Employee Study and Training (Qualifying Period of Employment) Regulations 2010

I think that I thank noble Lords for their comments, although the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, saw this as an opportunity to range far and wide. I do not think what he said is true, if we look at the track record of investment in training. I can comment only as I have done on a number of occasions on the abysmal situation that we inherited from the Opposition on the minimum number of apprenticeships. As I have said many times, if I likened apprenticeships to National Health Service patients, they were in intensive care, with only 65,000 in 1997 and only 27 per cent completing them. Under this Government, we now have more than 250,000 apprentices, 71 per cent of whom complete them. I welcome the latter-day conversion of the noble Lord, Lord De Mauley, and of Her Majesty’s Opposition to apprenticeships. He is fundamentally wrong on Train to Gain. We are expanding apprenticeships anyway, with another 30,000 advanced apprenticeships planned and more through public procurement. Should the Opposition ever find themselves in government, we will see how well they manage to succeed. To some extent, I agree that the careers advice service is not perfect. It can and should be improved. Have we made progress on the Leitch ambitions? I would say that we have and we are working towards delivering the aims set out in Skills for Growth. We set out our priorities in the skills investment strategy and we are currently rolling out the fifth competitive bidding round for the National Skills Academy programme and hope to announce successful expressions of interest in spring 2010. We are currently designing a joint investment programme. The UKCES will produce its first national skills audit and is looking at simplifying matters. I believe, as do many employers, that the training that we have made available through Train to Gain and apprenticeships is a success story. Turning to the noble Baroness, Lady Garden, it is true that I have often described that third of employers as believing that they can defy the force of gravity. It is unfortunate that we see this as a burden for small firms. Is it really true? We focus a lot of attention on trying to assist SMEs with targeting training that they are asked for. All the evidence shows that the companies that train will survive the recession. The ones that do not are two and a half times more likely to fail. We should not see this as a burden. Good firms train already. That is the reality. If anything, we hope that the regulations will do two things: first, that they will encourage employees to think about their own training requirements; and, secondly, that over a period of time we will change the culture in that third. If that group does not respond to a reasonable request from an employee with regard to training, eventually that could result in an employment tribunal. We do not want that; we want people to be persuaded of the argument. With regard to young people, we are in a state of change. Perhaps I can write more specifically on that but we are raising the participation age. We are saying that in 2013 every young person will either be in education or training. There will be no young person in work who is not in training. We have mandated a minimum of 280 guided learning hours. On the impact assessment figures, I am looking towards the Box, but I shall have to write to the noble Baroness rather than attempt to guess because it is important to get that right. I hope that with those answers and assurances noble Lords can endorse the regulations. Motion agreed.