SkillsActive briefing on the Queens Speech

Will Pickering, SkillsActive - 07/11/2007

Having already announced the main areas of legislation in advance, there were few surprises in this year’s Queen’s Speech, which outlines the government programme for the coming session.

Gordon Brown used his first Queen’s Speech as Prime Minister to set out the “long-term changes” he feels are needed in the UK by announcing 29 bills that he hopes to pass through Parliament this session.

Brown said: "On energy, housing, pensions, education, work-life balance, citizenship and anti-terrorism measures, the central purpose of this legislative programme is to make the right long-term changes to prepare and equip our country for the future and to meet the rising aspirations of the British people."

Although there is no sport focus in the legislative programme, education had a key part to play in this year’s speech.

There are two key pieces of legislation that will be of particular interest to those working in the active leisure and learning sector, namely the Bills focussing on education and skills and apprenticeships.

The Education and Skills Bill is being taking forward by the Department for Children, Schools and Families and focuses on many of the recommendations of the Leitch Review of Skills.

Following the final report of the Leitch Review, the government published its implementation plan, which set out how it intends to achieve ambitious targets for adult skills and literacy. These have been incorporated into the Education and Skills Bill, which bring in the legislative changes needed to implement key elements of the review of the UK’s long term skills needs.

Setting a duty on young people to participate in education and training, and on parents to assist their children to participate, the Bill will raise the minimum age at which young people can leave education or training to 17 by 2013 and 18 by 2015. It also places a duty on employers to release young people for the equivalent of one day a week to undertake training elsewhere and to check whether a young person is participating before employing them.

The Opposition has raised questions on the viability of compulsion, particularly since, it argues, students that drop out of school at a young age tend to be from disadvantaged backgrounds. According to opponents, raising the leaving age would mean more disruptive students and higher truancy.

The Bill places a duty on the Learning and Skills Council to secure “the proper provision of courses” for learners over the age of 19 to attain functional literacy, numeracy and first full level 2 qualifications; and learners aged 19-25 to attain first full level 3 qualifications, without having to pay tuition fees.

The Bill also makes changes to the functions of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, which the government says will enable it to take a more strategic approach to the regulation of qualifications and eligibility for funding.

A new independent body will be responsible for securing the standards of qualifications, tests and assessment, and for ensuring that public investment in qualifications provides good value for money.

A Draft Apprenticeship Reform Bill was also introduced, aimed at reforming the current apprenticeship system. The Bill will be jointly led by the Department for Innovation, University and Skills and the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform.

The government claims that it has "successfully revived apprenticeships” over the last year after their "near extinction".

This draft bill intends to regulate and promote their availability, as part of a drive to provide more workplace skills.  It runs alongside a review of apprenticeships currently taking place and which is due for completion in January 2008.

There are currently 250,000 apprenticeships available, offered by 130,000 employers. In step with plans to keep all young people in education or training until the age of 18, by 2013 all school leavers will be entitled to an apprenticeship place. The government has a target of 500,000 apprenticeships in the UK by 2020 - 400,000 of which will be in England.

The plans call for a statutory definition of what an apprenticeship means and a "right to public funding for apprenticeship programmes".

It also proposes a duty on public bodies to offer apprenticeships and will amend the minimum wage regulations on the current apprenticeship exemptions.

Giving his response in the Commons, Conservative Leader David Cameron said he welcomed many of the bills in the Queen's Speech "not least because we proposed them in the first place".

He accused Mr Brown of being "bereft of vision" and branded his first Queen's Speech "yet another re-launch that's yet another re-hash of short-term gimmicks and the same old thinking".

Acting Liberal Democrat Leader Vincent Cable went to town with a sporting analogy, saying: "The prime minister now, I fear, cuts a rather sad figure. He was introduced to us a few months ago by his predecessor as the 'great clunking fist' but the boxing story has gone completely awry. Like a great boxing champion as he once was, he somehow made himself unconscious, falling over his own bootlaces and he's now staggering around the ring, semi-conscious and lost and hanging onto the ropes. What certainly is absent is any forward movement and new ideas”

SkillsActive will follow the new legislation closely to see how it will affect our sector.

For more information on either Bill, please click on the title in bold.

Click here for information on all the Bills outlined in this year’s speech