Special Training Needs: Funding (Hansard, 10 March 1992)

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, training and enterprise councils make funding decisions according to local needs and priorities. All TECs are required to set out in their plans how they intend to make suitable provision for people with special training needs. There is a framework of rules and incentives bearing on the provision of training for those with special needs.

§ Lord Stallard
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Denton, for that reply. However, is she aware that the future of small schemes, such as the Harington scheme about which we have been corresponding with the Government, which provide a desperately needed service for young people with disabilities, is being jeopardised by the latest changes to the funding arrangements of the TECs, which include insistence being placed on unrealistic and inappropriate levels of literacy and numeracy qualifications? What assurance can the noble Baroness give me that those schemes which are concerned with special needs will continue to receive adequate funding?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, obviously I cannot comment in detail on the Harington scheme but I shall be happy to look into that. Perhaps I may draw the noble Lord's attention to the fact that 25 per cent. of training funding is paid for the achievement of agreed outcomes. Those arrangements take account of the fact that not all trainees achieve a positive outcome or attain a national vocational qualification. I am pleased to be able to tell your Lordships that, from April this year, the Department of Employment will recognise two new measures of achievement that will attract output-related funding. They are foundation levels in literacy, known as Wordpower and Numberpower.

§ Baroness Turner of Camden
My Lords, what steps can the Government take to ensure that there will continue to be placements for disadvantaged young people, given that employers are facing a recession? I know that there has been criticism of the quota scheme, but at least that scheme provided some kind of basis for making such placements. Can steps be taken to ensure that placements are available for those who are disadvantaged in this way?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, I am pleased to reassure the noble Baroness that there is great consciousness of that matter. A survey last year by Skill Survey showed a high level of awareness among TECs, with 90 per cent. having a named staff member responsible for matters such as special 1215 training needs and placements, and 80 per cent. having a working party or subgroup. Much attention is therefore being paid to this matter.

§ Lord Renton
My Lords, can my noble friend give me an idea of the extent to which employers are co-operating in providing employment for mentally handicapped people who have had some training? Is she aware that such people have frequently proved their worth in agriculture and horticulture? Will the Government bear in mind that that is an advantage to them?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, I hear my noble friend's comment on the advantages that such people can bring to agriculture and will pass on that message to my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Employment. Negotiations between industry and the training organisations involve the training and enterprise councils at a local level. Therefore, the results are known to them, and needs are met in the local area.

§ Baroness Seear
My Lords, is the noble Baroness aware that I have a letter from the chairman of the Leeds TEC in which he makes it clear that, as a result of a substantial cut in funding, it has been necessary to cut two training centres, at least one of which is for special needs? In the light of that, how can the noble Baroness deny that the matter is largely one relating to funding for the TECs?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, the objective is to move money for TECs to where it is needed so as to reflect value for money. That must be the job of the TEC chairman. I am also aware that in that instance arrangements have been made, or are in the process of being made, for the training of everyone on the training scheme mentioned by the noble Baroness to be continued.

§ Lord Dormand of Easington
My Lords, will the Minister confirm that there are performance-related bonuses which require TECs to achieve special targets for special needs before the payment is made? Is not that highly inappropriate for people with special needs? Does not it also mean that some at least, perhaps a majority, will not receive what anyone would consider to be adequate training?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, it does not follow that it means that people will not receive adequate training. The experience the TECs have had since being set up proves, as a result of exchanges among them, in particular through the chairman's group, that they are giving good value to the benefit of the taxpayer and the trainee.

§ Lord Rochester
My Lords, will the noble Baroness confirm that since the beginning of last year the number of training centres for ex-offenders, run by the two main providers—NACRO and the Apex Trust —has been reduced from 95 to 48? That is said to be due to cuts in the employment training budget and the system of funding allocation through TECs to which 1216 the noble Baroness has referred. If those figures are correct, what do the Government propose to do to remedy the situation?

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, the DES has made substantial payments to the Apex Trust and NACRO in the current financial year to help them reduce the scale of their ET provision. All TEC chairman and council are well aware of their responsibilities in that area. I shall quote one scheme which illustrates that point. The Sheffield TEC has established a task force, involving the probation service and NACRO, to look at the training and employment needs of ex-offenders. The work is not being neglected.

§ Lord Donaldson of Kingsbridge
My Lords, having cut some 5,000 places last year in NACRO, will the noble Baroness find out whether there has been any replacement? My information is that most of those disadvantaged young people who have recently come out of prison now find it much more difficult to obtain a job or training than they did when those 5,000 places were available to them.

§ Baroness Denton of Wakefield
My Lords, I appreciate the noble Lord's interest in this special area, but I would point out that YT and credit budgets, which cover that area, will be virtually the same next year as this, despite falling numbers of 16 and 17 year-olds and the increasing numbers staying on at school. Every effort is being made.