I am delighted to be here—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”]—and to be telling my hon. Friend that the growth in apprenticeships since 1997 has been a major success story. In England at the end of 1997, 75,000 young people aged under 25 were engaged in apprenticeships; by the end of last year, 254,000 were so engaged. I am also pleased to be able to tell him that the proportion of young people completing their apprenticeships is now a record 59 per cent.
May I say how delighted I am to see the Minister in his place? What he has told us about today is a genuinely significant achievement. Ten years ago, when this Government came to power, we simply were not training our young people in skills for the future. However, does he not accept that for a significant part of the population, at least—young women—we are still not doing enough in the provision of apprenticeships in engineering and construction, for example? If we are to bridge the skills gap that exists and will continue to exist, we must close the gender gap. What can we do about that?
I thank my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. He is right; although some 47 per cent. of entrants to apprenticeships are young women, there is still an imbalance in the occupations that they take up. We are drawing up an action plan across Government with employers and the Learning and Skills Council to market to particular groups, such as young women, the benefits of taking up an apprenticeship—one of which is higher pay in construction and engineering, which my hon. Friend mentioned. We also want employer champions, especially women who have come through the apprentice system and are now leading figures in those industries, to tell other employers that they are not tapping into 50 per cent. of the work force and to explain how they could improve their productivity and profitability by utilising the talents of young women.
Is the Minister aware of the excellent scheme at Battersea power station, in which many of my constituents are involved? It is about getting women into construction. I recently went round the power station with many women who live in Putney but work in Battersea. Does he think that lessons from that scheme can be applied to other developments elsewhere?
I am aware of that scheme and, indeed, we launched our further education White Paper at that location because we wanted to celebrate the success of such schemes. It might be helpful if the hon. Lady were to have a word with the hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr. Hayes), who unfortunately published an article recently that described apprenticeships disparagingly. He wrote that
“much training dubbed ‘apprenticeship’ is not worthy of the name.”
That is not a helpful contribution to attracting young people to apprenticeships.
I, too, welcome the Minister back. The figures are astounding, from 75,000 to 254,000, as he mentioned. However, we need to go further, because we still have an enormous skills shortage, especially of electricians, plumbers and other such trades. I wonder whether we should have some sort of scheme in which the apprenticeship starts in the last year of the child’s secondary education, so as to start it earlier. Is the Department doing any work on that?
I thank my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. We have a scheme called the young apprenticeship scheme, with 10,000 young apprentices aged 14 to 16 in different parts of the country. The scheme equips them well for making the choice at the age of 16. We want to go further: the Leitch report on the future of skills recommended an expansion of apprenticeships to some 500,000 a year by 2020. That is a big challenge to all employers and training providers. It is a challenge that we have endorsed and we will bring forward proposals on how to achieve that step change in the delivery of apprenticeships in this country.
It is great to see the Minister back. I know that the whole House shares my warm personal regard for him, but I am sure that he would not expect me to pull my punches. Despite his bluff and blather, the fact is that we are training fewer people in higher level technical skills. The take-up of advanced apprenticeships has crashed by more than a quarter and is now below its 1997 level. The adult learning inspectorate report exposed the fact that one can complete an apprenticeship without setting foot in a workplace. Does not that tell you, Mr. Speaker—a model of the apprenticeship system—and the House that these are virtual apprenticeships, barely worthy of the name? Written answers from Ministers also show that employer engagement is falling. Will the Minister admit that the number of people in apprenticeship training at all levels is declining?
The hon. Gentleman is factually incorrect and has just insulted hundreds of thousands of apprentices, employers and those on whom apprentices rely for their training and support, who are doing a fantastic job. It is not possible to complete an apprenticeship without having to set foot in the workplace: one has to be in work to complete an apprenticeship. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will take this opportunity to apologise to those people for his factual inaccuracies and disparaging remarks about apprenticeships and join the Government in celebrating their success. Half of the UK team that we are sending out to Japan to compete in the world skills championship—at the highest level possible—are young apprentices, so we can celebrate huge success in the training investment by this Government.