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Further Education and Training Bill [Lords]

In saying that we accept that FE colleges should have degree-awarding powers, I meant that I recognise that it should be possible for an FE college to provide such a course on its own if it is of sufficient rigour to warrant a degree. However, we want to hear a bit more from Ministers about how they are going to ensure that progression is not threatened. We also want to hear more about the status of the degree. We can all take pride in the fact that British university degrees are internationally recognised and valued. As we know from briefings from organisations such as the British Council, they are something that students around the world wish to secure. It is important that we do not do anything that damages the prestige and value that attaches to a degree from a British educational institution, be it FE or HE. My hon. Friends and I have received a letter from the Minister for Higher Education and Lifelong Learning. We welcome the concessions that he has made and appreciate that he has already moved significantly from the original proposals in the Bill in the light of debate in another place, as well as the extraordinarily constructive and statesmanlike role played by the shadow Ministers for further education and for higher education—my hon. Friends the Members for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes) and for Henley (Mr. Johnson)—who have put country before party in a remarkable way. The documents that the Minister sent provided us with some reassurance, but we still need to know more about how he is going to take forward the assurances given by Lord Adonis that the safeguards on progression will be put on to a statutory footing by way of a Government amendment. We greatly look forward to studying that. We have heard the Government’s bold rhetoric, read the extraordinary reports of Sir Andrew Foster and Lord Leitch yet we have a Bill that tries to reorganise the Learning and Skills Council, intervenes unnecessarily in the powers of appointment of a principal and changes the degree-awarding powers. If we compare those relatively modest provisions with the genuine problems that face further education and the skills agenda that faces our country, the omissions are extraordinary. Why have not we heard from the Secretary of State about what is really happening to apprenticeships? When the Chancellor—or the Prime Minister elect—talks about apprenticeships, he hopes that we think that he means an experienced, gnarled craftsman, wearing his blue overalls—[Hon. Members: ““Or her.””] Okay. I know that gender is a sensitive issue for the Secretary of State. The Chancellor expects us to envisage an experienced craftsman transmitting a body of knowledge that he has picked up over the years to a younger student—male or female—who wishes to learn a craft. Sadly, that is not what apprenticeships as delivered by the Government mean. All too often, they mean being present at a further education college for a further education course, which may be valuable, but has insufficient employer involvement and sometimes too little practical work experience.