To ask the Secretary of State for Employment what is his assessment of the effect of the removal of the Manpower Services Commission grant for industrial placement training on the engineering industry.

There need be no significant effect. This grant, which amounted to £850,000 in 1987–88, represented a small proportion of the total support the Training Commission gives to the engineering industry. Research indicates that many employers would have made a sandwich placement available without it. Moreover, I understand that the Engineering Industry Training Board has now introduced a modified scheme of grants for sandwich grant placement training for engineering undergraduates.