Speeches by Hinds.

“I think the hon. Lady was here for the first two or three minutes of my speech—that is broadly what I said. In fact, I quoted her talking about the transformational potential of this measure and its importance. I do not want to go through it all again, but I said that when we all agree on something, there is sometimes …”

“It is a pleasure to join in this important debate, as it has been to serve on the Bill Committee. I am very pleased that we have two days to debate the Bill on Report, because really it is two Bills, which are very different in character. In part 1, which we are debating today, there is a great deal on which I think al…”

“The hon. Member clearly did not consult the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Tristan Osborne), because he has made a slightly contradictory point. I was coming on to say that we did issue non-statutory guidance that mobile phones should be prohibited during school. That was the right thing to do. I do not know if…”

“No, it was not posturing then and it is not posturing now. We issued non-statutory guidance—”

“If there is a blanket ban on Ofqual regulating technical qualifications, can the Minister explain why there is a page on gov.uk—unless someone has hacked it—entitled “Information on how Ofqual is regulating the technical qualification component of T Levels”?”

“Before I talk about clause 9 and amendment 7, if it is not out of order, may I ask a question relating to the previous clause? I do not want to relitigate the arguments, but I just want to ask the Minister to write to me or to the Committee—I do not know what the correct process is—because I am afraid that I still do n…”

“Forgive me on that front as well, Sir Christopher. In that case, I have only two questions specifically on the amendment. My hon. Friend the Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston rightly asked about the public sector workforce. Specifically for the DFE, what impact do the Government expect on the postgraduate teachi…”

“I apologise for my misreading of the groupings earlier, Sir Christopher. Clause 9 is the new clause inserted by the Government in response to the other place. It requires there to be a report on the exercise of the Secretary of State’s functions and for the report to be made within six months and laid before Parliament…”

“I have not forgotten another one, have I?”

“I am very grateful; who knows where this conversation might take us? Last time I looked, 1563 was not in the past five decades. The hon. Lady says that every generation should try to reform, and that may well be true. I do not know how many generations she calculates there are in a 50-year period, but as sure as anythi…”

“I have missed one!”

“We are debating clauses 1 to 3 stand part and schedules 1 to 3. The Minister, in her opening remarks, talked a lot about the intention to create Skills England, how it will operate and so on. That is not in clauses 1 to 3. The Bill is all about transferring functions from the independent Institute for Apprenticeships a…”

“I had probably better go on a little, but I would love to hear from the hon. Gentleman. I promise that the Committee will have a chance so to do. Unsurprisingly, that panel found that the technical and vocational education and training landscape in this country was over-complex. The example of plumbing was given, with …”

“Yes, but the Bill does not do that, and if the hon. Member thinks it does, I am afraid he is mistaken. Some years ago, I used to sit on the Government Benches and was a Minister at the Department for Education, as the hon. Member said, and on many occasions I have had a close interest in these areas. There was a cross-…”

“My hon. Friend is right. If we take the full etymology, we can go back a lot further, to the creation of guilds centuries ago, which evolved into the modern system.”

“No, I do not, but there is a definition of what an apprenticeship is. There are perfectly good reasons to have all manner of training courses, including entry-level ones, that do important things, but they are not apprenticeships. The shadow Minister talked about Germany. In our country, the minimum length of an appren…”

“I do. Funnily enough, my hon. Friend anticipates my next paragraph. Any Government rightly want more young people to pass their GCSEs, get good A-levels, or start and complete apprenticeships. The truth is that the quickest way to have more people getting any qualification is to make it a bit easier, and there is plent…”

“It would be difficult to overstate the centrality of employer involvement in setting standards for technical and vocational qualifications. Earlier I mentioned Lord Sainsbury’s report and its finding that the then system of qualifications and courses had become “divorced” from the occupations that it was meant to serve…”

“Why not just do that now? How hard is it to figure out the list of criteria that might weigh on the Secretary of State’s mind? Why must we have a statement about a future statement? Why can the Government not say now what those criteria would be, before the Bill completes its passage through the House of Commons?”

“I may or may not.”