§ Mr. Montgomeryasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science whether he will make a statement about changes in the consultative machinery between the education system and the Manpower Services Commission.
§ Sir Keith JosephSeveral steps have recently been taken to improve the consultative machinery. The youth training board and its advisory group on content and standards involve strong educational representation in the planning and execution of the youth training scheme at national level. Officials of the Department of Education and Science are in close touch with the MSC and education interests about other aspects of national co-ordination, with regard to the whole range of MSC's training programmes.
At local level, area manpower boards are being established. They will have representatives of local education authorities and professional interests, and will be able to invite educational and other experts to meetings, and to establish sub-groups where appropriate including on matters of particular concern to the education service where the expertise of that service can be more fully represented. I hope that boards, and education interests locally, will take full advantage of these opportunities for working together at the local level where so many of the issues of co-ordination arise.
In the light of these developments, and following widespread consultation, the commission has recommended, and I have agreed, that the training and further education consultative group, which has had a wide remit for co-ordination, should be disbanded with effect from 31 December 1982. The chairman of the commission and I would wish to pay tribute to the group's members, and especially its chairman, Mr. Roy Helmore, for his service in that capacity for six years, as well as his contribution over nine years of membership to the deliberations of the commission itself.