§ Mr. Ridleyasked the Minister of Labour what is the cost in the current year of the retraining programme to public funds; and what it is expected to be next year.
§ Mrs. Shirley WilliamsThe total cost of retraining financed from public funds is not readily ascertainable but, for costs falling on the Ministry's Vote, amounts, in the current financial year, to about £7.5 million, the bulk of which relates to expenditure at the Government Training Centres. Costs falling on the Votes of other Departments, for example, for rent, rates, fuel are difficult to assess but may, in the current financial year, be of the order of £1 million. In addition, a sum of about £2 million will be spent on building and equipping new training centres during 1966–7.
Much retraining is done in industry and the cost of some of this is now spread over the industries concerned by the levy and grant arrangements of Industrial Training Boards.
It is not yet possible to estimate how much will be spent from public funds on retraining next year.