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Skills for Growth

My Lords, I was about to welcome what the Secretary of State said, apart from the last few sentences. I welcome the Statement. I wish only that it could have been made five or six years ago. If it had, today the Government would not have to announce an unemployment rate among young people of 19.8 per cent. In particular, I welcome the Government’s support for university technical colleges, which is the type of school that I and Ron Dearing, before he died, had been promoting. Technical and skills training must start at the age of 14. That is the key element for turning us into a skills-based economy. These colleges are for 14 to 18 year-olds. Finally, the past 25 years has been a golden age for further education, under both his Government—I recognise what has been spent—and the previous Conservative Government. However, the handbrake is on in further education; many fine colleges, such as Lewisham College, cannot expand. In the noble Lord’s talks with the Chancellor—it is rumoured that the Chancellor listens to him—can he ensure that in the expenditure programme for the next two years the budgets and programmes for FE are not cut?