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Further Education and Training Bill [Lords]

That figure relates to changes that have already taken place. The savings are already being delivered under the LSC’s strand 7, and those changes will further streamline the LSC’s operations. I shall deal with the right hon. Gentleman’s point in detail later in my speech. Because of the Government’s extra investment, because of our reforms and because of the phenomenally hard work of those who work in the further education sector, to whom we should all pay tribute, we have seen significant improvements in performance over the past decade. In the past six years alone, overall success rates in further education colleges have rocketed by a third, from 56 per cent. in 1999 to 2000 to 77 per cent. in 2005-06. We have seen 1.6 million learners attain their first skills for life qualifications in literacy, language and numeracy. We have—rightly—increased dramatically the number of people gaining both level 2 and level 3 qualifications. Much of today’s debate has centred on the relationship between the Bill and the Leitch agenda. Let me respond in detail to the points that have been made. The Leitch report built on reforms already introduced through the further education White Paper and, indeed, the Bill. The Bill is about the supply side preparing to deliver a more responsive system, increasingly engaging with employer needs, while Leitch focuses more closely on stimulating and channelling the demand side. If we are genuinely to rise to Lord Leitch’s challenge, Government, employers and individuals must work together. That is why we are engaged in a process of consensus-building on the Leitch recommendations. Should we and partners agree at the end of that process that any of Leitch’s recommendations require legislation—and we may well take that view—we will use a separate legislative vehicle. In the meantime—and I consider this the really important point—there is no benefit to be had from stalling the momentum for change which has built up in the further education system, and which the Bill enables us to take forward.