Clause 1
4:00 pm
John Hayes (Shadow Minister, Innovation, Universities and Skills; South Holland and The Deepings, Conservative)
Let me do that, Mrs. Humble. Clause 1(1)(b)(ii) would enable the body issuing an apprenticeship certificate to charge a fee for so doing. This is essentially a probing amendment to determine the reasons and circumstances under which a fee would be charged.
Having heard what witnesses have said about apprenticeships and other matters—the Bill has been variously described as a missed opportunity and a bureaucratic muddle—we hope that the Minister, in the context of his assumed rejection of our amendment, will say why he feels that the many people who have criticised the Bill are wrong and he is right.
As we begin our albeit imperfect efforts to make this Bill better, I am encouraged by the fact that I have alongside me as ever my hon. Friend the Member for Bognor Regis and Littlehampton. Man and boy, for more than 30 years, we have toiled in the name of righteousness. Over that time I, like Dorian Gray, am largely unchanged. He is more like the picture in the attic. Nonetheless, we are united in our efforts to make the Bill better and, with particular regard to this amendment, to ensure that apprenticeships are worthy of their name. I am concerned that the Government, in meeting their ambitious targets to make entitlement a reality—a key part of the Bill—will water down apprenticeships and so may damage the quality of that brand. The Minister will no doubt want to take the opportunity to reassure me that is not the case but there are real fears. There are risks associated with radically increasing the number of apprenticeships without putting into place the necessary infrastructural changes to ensure that those apprenticeships teach and test real competencies and make the individuals who engage in them genuinely more employable. That was, and should be, the test of the apprenticeship system, which is why this side of the Committee supports it.
We also hope that the Minister will say something about the nature of the reorganisation, which is pertinent to this part of the Bill and the amendment. It is difficult to understand how the proposed changes will make the system more responsive to employers’ needs, less bureaucratic and more cost-effective. Indeed, I contend that it will achieve the opposite of all those things; the system will be more cumbersome, bureaucratic and expensive. Nothing I heard from the Ministers this morning reassures me; there seemed to be confusion as to whether the changes will cost more, the same or less, as well about the true motives behind the legislation.
This is a David and Goliath battle; the Minister has all the might of the establishment at his disposal, whereas we are merely armed with the slingshot of truth and the spirit of virtue. On that basis, I hope that the Minister will deal with the contextual matters, because they are highly pertinent to the amendment and vital to a proper understanding of the Bill and our attempts to improve it.
The structure that is put in place must not be inappropriate or, indeed, incapable of delivering a demand-led, highly responsive and slimmed-down system of funding and management of skills. We will go some way to fulfilling our purpose if we implement the very structure advocated by the Leitch report, to which the Government at least pay lip service. We regard such a system as essential to delivering the right kind of skills for our businesses and economy. If we receive more unsatisfactory answers, obfuscation and doubts, our profound reservations about the legislation will, frankly, be set in stone. In anticipation of longer and more interesting speeches to come, I look forward to what the Minister and others have to say about the amendment and its context.