Speeches by Western.

“I am grateful to the hon. Member for South West Devon for her contribution and for the thoughtful scrutiny applied to the draft levy order. The evidence is consistent: market forces alone will not deliver the pipeline of skilled workers that the industry urgently needs, which I suspect is what is driving her questions …”

“I thank the right hon. Gentleman for that clarity. He will be aware that Connect to Work is already live in two thirds of delivery areas. By April, that will be all areas. In his area of East Hampshire, it is already live, and we expect that it will support up to 4,800 people.”

“If only the Conservatives had had 14 years to do much of what the shadow Minister just outlined. It seems as though they never tire of pulling apart their own abysmal record. Today they have chosen to focus on the crisis of opportunity that they handed down to young people, and that this Government are determined to ad…”

“I will confirm for him separately the figure for this financial year. That figure is the aspiration in the round, using the £18.7 million funding that has been made available. The right hon. Gentleman then launched a staunch defence of zero-hours contracts. He will know that we have a fundamentally different view of th…”

“The challenge in the NHS is markedly different—I would freely acknowledge that—but the right hon. Gentleman is talking about other roles in the NHS. It is not unusual for people to hold more than one job if they are operating as bank staff, so they do not have the uncertainty about receiving no funding at all. The righ…”

“I certainly would. I also note that the Opposition spokesperson, the hon. Member for West Worcestershire (Dame Harriett Baldwin), having complained about the increase in the minimum wage in her closing contribution, failed to say what level the Conservative party think it is acceptable to reset that at. I personally co…”

“If that is the position of the Leader of the Opposition, Conservative Members may need to find a new home other than Reform—[Interruption.] I am not sure where that comment came from, but I think it might have been my hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford), who knows a little about political journey…”

“That is why we are making interventions in the form of the youth guarantee and increased investment in the growth and skills levy. I gently point out that, as the right hon. Member will be aware, the rate of youth unemployment rose by 4% in the Conservatives’ last two years in office. Today we have heard attack after a…”

“My hon. Friend will be pleased to know that we have already taken action. We published the skills White Paper in October, and we are investing £1 billion in skills packages in sectors that will create hundreds of thousands of jobs over the next five years. The Budget also set out more than £1.5 billion investment in em…”

“I confess that my hon. Friend has had more conversations with the Department for Education on this subject than I have, because he met the Secretary of State recently to discuss this. He will be pleased, I am sure, to know that the Department for Work and Pensions, working with UKHospitality, piloted skills passports i…”

“The hon. Member raises an important point. Can I begin by commending that charity in her constituency? There is an acknowledgment among the ministerial team that we need to look particularly at the support available for people looking to move into self-employment, and I would be happy to meet her to discuss the work of…”

“I am very sorry to hear about the case that the hon. Gentleman raises. If there is evidence of false claims made in applications, I would clearly be very grateful if he would share that information with me directly. I will be sure to come back on him—[Interruption.] I will come back to him on that to ensure that it is …”

“The hon. Gentleman raises a very serious issue. Payment accuracy and ensuring that only those who are eligible to claim benefits do so are incredibly important for confidence in the system. I have not seen the specifics of the case to which he refers, but where we become aware that such errors have been made, we seek t…”

“I will have a look at the general issue, and if the hon. Member could share details of Sam’s case with me directly, I would be happy to look at it for him.”

“The hon. Gentleman will forgive me if, for commercial reasons, I do not confirm that Adzuna’s specific tool or any other would be part of the work we are taking forward. I can tell him that we will be bringing forward a new AI tool in the coming months that will include not only “find a job” options, but CV support, in…”

“May I begin by apologising to the hon. Lady for the experience that she and her constituent have encountered? She will be pleased to know that I recently met our newly appointed complaints lead and the independent case examiner, who is raising concerns about the trends she is seeing. We are putting in place a range of …”

“The hon. Lady will recognise the significant investment that this Government have put into agriculture more broadly since coming into office. I am not aware of the “Farm First” scheme, but if she would like to write to me about it, I would be happy to meet to discuss it further.”

“My hon. Friend is correct. The Milburn review will consider all the interventions required to bear down on NEETs and to support institutions such as the Doncaster UTC. It will consider what is working, what is not, and what needs to change, given our shameful inheritance from the Conservative party of nearly 1 million …”

“I thank the hon. Lady for raising that important case. If she writes to me about it, I will be certain to look into the circumstances she has set out. On telephony more generally, there has been a significant decrease—of more than a minute—in the average waiting time, but clearly the case that she describes is unaccept…”

“I can give the hon. Lady that clear assurance, using two specific examples of the work the Government are doing. First, we have provided £725 million of additional support for the delivery of the growth and skills levy in the Budget. Secondly—specifically to the hon. Lady’s question—the delivery of apprenticeships for …”