technologists in the information technology area. Arising from the recommendation of that committee, the Confederation of British Industry have undertaken to set up a group to deal with the fire-fighting problem of the immediate shortage in this one area of technology. With this action under way, your committee considered it more appropriate to concentrate on the longer-term problem of making sure to the best of our ability that we avoid shooting ourselves in the foot again by having a drastic shortage of people with the right skills in the middle of 3½ million unemployed.
§ There was a good deal of debate in the committee regarding the form and organisational link-up for such a group. It did not make sense in the present circumstances to suggest an independent quango, so we looked for an organisation already involved in continually looking at new technologies. Such an organisation is the Science and Engineering Research Council. It sponsors research into the technologies of tomorrow, and sponsors post-graduate education for the technologies of today.
§ We have recommended therefore that an education and training board should be set up within the Science and Engineering Research Council to provide the focus that I have described previously. We have suggested the following provisions: It must have the right independently to report to Parliament; the subject is far too serious for it to report anywhere else. It should 778 be composed of industrialists, scientists and government to provide a balanced view. It should commission research and studies from existing organisations who specialise in this field. It should be financed to provide post-graduate education to the highest possible standards. It should have the power to request reports from Government departments and local authorities.
§ Since our report was published, I have heard many suggestions where else such a board should be located, ranging from an independent quango via four different government departments to a Cabinet committee. I have not yet heard of any suggestions that stand up to the logic of locating it within the Science and Engineering Research Council. I hope and I stress in considering this recommendation that the Government will apply logic and not allow bureaucratic jealousies to determine their course of action.
§ The other myth relating to a stand-alone three-year first degree is that it provides the knowledge for the next 40 years. Of course, this is quite absurd—patently so—and yet to a large extent, unbelievable though it is, this is what many graduates have to do. Our competitors have realised that technology marches up the exponential curve, and that their livelihood depends on continuing education, since they have no North Sea oil to lull them into a false sense of security.
§ We must have expanding provision for re-education and continuing education. Here the essential problem lies with industry. As an industrialist, I am sorry to say that industry in this country spends far less on education and training than any of our competitors. For the good of us all, that must change. This is another area where there was a great deal of debate within the committee. The pattern which has emerged from the evidence is that there are many companies, particularly in the manufacturing sector, who take seriously their responsibility for education and training, but there are many other companies, particularly in the service sector, who obtain their skilled personnel by poaching from the responsible organisations that do the training. I hasten to add that of course there are those in the service sector who recognise their responsibilities and contribute and provide training in technology; equally there are many in the manufacturing sector who do not.
§ Looking around the world at our competitors, there is a dichotomy. On the one hand there are countries like Japan and Germany, where education and training by industry is built into the nature and culture of the country, and where it would be totally unacceptable for industry to shirk its responsibilities. There are other countries, like Sweden and France, which ensure the training requirement is fulfilled by applying a levy. As I have said, your committee had considerable discussion about this situation. We came to the conclusion that certainly in the short term the only way forward in this country was by levy, although in the long term your committee hopes that by compulsory reporting in company accounts of training activities the need for compulsory levy could be relieved.
§ Your committee stress the potential of distance learning techniques in the field of continuous learning. They encourage the adoption of tutored video 779 instruction to provide updating to those employed in industry. They expect both the Open University and the Open Tech to be instrumental in providing such techniques. It is suggested that the Open University should broadcast material from other universities and polytechnics which could be combined to form a post graduate degree. I commend the efforts being made by Aston University to pioneer tutored video instruction in this country. They should be given every encouragement to continue in this work.
§ There are 63 conclusions and recommendations from the committee's report. I make no excuse for the length of the list because the subject is too complex and the problem too important not to deal with it in detail. I have highlighted only a few of the more important issues arising from the report. I have no doubt speakers, including my fellow members of the committee, will dwell on other matters contained in the report, but may I finish by saying to the Government and to industry there is a very urgent problem to be dealt with, which is outlined in this report. It is fundamental to the future economic wellbeing of all of us and the future standard of living of most of us. It is too important to be fudged, and neither Government nor industry will measure up to the solutions to the problem without spending money. Not to spend the money now could be the greatest error of omission committed this century.
§ I look forward to an interesting debate and in particular to a notable maiden speech by the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Durham. I look forward also to hearing the views of the Government and to further explanation of proposals in the Budget regarding education and training. My Lords, I beg to move.
§ Moved, That this House takes note of the Report of the Science and Technology Committee on Education and Training for New Technologies (2nd Report 1984–85, H.L. 48).—(Lord Gregson.)