HL Deb 25 July 1990 vol 521 cc1445-7

3.53 p.m.

Lord Peston asked Her Majesty's Government:

What is the reason for the proposed creation of a new body, the National Youth Agency, to amalgamate the National Youth Bureau, the National Council of Voluntary Youth Services, the British Youth Council, the Council for Education and Training in Youth and Community Work and the National Association of Young People's Advisory Councils.

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State seeks to help the whole of the youth service to develop a secure educational foundation and clear framework for meeting the challenges of the 1990s. The development of a single, strong, comprehensive body through which government funding can be channelled to provide support at national level is central to achieving that.

Lord Peston

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for her Answer. On reflection, I wonder whether she is entirely happy with it. I understand that essentially her right honourable friend the Secretary of State has set up a highly centralised new quango in place of the very successful decentralised structure that we had before. Is it now the Government's new policy to set up such quangos and to centralise in that way? Perhaps I may also draw her eye to the wording of the Question. I asked what the reason was. I did not ask what the policy was.

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, first, I do not agree that it would necessarily decentralise. We were talking about replacing centralised bodies—many of them—with one agency. The reasons for that include: better use of resources; better co-ordination of support services; strengthening of the partnership between the voluntary and the private sectors as well as the local authority sector; strengthening support services to the youth movement generally throughout the country and to community education; improving the quality, range and effectiveness of services and making the responses to government priorities even better.

The Lord Bishop of Manchester

My Lords, is the Minister aware that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Bath and Wells, George Carey, whose appointment as Archbishop of Canterbury was announced this morning, has a long-standing interest in youth matters? Is she further aware that when he comes to this House he will have much to contribute on that subject, among others?

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, I shall have the privilege to be the first to welcome him from the Dispatch Box. I look forward very much to his involvement in this debate.

Lord Tordoff

My Lords, I must declare an interest which I am sure will surprise some noble Lords. I am a president of the British Youth Council. I shall explain at a later date to my noble friend the Deputy Leader, who asked from a sedentary position about my qualifications for that post.

Is the noble Baroness aware that there is great concern in the British Youth Council that its 40 years' democratic running of an organisation which has provided tremendous experience for young people is being eroded by the Government? Already it has had its core funding taken away and is only able to carry out projects which have government approval, not just the approval of its members. What is the intention of the Government in relation to the activity of the British Youth Council in international matters, which has been in a compartment separate from the funding by the Department of Education and Science?

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, as the noble Lord will know, the funding has changed for all youth bodies operating nationally and will continue for the agency. The funding will be based on work submitted to the Government and approved by them. The organisation with which the noble Lord has an involvement has chosen to remain separate under the new arrangements and will continue to be separate. Therefore the way in which the British Youth Council operates outside the national agency will be very much a matter for it.

Lord Harmar-Nicholls

My Lords, will my noble friend say whether the appointment of a national youth agency necessarily means that all the other organisations involved in such work have to cease to exist? Is it not possible that in their separate forms they can exist and make a contribution towards strengthening the National Youth Agency which is now being set up?

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, I am very pleased to be able to assure my noble friend that the decision to exist alongside the national agency as an independent body is very much a matter of choice. The agency will be based on the National Youth Bureau and on the Council for Education and Training in Youth and Community Work. Those two bodies will be subsumed under the new agency. However, the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services and the National Association of Young People's Counselling and Advisory Services have opted to remain separate but nevertheless to work constructively with the agency. The British Youth Council has also opted to remain separate outside the agency. They all wish to work constructively with the agency. I believe that it will be a very profitable arrangement.

Lord Denham

My Lords, we have now spent 25 minutes on four Questions. Perhaps I may suggest that the noble Lord, Lord Molloy, asks his question and that my noble friend answers it. Then may be the time to move on.

Lord Peston

My Lords, I protest strongly against this curtailment. I asked my Question in a perfectly bona fide way and I expect to get a decent amount of your Lordships' time on an issue which I regard as of great importance to the youth of this country. I resent it very strongly because I know that, at least until this moment, several noble Lords wished to intervene. I appreciate the noble Lord's problems but I do not see why I should bear the cost of them.

Lord Denham

My Lords, the difficulty is that by the express wish of your Lordships' House we are meant to take 20 minutes on Questions. We took an inordinate length of time on the first two Questions. We got through the third one very expeditiously. We have now been on this Question well over six or seven minutes. I am in the hands of the House, but if the House wishes Questions to take a reasonable length of time it must support whoever rises at this Dispatch Box to cut to noble Lords the feelings of the House.

Lord Molloy

My Lords, will the Minister say whether there have been any discussions with the existing seven youth organisations? If not, will there be such discussions, and when they have taken place will those discussions be brought to Parliament for further examination?

Baroness Blatch

My Lords, there have been discussions with the five organisations. All of them have responded. All the local authority associations have also been consulted. The proposals are being brought forward on the basis of all those consultations.

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