I beg to move Amendment No. 8, page 21, line 33, leave out Clause 27.

With this it will be convenient to discuss Amendment No. 9, page 24, line 13, Clause 32, leave out subsection (2).

During Second Reading on 21 May, my right hon. Friend Mr. Murphy and I raised concerns about the pre-legislative scrutiny of what is now Clause 27. The clause not only transfers responsibility to legislate on further education and training from Parliament to the National Assembly, but makes changes to the devolution settlement in Wales.

As I said on Second Reading, I do not oppose the idea of using framework legislation to transfer power from Parliament to the National Assembly; however, clause 27 is a constitutional change—a change, I hasten to add, that has moved ahead without the full rigour of parliamentary scrutiny and debate. Indeed, the crux of the matter is that we are being asked to give new powers over further education and training to the National Assembly, even though it has not yet completed its consultation about how it would use such powers and has no settled view about what it would do with the powers if it had them.

Also during Second Reading, I asked my hon. Friend the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education for an assurance that Parliament would have an opportunity to consider that transfer of law-making power before we were asked on Report and Third Reading to pass the Bill. My hon. Friend replied:

"My right hon. Friends the Members for Torfaen and for Islwyn raised important issues concerning the scrutiny of the legislation and the enabling powers of the Welsh Assembly. I should make it clear that in Committee every line of the Bill will be scrutinised. Any proposed measure by the National Assembly for Wales must be fully debated by the Assembly, and we will ensure that there is adequate and proper scrutiny of the proposals."—[ Hansard, 21 May 2007; Vol. 460, c. 1074.]

Having read the report of the Committee proceedings, I am disappointed because it seems that line-by-line scrutiny of clause 27 did not take place.

In effect, there has been no consideration in detail by Parliament of the merits of transferring a primary law-making power to the National Assembly. I stress that I am not opposed to using framework legislation to transfer responsibility for such matters from Parliament to the National Assembly, but I am wholly opposed to doing it by such a backdoor method.

As I said on Second Reading, this is the third occasion on which the Government have used primary legislation to pass powers to the National Assembly without scrutiny of the issues. It happened with the Education and Inspections Act 2006 and with the NHS Redress Act 2006. The very fact that Parliament has not been able to consider the transfer of powers to the Assembly prompted the Amendment.

Tucking the clause into the Bill meant that it was overlooked and was not subject to the rigorous debate and scrutiny that Parliament deserves. The Welsh Affairs Committee, chaired and led so ably by my hon. Friend Dr. Francis, shares the concerns of my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen and me. The Committee expressed exactly the same fear in its second report of 9 May. Paragraph 47, which refers to adding matters by primary legislation, states:

"In a supplementary note on the use of framework powers, the Secretary of State stated that Parliament will be able to scrutinise framework powers in Bills by bringing forward amendments."

My hon. Friend's Committee doubted whether that would happen. In fact, it went on to say:

"The reality may prove to be disappointing in this respect. Such clauses, which typically appear in the latter parts of Bill, tend to receive less attention than substantive policy clauses."

Having studied the Committee stage and the progress of clause 27, I am inclined to agree with the conclusions of my hon. Friend's Committee.

At paragraph 46 of the report, the Committee said:

"We are concerned that continuing use of primary legislation to extend the powers of the National Assembly...will mean that Matters introduced in this way will escape the detailed arrangements for pre-legislative scrutiny put in place".

Indeed, at paragraph 49 of the report, the Committee said:

"We are concerned that to continue to add Matters by primary legislation could therefore be a device for a general, rather than a specific, extension of Assembly powers, which at the same time negates the opportunity for specific and detailed pre-legislative scrutiny, either by a Committee of the National Assembly or by the Welsh Affairs Committee."

I have always felt that when framework powers are included in any Bill, they should be closely examined under the spotlight of separate parliamentary scrutiny. I hope that when my hon. Friend the Minister replies he will respond to that point. That is the whole reason for the amendment.

I seek an assurance from the Government that this will be the last occasion when they slip a clause into a Bill to transfer primary powers from Parliament to the Assembly, without separate and proper scrutiny by Parliament of the merits of that proposed transfer. If that practice, which I abhor, is to continue, we run the risk that all such future primary legislation will be passed to Cardiff without the benefit of pre-legislative scrutiny by Parliament. The Government have a duty to ensure that Parliament is not bypassed in that way.

I rise briefly to speak in support of the Amendment moved by Mr. Touhig. He has spoken eloquently to it, and I seek the leave of the House for a moment or two to explain why I support it. I do so with some trepidation, or apprehension, because I should not like it to be thought either that I was expert in the constitution of Wales or that I was in any sense seeking to subvert the devolution settlement or to make difficulties for the Welsh Assembly Government—I speak not for that purpose. The nature of the Bill's consideration has been broadly constructive and consensual, but it is necessary to put down a constitutional marker on the Clause.

If I have interests in relation to the Principality, they are certainly in education. As I mentioned in Committee, I am about to become involved with the Higher Education Corporation in Wales, and one of the reasons for doing so is that many members of my wife's family, who emanate from the Principality, have been, as one would expect, teachers, one of whom had the great privilege of teaching the new Under-Secretary of State for Wales, whom I warmly welcome to his position—he has certainly lost nothing of her loquacity judging by his performance this afternoon.

To come to the substance of the matter, we in this place should be very careful about enabling legislation, which has a very bad history—modestly in relation to the United Kingdom and certainly in respect of other legislatures. The purpose of Parliament is to scrutinise legislation and to ensure that it is properly considered, and it is not helpful to those for whom it is written and who are intended to benefit to let all this go on the nod, particularly when it relates to constitutional matters and, indeed, education matters. Two areas are particularly sensitive: first, the general interests of the United Kingdom Parliament in relation to education. For example, there is a broadly common qualifications framework, and such issues cannot be discussed in Wales in complete isolation from those in England or the rest of the United Kingdom.

Secondly, there will be cross-border issues, which have been discussed in other contexts but have not been brought out in this discussion. It is quite wrong just to transfer the powers, without a proper discussion, to a body that, as the right hon. Gentleman said, has not yet even expressed its firm intentions about how to handle them. I have little doubt that when we do make the transfer—I am sure that we will, through acquiescence—the powers will be well and responsibly handled. That is not the issue. The issue is whether we should have taken a little longer to look at the powers in more detail before signing them off to somebody else, before proper process. That is a weakness in our constitutional arrangements and I strongly agree that we should not allow that process to be repeated.

I fully support the Amendment of my right hon. Friend Mr. Touhig. When the Government of Wales Bill was being considered in the Chamber—it involved major constitutional change to our country and to Wales—the question of the scrutiny of how we devolve primary powers to the Assembly in Cardiff was a matter of great debate. Behind that lay the desire for proper scrutiny of such legislation. Normally, it would be done by legislative Orders in Council. That would involve pre-legislative scrutiny by the Welsh Affairs Committee, which is chaired my hon. Friend Dr. Francis, together with a Committee in the Assembly. Letting these things go through in primary legislation avoids that proper scrutiny.

We have a new dispensation in Wales. We are told that we are in a new dawn of politics. That means that the spotlight on Welsh Members and on the business of Welsh legislation in this place is much stronger than it used to be. There is also the problem that if what we might call English Whitehall Departments are charged with legislation that involves scrutiny of the devolution of primary powers, they do not take too much notice of that because they see it simply as being something Welsh. Unhappily, that can also be the case among Members of the House. We have to beware of how we scrutinise our legislation.

When my hon. Friend the Minister winds up, will he assure me that the Wales Office will take particular care to ensure that when dealing with the National Assembly, and particularly with other Departments, there is proper scrutiny and that we avoid the mess that we have got into over devolving this issue? We had a debate earlier about the awarding of foundation degrees at further education colleges in Wales. That would have been resolved had there been a proper system in this place to deal with these matters.

Mr. Touhig is right to emphasise that there will be more than one method by which primary legislative powers are passed to the Assembly. During the scrutiny of the Government of Wales Act 2006 I tried to emphasise that point, but it did not receive sufficient consideration. As a matter of principle, all Members of Parliament should be given the fullest possible opportunity to scrutinise legislation that passes primary powers to the Assembly. This is a topical discussion because only this week the Prime Minister outlined 23 new Bills, many of which were on health, education and housing and will contain similar powers.

The suggestion is that the Welsh Affairs Committee should scrutinise this type of legislation as well. I would add a word of caution—already two requests have been made for the Committee to consider legislative competence orders. If the Committee is to carry out that work, and the work of scrutinising the Wales Office and other issues of importance to Wales, it will have a very full programme. An ad-hoc Committee should be set up, along the lines of the Statutory Instrument Committee that I believe sat on Wednesday to consider part of the Government of Wales Act. That would be the best way forward, rather than overburdening the Welsh Affairs Committee, which does valuable work under the chairmanship of Dr. Francis.

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Order. I want to try to fit in a ministerial reply and one other Speaker. I call Mr. Hywel Williams.

I will be brief, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Plaid Cymru Members support Clause 27. It is a substantial change, but leaving it out would be a substantial change, too. Of course, there will be new arrangements that might allow us to avoid some of the problems to which hon. Members have alluded. Education is rightly a devolved matter, and the new freedoms given to the Assembly under the clause are proper, reasonable and coherent. Proper scrutiny will be given to any Assembly measures by the Assembly itself.

I shall quickly respond to some of the comments made, so as to allow my right hon. Friend Mr. Touhig time to make his observations. Clause 27 was scrutinised in the Commons in Committee. In policy terms, the measures in the clause were drawn up to enable the Welsh Assembly Government to develop and present to the National Assembly for Wales coherent and detailed policy proposals, built on identified needs and established Welsh policy objectives. If I had time, I would have liked to have elaborated on the subject and to have read into the record a range of points that have not yet been made, including on matters 5.13, 5.14, 5.15, 5.11, 5.12, and 5.16. I assure the House that in future my aim will be to ensure that there is adequate information to enable meaningful scrutiny to take place earlier in the public Bill process.

Clause 27 ensures that the National Assembly for Wales has the powers that it needs, when it needs them, to debate and determine the appropriateness of proposals put forward by the Welsh Assembly Government for the development of further education in Wales. That will enable the Welsh Assembly Government to propose Assembly measures that are appropriate to Welsh circumstances. In a wider context, that delivers on the Government's commitment to ensuring that the Assembly has the tools to deliver change in the areas for which it has responsibility, and to rebalance legislative authority, without affecting the overall constitutional supremacy of Parliament as regards Wales in the United Kingdom. Parliament has a pivotal role when it comes to scrutiny. It must work in partnership with the Welsh Assembly Government and work in the best interests of the people of Wales. The clause is therefore important, and I hope that the House will support it.

However, I acknowledge the constructive and valid contributions made by Members, including my right hon. Friends the Members for Islwyn, and for Torfaen (Mr. Murphy), and I recognise their genuine concerns. It should be acknowledged that the collaboration between the Welsh Assembly and the Wales Office on how we take forward the devolved settlement is an evolving and learning process, so I am more than happy to meet with hon. Members to gain their views, so that we can further improve the process and ensure that the valuable contribution of hon. Members and the pivotal role played by the House is taken into account. On that basis, I urge my right hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn to withdraw the Amendment.

I listened to my hon. Friend's points, and it is important that we find a mechanism for better scrutiny of such issues. We should not in any way seek to prevent powers being passed over, if that is the view of Government and Parliament. I take on board the point made by Mr. Williams about the pressures of work on the Welsh Affairs Committee, but in view of the Minister's offer to hold a meeting—with, I am sure, colleagues of all parties—in which we can explore ways of scrutinising legislation, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn .

Order for Third Reading read.

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.

This is a small, relatively uncontroversial Bill. We have had a robust debate that has been consensual, on the whole, and I appreciate the constructive contributions made. I hope that Members on both sides of the House will agree that the Government have listened carefully, and have responded, where possible, to make the Bill better.

One subject that has benefited from being debated is foundation degrees. When we look back at the legislation with the benefit of hindsight, we will be certain that enabling colleges to apply for powers to award their own foundation degrees was the right thing to do and was truly groundbreaking. The foundation degree has established itself as an important part of the higher education qualifications landscape; it is valued by learners and employers alike, and it helps us to go forward and face up to the skills challenges that the country faces. I have made it clear that the new powers that the Privy Council can grant under Clause 19 will be appropriate only to certain providers, but the provision nevertheless speaks volumes about the status of further education, which is finally getting the recognition that it deserves.

For an uncontroversial Bill, the legislation has certainly had its moments. The importance of robust policy, underpinned by legislation, to eradicate poor performance and performance that is not improving, is widely accepted. There has been progress in further education, but where there are lingering, serious problems, it is right that we retain the power, through the Learning and Skills Council, to intervene in extreme cases. The Bill will also help more colleges to gain greater freedoms, but within the structure of a robust Intervention strategy that is clear and unequivocal.

The Bill is small, but it is important. Machinery of government changes mean that we will need to consider the detailed funding arrangements for young people, adults and employers to learn, engage and progress, but the Bill remains crucial to our wider goals of further education reform.

The tremendous amount of good will, confidence and support for the further education system that has been expressed in all parts of the House during the debate is testimony to our FE system, which is benefiting from the unprecedented increase in funding over the past decade. That is bearing fruit, with achievement rates up by 20 per cent., more than 1.7 million adults helped with their basic skills, more than a million more adults qualified to level 2, and a tripling of the number of people engaged in apprenticeships. I pay tribute to all those who have made that investment count.

We must continue to enhance the capacity of the FE system through measures that include the foundation degree-awarding powers for colleges, improving the leadership in further education through a new power to regulate the qualifications of principals, and better consultation with employers and learners. Modernising the law on industrial training levies is a key consideration for the construction and electrical engineering sectors, and the devolution to Wales of education and training matters will underpin the review of FE in Wales.

In conclusion, further education is a vital public service, which has more power, perhaps, to transform lives than any other part of the education system. In a small but significant way the Bill has helped to give FE the status and recognition that it deserves. I am pleased to commend the Bill for its Third Reading in the House.

Like the Minister, I am pleased that we are coming to the end of our journey. It has been a long journey, but not an altogether uncomfortable one. It has been characterised by a broad measure of agreement and co-operation in trying to make the best of the Bill. I acknowledge, as I have previously, that the Minister has listened to argument put by both the Opposition parties and by others in an attempt to improve the Bill. I hope that he acknowledges that the Opposition have played a constructive part in that process, although there is sometimes need for drama and colour in our considerations, and we have tried to provide those as well.

This is not a bad Bill, but it is not good enough. Its worst facet is what it ignores. I said in debate earlier that it was extraordinary that the Bill was passing through the House at the same time as the Government were considering their response to the Leitch review of skills. The Leitch report has been in the public domain for a considerable time. The Government have yet to respond to it, but the Bill could well have included proper consideration of the kind of matters that Lord Leitch examined. It is curious that the Government, who are about to respond to a major piece of work that they commissioned, should introduce a Bill dealing with further education and training in the full knowledge of the fact that that review might necessitate further legislation in the short term.

When I tested the Minister on that in Committee, he was in denial. I appreciate that, as he suggested earlier, Ministers can deal only with the material that they have at the time that they have to deal with it, but it is now clear that there will be further legislation in some form later this year in the Queen's Speech, to address some of the issues on which Lord Leitch reported and with which we anticipate the Government will deal in the short term. We hope that even next week we might know more about the details of that.

The Bill acknowledges, as did Lord Leitch, that skills matter, not only for our economic competitiveness but for the individual well-being of millions of our countrymen. The debate on skills is often conducted in a rather utilitarian way. We are actually speaking of the life chances of millions of Britons who pass through FE colleges and benefit from the quality of teaching and learning that takes place there. The Bill has a direct relationship with those experiences. When I champion skills, I do so not for some dull, utilitarian reason, but because I want those people to have the best possible opportunities and for their life chances, economic opportunities and sense of worth to be enhanced by the skills they acquire. That is why I am a robust, vigorous and determined advocate for our further education colleges and those who govern, lead and teach in them, and have been so throughout the passage of the Bill.

I acknowledge that the Minister, too, has spoken for FE in a way that politicians on both sides of the House have done too infrequently in the past. The exception to that, of course, is my hon. Friend Mr. Boswell, who has made a typically intelligent, thoughtful and measured contribution to the passage of the Bill. What a privilege it is to be a Member of the House alongside him, and what a loss he will be to this place when he enters retirement—prematurely, in my judgment—as he says he will at the end of this Parliament. He showed again today why he was such an excellent Minister and why he is such a very good friend to those of us who without his skill and expertise struggle with these matters.

Further education is vital in enhancing the nation's skills, but there are other things to be said about it. There is also immense educational, cultural and social capital in FE, and we must not see FE colleges merely as a vehicle to deliver skills, for other aspects of what they do count too. I believe in education for democratic citizenship, to use the words of Rab Butler, through adult and continuing education. I am sorry that we have lost nearly 1 million adult and continuing education places on the Minister's watch.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the unmerited personal tribute that he just paid me. Before it fades, may I ask him whether he shares my view of the educational merits of vocational education? Many young people who have failed at school in the conventional academic system go to college or go through training at their workplace and find themselves confronted for the first time with the world of work, where they also need general educational skills, and they enthusiastically acquire them because they then see the point of doing so—but that requires the vocational context.

I would make two points in response to my hon. Friend's typically incisive Intervention. First, his reputation will never fade in the hearts and homes of South Holland and the Deepings for all the time that I am the representative of that place in this place. Secondly, he is right to focus on the difference that further education can make to people who have not always had the most successful experience at school. Many people return to education through FE or adult and community learning—continuing learning of the kind that I described. It is vitally important that we see further education not merely as a vehicle for delivering skills to the existing work force, although it is vital, given the demography, that we upskill and reskill our work force in order to meet the skills target; and not merely as a vehicle for equipping a new generation of young people with essential vocational skills—I shall speak more of that in what will be a lengthy peroration in a few moments—but as an opportunity for people to acquire all kinds of other competencies that add to their sense of worth, for the acquisition of practical skills can achieve that just as much as the acquisition of academic qualifications. For too long in this country, we have undervalued those practical competencies and elevated academic learning as the only means of delivering the sense of value to which my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry alludes.

In speaking about what the Bill says, rather than what it does not, I would like to talk about its unhelpful aspects. I do so with hesitation because I do not want to be unkind to the Minister, having praised him earlier. I do not want to injure him in any way—he is a sensitive soul—but it is important to point out that the Bill may be unhelpful both in respect of the intervention powers we debated at some length in Committee, which he and I have discussed privately a number of times, and of the lack of clarity about the ongoing role of the Learning and Skills Council.

I shall explore those two matters for a moment or two. We had a lengthy debate about the first point earlier, so I will just say the following. In the end, it seems unconvincing for the Government to argue that they are in favour of Andrew Foster's recommendation that FE colleges move to greater self-regulation, while simultaneously arguing that the LSC should have new powers to dismiss college governors, principals and senior managers. Of course, it is right that long-line powers are vested in Government when public money is being spent, to ensure that in cases of an absence of quality or probity an intervention takes place. In the interests of learners, as the Minister said earlier, we all want to protect people against such circumstances.

However, I am not convinced that those powers, which have never been used—I repeat, they have never been used—although already in the hands of the Secretary of State, should be extended and transferred to the Learning and Skills Council. I simply do not buy that that is not paradoxical, and nothing that the Minister has said today, previously or in Committee has persuaded me one iota of the strength of his case. It may be that the Association of Colleges has come to a different view about that—I respect it, and I have had many dealings with it, as has the Minister—but I am not yet convinced. We need to test the matter further, and I look forward to seeing what the other place has to say about it when it considers the Bill following our consideration.

The second unhelpful aspect of the Bill is the embedding of the role of the Learning and Skills Council at a time when we are not sure of the Government's position on the future of the LSC. If they respond to Lord Leitch's review in the way that they might, which is to say that sector skills councils should be the principal conduit for the management and funding of skills, and they respond to his recommendation that we move to a more demand-led system with employers in the driving seat, that at the very least means a different role for the LSC, and it may mean a diminished role. However, the Bill, by developing and enshrining in law a regional structure, effectively embeds the Learning and Skills Council in the management and funding of skills. I am not sure whether that it is sensible. Again, it arises from the extraordinary position whereby we are debating a further education and training measure against the background of a review of skills to which the Government have yet to respond. That is not good government and I do not believe that the Minister, in his heart, thinks it is either. Hon. Members of all parties who have spoken to me about the matter expressed reservations about the Government's conduct.

Those reservations were expressed loudly and with Celtic lyricism when it came to the matter of Wales. Given the contributions from some of the House's distinguished Members, we can conclude only that, as far as Wales is concerned, the matter has not been handled as it could and should have been. The argument that pre-legislative scrutiny would have been beneficial to clarify the position on degree-awarding powers and Welsh colleges was clear and unequivocal. It is an unanswerable case and so the answer that we got was as unconvincing as could be.

The Bill therefore has unhelpful aspects, but let me consider the more promising elements, about which there has been broad agreement. Perhaps the most significant aspect is the extension to FE colleges of the power to award foundation degrees. That lies at the heart of the measure. Conservative Members passionately believe that FE colleges provide an important element of widening participation, not only in further education but in higher education. It is understated that further education institutions teach a great deal of higher education. They teach many degree courses, and approximately 12 per cent. of higher education already takes place in further education colleges. Foundation degrees provide an opportunity to widen and deepen participation in a new and exciting way.

Does my hon. Friend agree that many people are unable to study away from home for various reasons, including domestic responsibilities, but are at a stage in their lives when they could take advantage of a higher education course? Being able to do that at their local FE college means that they can study the subject that they want without having to leave home to do it.

With her usual care and insight, my hon. Friend has anticipated some of my comments. She is right that FE colleges are local, community based, highly responsive and flexible about modes of study. They are therefore successful at recruiting learners of a type that HE—with notable, honourable exceptions—is not so successful at recruiting. The facts speak clearly. Further education has a greater proportion of ethnic minority learners, mature learners and learners from disadvantaged backgrounds, who study both FE and HE courses. That is partly because, as my hon. Friend said, they are more flexible, local, accessible and responsive than their counterparts in the university sector. That is not to say that universities do not do excellent work—many do. However, FE can play a critical role in widening participation. The Bill is therefore right to extend the power to FE colleges to award foundation degrees.

There are important caveats. We have argued throughout the Bill's passage that the degree brand must not be diminished by the change and that it is important to maintain rigorous quality; that the progression from foundation degrees to other professional qualifications and, indeed, full degrees must be assured; and that partnership between universities should be maintained where it is already strong and grown where it does not exist. There are important qualifications to our support in principle for those provisions. We have listened to the representations from Universities UK, which has made a measured and strong case to us about such issues. That is why we have both argued publicly and lobbied Ministers privately to try to persuade them to amend the Bill, as they have indeed amended it, to take account of some of those concerns.

Does my hon. Friend agree that the great thing about further education institutions, as opposed to higher education institutions, is that the wider public perceive it as less elitist, because further education institutions take in those who might be from disadvantaged backgrounds and those who never had a chance to progress their education at all? We have a great opportunity to support further education, for that very reason.

My hon. Friend makes a good case, but there is a danger in overstating it. I am familiar with the Institute of Continuing Education, based at Cambridge university, and with other organisations in the HE sector that do immensely valuable work in ensuring that people from all kinds of backgrounds, in all kinds of localities and studying all kinds of courses can have an interface with the very best institutions, resources and teachers. Many universities are doing good work on that, but my hon. Friend is right in essence that FE is more appealing to many learners because of its localness and accessibility, and its style and character.

On a more functional level, the issue is also about modes of learning. Modular courses, distance learning and part-time learning are critical for certain kinds of learners, as my hon. Friend Angela Watkinson pointed out. FE is particularly good at those things. The Bill is right to build on that principle and right to give further education the enormous fillip that it will get from the granting of foundation degrees.

The process will be measured and gradual, because the criteria will set the standards high, so there is no suggestion that the measure will weaken the quality of what is offered. I hope that it will also facilitate good relationships between HE and FE, owing to the changes that have taken place during the passage of the Bill. There was a risk that that would not be so when the Bill was first published, but things have moved on. The Minister has listened to and learned from the representations that have been made. We can achieve the ambition of widening participation without damaging the degree brand or damaging those good relationships. My judgment, therefore, is that the proposals at the heart of the Bill regarding foundation degrees are worthy of the support that we have offered them.

However, there are ongoing concerns about how the Bill fits into the Government's overall strategy for FE and HE. The landscape has changed while we have been debating and considering the Bill. There has been a seismic change in the structure of government. We have a new Department, a new team and a new Prime Minister with his own agenda. It is not yet absolutely clear where the Government are heading in respect of further education and higher education.

I make no apologies for amplifying the points that I made earlier, when we were discussing amendments. FE colleges are feeling quite insecure. I visit a number of further education colleges every week and I meet representatives of the sector equally frequently. I can tell the House that FE is most worried about whether the Government are really committed to its long-term future. FE colleges are worried that the change in the structure of government and the anticipated response to the Leitch report, or indeed the passage of the Bill alone, irrespective of the first two things, will mean that their future is less secure than they would want it to be.

I have enjoyed my exchanges with the Minister immensely. He now needs to give a clear signal in his final words on the Bill that the Government are indeed committed to further education colleges, and that they want them to move to a greater degree of independence, as Sir Andrew Foster has recommended, and to self-regulation of the kind that I have passionately advocated during the Bill's progress. He also needs to give a clear indication that, in the Government's response to the Leitch review, which we eagerly anticipate, there will be a bold series of steps that will enliven skills, allow the Government to meet their targets and enable a new generation of learners to achieve the status and worth that I described when I was advocating the glories of practical accomplishment earlier.

If we can have those assurances from the Government, we can end where we began on the Bill, with a determination to ensure that it will be good for FE and for learners, and that it will be a credit to the House and worthy of the support that it has received on all sides. I hope that the Minister will offer us those assurances today. If he does, I am sure that we can move together with a degree of unanimity, and certainly with a degree of consensus if we cannot agree on absolutely everything. On that basis, I offer the Opposition's support for the Bill's Third Reading. We look forward to its passage into law.

I am pleased to support the Bill through its final stages. I also commend my hon. Friends on the front bench for their work on improving it during its progress through the House. It is now much better than it was when we debated it on Second Reading. I also spoke in that debate.

I have a passionate interest in further education, having been an FE lecturer many years ago. I was also chair of the governors of Luton college of higher education, which is now the university of Bedfordshire. I am now vice-chair of the governors of Luton sixth-form college. As I have said many times, my Constituency has the best further education college in the country, although others might argue about that. It was the first further education college to achieve beacon status, which speaks volumes for the quality of our college.

Early on, I was quite concerned about powers being given to further education colleges to grant foundation degrees, not because it was not a good thing to do but because I could see that conflicts might arise, particularly with the modern universities. Indeed, I was lobbied by the modern universities, one of which is, of course, the university of Bedfordshire. On the other side, I was lobbied by the Association of Colleges, which was very keen on the idea and wanted it to go ahead. Since then, the Minister for Lifelong Learning, Further and Higher Education, my hon. Friend Bill Rammell, has given me private assurances that the power will be used sensibly, and I hope that that will be the case. One of the main purposes of my speaking in this debate is to ask Ministers to exercise the powers carefully and sensibly, and not to cause difficulties for other colleges or, particularly, the universities.

The university of Bedfordshire awards foundation degrees and caters for lots of local students. Our large, excellent further education college might wish to award foundation degrees itself, and the two institutions might end up seeking students from the same local pool. That could have an impact on funding and on the viability of the university. These matters are significant for me locally, and for the rest of the country as well. Fortunately, both institutions have very good, sensible leaders. The principal of Barnfield college, the further education college, and the vice-Chancellor of the university of Bedfordshire are both good friends, and I know that they have spoken together about this. I am sure that they will co-operate and work together sensibly, whatever they decide to do. However, it is important that these potential conflicts should be recognised. In many areas, there will be further education colleges without a local university offering foundation degrees. It may be a good idea to promote foundation degrees at those colleges in order to give local students greater opportunities for the future. One wants to encourage that.

There are more higher education courses delivered in further education colleges today than there used to be degree students when I was one in the 1960s. That reflects the quite astonishing growth of higher education in general, and of higher education within further education colleges. FE colleges are enormously varied organisations that put on a variety of courses—from simple leisure-based courses to courses for people with learning difficulties and those having a second chance, as well as for those studying for higher degrees.

The Bill has been somewhat overshadowed by announcements of constitutional change in the near future, as well as by a new Prime Minister and effectively a new Government. Significant changes are taking place that will have a major effect on further education and, in particular, on sixth-form colleges. I welcome that prospect and when the legislation is passed, I will doubtless speak to many interested parties there. I have been a passionate advocate of sixth-form colleges, as the Minister and other Members may know, because I really believe that they are the jewels in our educational crown. They work very well, they provide good value for money and they offer the best possible opportunities for students. They make a wide range of courses available, provide unusual combinations of subjects, have several teachers in the same subject who can reinforce and support each other, and do a wonderful job.

My constituency includes many people who do not come from traditional academic backgrounds. Some family members have never been past the school leaving age and many come from overseas where those opportunities were not available, yet they now have the opportunity to progress their education beyond A-levels and into university. Our sixth-form college does a wonderful job—about 60 per cent. of its students come from the full range of ethnic minorities.

One of the advantages likely to result from the constitutional changes is that local authorities may be more inclined to create sixth-form colleges than they were before; they are not going to close down their school sixth forms and hand them over to another sector. That will not happen. At a recent conference I attended, a sixth-form college principal suggested that if those colleges had remained within local authorities, there would have been 100 more of them. I shall say no more about that for now.

Finally, it is important to note that further education is now properly recognised as a major component of our education and training, perhaps in a way that was not the case before. FE institutions are now more highly valued, and our Government value colleges more than ever in the past. They will make a major contribution to the training and education of our young people for the future. Millions of young people will go through further education colleges, particularly if we raise the school-leaving age to 18, and it is right to give them additional support, encouragement and financial sustenance to do their job. I have probably already said more than enough, but I want to commend the Bill and support my Front-Bench colleagues.

Rather curiously, a Labour Whip has been going around asking everyone to speak for as long as possible. I assume that another Department is attempting to table some amendments in the Table Office at the moment. At this point, however, I am probably allowed to be brief.

This is a small Bill, as the Minister said, and I am afraid that it is not a particularly inspiring Bill either. Curiously, it was published between the Foster and the Leitch reviews without directly referring to either. Even more curiously, much of the Bill has been superseded by Government announcements on moving 16-to-19 funding to local authorities. We are left with a Bill that contains a number of new powers that will effectively be made irrelevant by the Government's proposals to move funding to local authorities. Disappointingly, the Minister was unwilling to acknowledge that during the earlier stages of debate, which makes it difficult for us to appreciate the full implications of the Bill a couple of years down the line.

Unfortunately, the Bill still contains Intervention powers for the Learning and Skills Council. Given that those have never been used by the Secretary of State, that seems largely pointless. By sleight of hand, the LSC will still be allowed to instruct colleges to dismiss senior staff. That is even more bizarre, given that the Government intend to transfer funding powers for many colleges away from the LSC altogether.

Nevertheless, with those provisos, I wish to acknowledge how far the Government have moved since the Bill was first published in the other place. The Bill is much better than when it was first discussed. One of the sections of the Bill that has been improved considerably is that which relates to foundation degrees. The Government accepted Opposition criticism about progression routes, and made them much clearer. Similarly, in response to concerns that I raised in Committee, the Minister has agreed to amend the guidance on franchising such that it is no longer automatic on completion of a probation period. The Bill is therefore much improved, albeit that many of the new powers will be made irrelevant, unfortunately, in no time at all.

We on the Liberal Democrat Benches—I say "we", but I appear to be left on my own at this point—will support the Bill. I hope, however, that the other place will continue to press the Government on intervention powers. I hope that it will extract further reassurances on the Government's intentions with regard to moving 16-to-19 money to local authorities. Given a little time, I suspect that the Government's thinking might have advanced, and that they might be able to give reassurances in the other place that they could not give to me today.

During the progress of the Bill, we spent a great deal of time discussing foundation degrees. As I have said to the Minister during those proceedings, and on other occasions outside the Chamber, the danger is that the controversy over foundation degrees will obscure the real challenge, which is to provide better, more flexible routes to move between further and higher education. When the Government have thought through the implications of moving 16-to-19 money away from the LSC, I hope that one of the reforms that they will consider next will be to make it much easier for students to move between further and higher education.

We know that further education transforms lives, and if we had a more flexible system that allowed young and older people, depending on their caring and other responsibilities, to move from an institution close to their home to somewhere else, as their responsibilities and choices changed during their course of study, we might have an exciting opportunity to transform lives in the future.

I thank the Minister for being willing to make changes during the Bill's progress, and I hope that further reassurances will be extracted in the other place.

I welcome the Bill, as it will equip learners with the high-quality skills that they need to compete in the global economy and job market. I have always argued that we need to upskill and retrain our people. When my father went underground at the age of 14, he needed muscles in the arms; now we must develop the muscles between the ears. That means investment in training and upskilling all the time.

In the United States, 80 per cent. of people in work have been in a learning situation since they left school. In Germany and Japan, the figure is about 56 per cent. In the United Kingdom, it is still about 30 per cent. That shows how far we still have to travel if we are to give our people the skills that they do not have now, which will enable them to do the jobs we need them to have to maintain our strong economy and to build our future.

In my Constituency, all post-16 education takes place at a tertiary college. I endorse the point made by my hon. Friend Kelvin Hopkins: such colleges make an important contribution to our whole education system. When I came into the House more than 12 years ago, I was a member of the Welsh Affairs Committee—now chaired by my hon. Friend Dr. Francis—which carried out an inquiry into post-16 education in Wales. We certainly saw the huge benefits of tertiary education in offering a range of skills that are not offered in 11-to-18 schools.

When I was a councillor representing part of the constituency of my right hon. Friend Mr. Murphy, the local comprehensive school in my area—an 11-to-16 school—held a debate on whether it should have a sixth form. This is the basis on which I made my decision. I examined the cohort of youngsters who had progressed from the comprehensive school to the local tertiary college over the previous two years. I found that only two of the 40-odd children would have been able to study the subjects that they eventually studied if the school had had a sixth form. In other words, they had a much greater opportunity in the tertiary college than they would have had otherwise. I therefore think it important for us to continue to strengthen and invest in further education and training.

During the 20 years for which I was a councillor, further education was often the Cinderella. Primary and secondary education were considered very important—people were saying "Let us reorganise our schools", "Let us end the 11-plus" and so forth—but further education was largely ignored. My experience of it was not as enjoyable as that of my oldest friend, my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen, who taught at a further education college for 17 years. I was a student at a further education college; my education came to an end when I had a dispute with the principal and was asked to leave, but that is another story. I have seen how my children have benefited from the opportunity to opt into a course at a college after abandoning a course at school.

On Second Reading and on Report, I expressed concern about the way in which parts of the Bill had been handled, particularly Clause 27. I have no doubt that if the Bill had received proper pre-legislative scrutiny in the context of Wales, today's debate on foundation degrees would not have taken place. I am convinced that we would have found a way of resolving the issue beforehand.

I strongly support the initiative and the thinking behind the Bill. I thought that Sarah Teather was a little dismissive. As she said, this is a small Bill, but it is making a very big and important contribution to the ongoing education and training of our young people. In this new century, it is important for us to recognise that if we do not invest in upskilling and retraining there is no way in which our economy will be able to compete, given all the global pressures that we face.

I commend the Minister for the way in which the Bill has been handled, and I commend those who served on the Committee. We have had good debates on Second Reading and on Report. As I said on Report, I hope that in future we may be able to deal rather better with the Welsh context. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen pointed out, we are in a different position now vis-à-vis the devolution settlement in Wales. The spotlight will be on this place, showing how we handle legislation that has an impact on Wales. Welsh Members of Parliament have a responsibility in that regard. The 29 Welsh Labour Members received 600,000 votes at the last General Election, more than those in the Assembly and in local government put together. We have a voice and a mandate to represent our people, and it is important for our voice to be heard here. If legislation affects the Welsh people and the Welsh economy, we must ensure that we get the very best from it.

I will not take up any more time, because I am sure that others wish to speak. I congratulate the Government on the Bill. A small Bill it may be, but it has had a major impact. I look forward to the enactment of the important measures that it contains: we will soon see the benefits derived by our young people and our economy.

Mr. Touhig expressed the mood of the whole House, and the support of all Members present for further education and its unique and central role in empowering people and increasing the country's skills base. I only wish that some of those outside took it as seriously as we do.

By way of contentiousness, I want to make three slight criticisms of the Government and the Bill. The first point is that the Government's ambition has shrunk. The Minister has just told the House that this is a small Bill; as I recall, in Committee he said that it was the first major FE bill for a generation. He has now scaled the Bill down to its appropriate size; I thought it might have been called the Further Education (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill. However, that does not mean that it is not worthwhile and I shall support it tonight.

The second point concerns what is almost the default feature of Government practice: to seek to intervene when Intervention is not always necessary and certainly not precedented. My hon. Friend Mr. Hayes talked about the powers being devolved to the Learning and Skills Council to intervene in the governance of FE colleges, which I do not think is appropriate.

The third factor that tells against the Government to a small extent is a certain insouciance in relation to the details of legislation. The right hon. Member for Islwyn has mentioned devolution to the Welsh Assembly; this could have all been thought out more and we would have had a better Bill with a lot less trouble if it had been.

Having said that, there are some positive features. One on which I have not spoken, because of my absence from the Committee when it was raised, is the industrial training levies, which are sensible. Having started with scepticism, I am also now a supporter of the new arrangements for foundation degree-awarding powers. It is a very bad thing for someone who has been a Minister never to think that anything is added to the sum of things afterwards. The foundation degree programme has been a thoroughly worthwhile innovation and has proved itself as a very important part of the further education scene.

With a slight detachment from direct involvement in the management of these affairs, one sees some items coming round again. I remember the Learning and Skills Council being launched with a fanfare in 2000; now it is effectively being restructured and sidelined, an interesting and complex arrangement. The Government have not told us, so I do not know, what final structure they will come up with but it is clear that the role of the LSC will not be as great as it has been. There will be some important areas of policy from Foster but, more particularly, through Leitch that will need further debate and legislation in this place, including the financing package.

I put down a slight marker of concern. Having seen the tremendous liberation of further education colleges when they were transferred from local authority control in 1993, I am concerned that there will be some resumption of the dead hand of local authorities. I very much hope not.

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the early indications are that although funding will be channelled through local authorities, institutions will retain their relatively high degree of independence within that arrangement?

That is both my anticipation and my profound wish. It ought to be possible for consenting adults to find a way of doing this without destroying the important lead that FE can take.

As regards the funding model, we will have to debate that later. I am attracted by the industrial demand-led model to a large extent, but it needs to be matched with a personally driven model and a resource model in terms of individual learning accounts. We know that their history has been unfortunate but the concept is entirely right and we need to balance the two. We must remember that further education is a service not only to industry and competitiveness, but to the individual as well. In learning and participating, one is also making a national contribution.

There is a huge degree of goodwill for further education and, by that token, support for the Bill. There is a lot of work to be done, but that is not an excuse for subverting what has been done, improved and explored in Committee and we should put through the Bill tonight.

I, too, welcome the Bill, which I hope will be of benefit to learners in England and Wales. The Welsh Affairs Committee has been mentioned several times this afternoon and I thank hon. Members for all their contributions, which have, for the most part, been very benign. We have already taken seriously the points raised today. Our "Legislative Competence Orders in Council" report has been mentioned on several occasions. I welcome the comments of my right hon. Friends the Members for Torfaen (Mr. Murphy) and for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig), who emphasised our report's recommendations in respect of the importance of pre-legislative scrutiny. I also welcome the observations of Mr. Williams: he asked whether the Committee is preparing for the volume of work that will come before us. We certainly are—that is why we produced the report. Further, we have held meetings with key Assembly Members and my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales in order to ensure that we are ready when the Orders in Council come before us. We will scrutinise them with our Assembly colleagues in Sub-Committees of our Select Committee. Having said that, I reassure the House that we take on board all the points made today about the importance of pre-legislative scrutiny, and that we will respond to the strong views that have been expressed in all parts of the House.

I welcome the undertakings given by my hon. Friend, but I felt that his statement was introspective in that he did not fully appreciate cross-border issues. The North East Wales Institute of Higher Education and nearby FE colleges are concerned about the impact on them of foundation degrees and other advances in England. I should also say that NEWI is a progressive and forward-thinking institution, and that I share the hope of my hon. Friend Ian Lucas that it will become a university very soon.

Finally, let me state that the Committee which I chair is totally committed to securing and sustaining the role of this House in pre-legislative scrutiny of all measures relating to Wales, regardless of whether they emanate from the Assembly or this House.

Our discussion on Third Reading has been an important one. I should start by paying tribute to Mr. Hayes: he was doing a service in delivering his insightful and lengthy contribution, as today is his 10th wedding anniversary and he needs to leave the House. He has demonstrated great commitment.

I welcome the support that the hon. Gentleman has given to foundation degree awarding powers. Members in all parts of the House—I include Liberal Democrat Members—have engaged constructively; we have witnessed this House operating at its best, in that we took on an initial proposition and then worked at it and scrutinised the proposals as they have progressed. We have ended up with what I genuinely believe is the most significant element of the Bill.

We must ensure that there is as much innovation and creativity as possible to help us face up to the skills challenge at the higher levels. Highly performing FE colleges have a significant contribution to make, and enabling them to award their own foundation degrees is a positive step forward. We have also been able to ensure that there is progression from foundation degrees on to further study courses, where that is appropriate and the student concerned wishes it. We have made it abundantly clear that there is a strong, robust and coherent quality framework within which these qualifications will exist. On the hon. Gentleman's point about higher education in that regard, universities have nothing to fear from these proposals. The market is expanding significantly. Today, there are some 61,000 foundation degrees; by the end of the decade, we will be moving toward 100,000 and beyond. So there is certainly enough business for universities and FE colleges, and in my view, many of them will continue to work productively in collaboration.

The hon. Gentleman also expressed concern about what is happening to adult learner numbers. We need to be clear that there has never been as much money going into the system as there is today. Overall, FE funding during the last decade has increased by 50 per cent. in real terms. I do not wish to make a crude party political point, but I will. That compares very favourably with the 14 per cent. real-terms cut in the five years to 1997. Here, we should consider not just revenue, but capital expenditure. When this Government came to power in 1997, there was not one penny in the mainstream capital budget for FE. Today, the budget is £500 million a year, and we can see the evidence of that in virtually every FE college throughout the country.

So more money is certainly going into the system, but we do have to make real choices about priorities. We are not cutting adult education funding, but we are re-prioritising, saying that adult basic skills and work-based training—such as the train-to-gain initiative—has to be the priority. We are putting extra resources into those areas, but we are not saying that non-vocational adult education is not valuable. However, we are saying that we expect the individual to make a slightly greater contribution. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings nods, and there is indeed a consensus on this issue. We need to bring about a cultural change that ensures that individuals contribute more to their learning, and that employers do so as well. I am very pleased to say that this week we launched the basic skills campaign, using major TV, radio and other forms of advertising to get across to people the message about the importance of skills, and the investment and commitment that they make as individuals.

The hon. Gentleman also asked about the Leitch implementation plan—the Government's response to Sandy Leitch's important and ground-breaking report. I made it clear earlier and I reiterate that we will produce our response to Sandy Leitch's proposals very shortly. I repeat: nothing in this Bill contradicts the strategy that we are putting forward. Many times today and in Committee, the hon. Gentleman has tried to make great play of that issue, but when we launch the implementation plan, he will see that it is absolutely coherent and consistent with the measures in the Bill.

The hon. Gentleman also questioned me about the powers of Intervention—an issue on which we have had a major debate this afternoon. He wanted me to make it clear that the Government are committed to FE colleges, and we certainly are. Indeed, we are committed to the FE sector in a way that no previous Government ever were. He also asked me to make it clear that we want greater independence and self-regulation for colleges, and we certainly do, which is why we are introducing the proposals on self-regulation. He also wanted me to commit ourselves, following the Leitch proposals, to a further series of bold measures and steps, which we certainly will.

We are therefore responding to the concerns that the hon. Gentleman has expressed, and we want to move much further in the direction of self-regulation. However, and as I said earlier, at the same time, in extremis, when all else has failed, it is absolutely right that we retain, through the Learning and Skills Council, powers of intervention. As I said earlier, if Opposition Members discovered that a college in their Constituency was fundamentally failing and were told that there was no power of intervention in those circumstances, they would not be happy with that. That is why the proposals in the Bill are so important.

My hon. Friend Kelvin Hopkins made an important contribution. I genuinely pay tribute to the work he has done as joint chair of the all-party further education and lifelong learning group. He has been an absolute champion—

It being Six o'clock, Mr. Deputy Speaker put forthwith the Question already proposed from the Chair, pursuant to Order [21 May].

Bill accordingly read the Third time, and passed, with amendments.