Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Committee, 06 Dec 2000

Meeting date: Wednesday, December 6, 2000

Official Report 224KB pdf

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European Issues

Members have three papers in front of them: an overarching paper on European issues, EL/00/30/2; a paper on the social policy agenda; and a paper on employment policies from the Council of the European Union. I want to draw members' attention to the first paper. The European Committee will, from time to time, refer matters to us for comment and consideration. Page 1 of paper EL/00/30/2, under the heading "Scrutiny Process", explains the process by which we will be asked to comment on European papers. It says:

"Once a document is deposited in the UK Parliament, the European Scrutiny committees at Westminster request an ‘Explanatory Memorandum' from the relevant Whitehall Department."

On devolved matters, we are the equivalent of the relevant Whitehall department. Papers will be referred to us fairly regularly.

I assume that members have read paper EL/00/30/2. Simon Watkins has made three recommendations. The first is for the committee to

"further its understanding by questioning the Executive officials".

I will come back to that. The second recommendation is for the committee to

"indicate on which issues it would like to report back to the European Committee".

I suggest that we identify those issues when we consider the other two papers. The third recommendation is for us to

"instruct the clerks to prepare a draft note to the European Committee, to be agreed by correspondence".

That will follow from the discussions of the other two papers.

I would like to introduce Mabel Hildebrand from the new deal unit at the Scottish Executive. She has responsibility for the other two papers. Welcome to the committee, Mabel. I believe that you are not going to make a presentation but will be available to answer any questions.

Yes.

I suggest that we start with the social policy agenda paper. Since we received the paper, the European Union has made some revisions to it.

Would you like me to run through those revisions?

Yes, please.

The original idea came out of the Lisbon European Council in March 2000, which recognised the need for

"modernising the European social model, investing in people and combating social exclusion."

There was broad agreement on the resultant paper, which the committee has received, but its text was considered disappointing, as it placed an emphasis on old-fashioned regulatory proposals. That was unwelcome, especially to us. After a number of redrafts, a new text was submitted to the employment and social policy council on 27 and 28 November. It provided a positive platform for EU action on social policy for the next five years. The agreed text will now be presented for adoption at the European summit in Nice tomorrow and on Friday.

Several changes were made to the paper that members originally saw. The agenda now includes positive references to employability, lifelong learning and the need to meet skill shortages, especially in information and communications technology—which is interesting, given the committee's earlier discussions. The agenda now recognises the need to target those who are economically inactive or who may face disadvantage in the labour market, in particular, disabled people, people from ethnic minorities and older workers.

The text of the agenda now contains no commitments to burdensome legislation for small business—that was a particular issue for us. There is now explicit recognition of subsidiarity, so decisions will continue to be made at national level unless a specific reason exists for them to be made at European level. The European Commission will support that with appropriate initiatives, although we do not yet know what they will amount to.

Member states will be asked to translate the new agenda into national or regional policies, setting specific targets. The Department of Social Security at Whitehall will lead in the production of the plan; the social inclusion division is the lead contact for the Scottish Executive.

We are not under any pressure to respond immediately. The changes, particularly the ones that relate to lifelong learning and ICT skill shortages, sound to me as if they are substantive enough for us to want to see the redraft before we consider the social policy agenda. We could spend a lot of time on this paper, and then receive a second paper that had been substantially redrafted. I suggest that we wait until our January meeting and consider the redrafted social policy agenda.

I want to be clear about the time scale. Mabel said that the text of the agenda was on the table for the Nice summit.

Yes.

The redraft will therefore be over and done with by the time—

Exactly.

At least we will know what it says.

It will be a final paper by January.

Our responsibility is the implementation.

Yes.

I wanted to ask about that. The documents were interesting to read and contained all sorts of things that relate to our work, but what will our responsibility be? Are we to agree that the ideas are good? Are we to make suggestions on how to proceed? What are we being asked to do?

Had we been discussing the current draft, the pages that would relate to our responsibilities are pages 15, 16, 18 and 19. Section 4.1, on full employment and quality of work, relates to a number of our responsibilities. For example, section 4.1.1.2, under the heading "Action", refers to the need to

"strengthen the lifelong learning theme under the Employment Guidelines".

Pages 18 and 19 touch on the knowledge-based economy, which also relates to our responsibilities.

We have seen the documents, but what are we going to do about them?

After reading the paper, it struck me that, when the redraft comes back to us in January, it might be useful to have a covering memorandum from Simon Watkins and me to suggest specifically what the committee should do. That would help as a guide.

That would be good, because otherwise we might just go round the houses.

If the European Committee gets the idea that it can send a lot of things to this committee and that we will do something with them, we will be sent something every week.

We should focus on what is required of us.

The social policy agenda paper has been fairly substantially redrafted. Can we agree to hold over consideration of that paper until our January meeting and to circulate it with a covering note suggesting what the committee would like to do with it?

Members indicated agreement.

Perhaps you should rephrase that.

The next item is the employment policies paper. I take it that there have been no changes to this one, Mabel.

No.

I looked through the paper for the committee's guidance. Page 3 refers to the fact that most member states

"still lack a comprehensive policy framework for lifelong learning, supported by appropriate targets called for by the new guideline, introduced in 1999 to address the challenges of the knowledge-based society."

That seems to touch on the subject of our next major study—lifelong learning. When considering the remit of the committee, perhaps we should consider the need for a comprehensive policy framework with associated targets, bearing in mind the European dimension.

The other page that is relevant to our work is page 27, which refers specifically to the action that is to be taken by the UK. The paper states:

"Some sectors, particularly information technology, suffer from a skills gap. The low level of basic skills is a generalised problem in the UK."

That should inform the remit for our lifelong learning inquiry as well. Also on page 27, subsection (4) of the recommendations on what the UK should do is important. It states that the UK should

"intensify efforts to implement initiatives on life long learning, particularly those aimed at increasing the general level of basic skills, demonstrating how access will be ensured for those groups traditionally reluctant to take up the opportunity or unable to find suitable provision."

That should also form part of the remit of our lifelong learning inquiry.

I suggest that the committee note the paper, and that the gist of our response to the European Committee be as follows. We have already agreed that our next major inquiry will be on the subject of lifelong learning—although we have still to agree the precise remit—and we agree that, in drawing up the remit, we will take into account the points that are raised in the paper as they relate to Scotland and the Parliament's devolved responsibilities. I do not think that we can do much else with the paper.

Individual learning accounts are part of the Executive's programme to address some of those issues. That is why I asked what we are supposed to do with the paper. Is it to inform us? Are we supposed to express our views or to find out what the Executive is doing to address those points? It would be interesting to know how the Executive's programme fits in with those issues.

What the convener is suggesting is probably fine. All the papers contain references to gender differences—whether gender pay gaps, sectoral and occupational segregation between men and women, access to the labour market for single parents and so on. In the context of the lifelong learning agenda, it is important that we focus on how more women can be encouraged to enter the labour market and how proper access to training and education can be ensured at all the different levels. That consideration must inform our inquiry.

Although that is not referred to specifically in subsection (4) on page 27, the paper recommends

"demonstrating how access will be ensured for those groups traditionally reluctant to take up the opportunity".

That should address the gender issue.

We can learn from Finland and Sweden—there are no such problems there.

I am not sure about the dynamic of the process. Is this a declaration of a general European policy intent, with a requirement on us to work out, with the Executive, how it is to be implemented, or is there an opportunity for a flow of information?

The third bullet point on page 27 of the paper states:

"Some sectors, particularly information technology, suffer from a skills gap."

That is perfectly true: in certain areas, there is a deficiency of IT skills. However, in Scotland an alarming deficiency in science and engineering skills is emerging. Do we have the opportunity to feed that information back in somewhere? The paper seemed a bit like a blancmange to me—I did not know which bit to grab.

I should have thought that we could feed that back in several ways. We can address that issue, which is important, in the inquiry.

This is the European framework for employment policy. It touches on issues that need to be addressed at the European level, the level of British reserved matters and the devolved level. Our job is to address the issues that fall within our devolved responsibilities—in this case, primarily, but not exclusively, lifelong learning and related issues.

It seems sensible to inform the European Committee that our next major inquiry will be on lifelong learning, that we will take evidence from the Executive on what it is doing and what it is going to do and that we can then submit our inquiry report to the European Committee to feed back into the UK and European system, so that it will be clear what we are hoping to do in Scotland. That seems the sensible route to take. Does Mabel Hildebrand agree?

Yes. A UK employment action plan is in place, which includes some of the things that are happening in Scotland. A raft of measures have been implemented recently, such as the get-into-enterprise scheme and the announcements on learning accounts and so on. All those measures are covered by the great big European umbrella that says, "Here are all the important things that affect employment." The social policy paper shows that there is a social issue, concerning getting people who are not in the work force into it and ensuring that lone parents are involved. There is a link between the two.

The social policy agenda is not yet agreed, so we have not produced an action plan for it. There is also no agreed employment plan, so the employment policies paper is asking how or whether we are getting on with it. The committee should ask whether and how we are getting on with it in Scotland. It is an enormous job to dig into all the different areas that come under the umbrella—from gender differences to lone parents getting into work and child care. There are many issues.

We must keep our input to manageable proportions, and it must relate to the remit of the Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Committee.

The whole equality issue runs through the paper. When we took evidence from the minister on individual learning accounts, we raised the issue of access and we talked about child care and travel costs. The minister told us that two pilot schemes were under way, which were investigating different models of support—child care and so on. As members will know, there are many models—skillseekers, the new deal, training for work and so on. Previously, we said that we would examine the different cost issues and consider the impact of the two pilots as part of our lifelong learning inquiry.

Perhaps the clerk can suggest how we should address this.

It is fair to say that the European Committee has referred relatively little to us over the past six months. The committee referred the two documents because they set out the five-year policy of the European Union on those areas, thus forming a backdrop to any work that the Enterprise and Lifelong Learning Committee carries out, including our lifelong learning inquiry. As the documents touch on devolved areas, the Scottish Executive has an input in the process. The Scottish Executive is consulted on the employment action plan by the UK Government. We should consider what input the Executive has, the issues that it raises and whether the circumstances in Scotland require different policy responses. That is why the documents were referred to us.

I suggest that we ask Simon Watkins to write to the Executive on behalf of the committee, posing those questions. The answers would be helpful in designing the remit of our lifelong learning inquiry. Do members agree?

I understand that I am about to leave this committee and perhaps join the European Committee, so I am likely to see more of this kind of stuff. I am struck by the contrast between the way in which the committees of the Scottish Parliament consider the European agenda and the way in which it is done at Westminster. Despite 22 years' experience at Westminster, this is the first time that I have sat in a committee room considering the European agenda constructively. In Westminster, such matters are dealt with late at night, in huge bundles and are used as an excuse for a domestic debate on whether we should be for or against the European Union. I am immensely encouraged by the idea that we might be considering aspects of the European agenda in a constructive way.

John Home Robertson will do very well on the European Committee. However, this has made me a sceptic.

What is new?

Why on earth are we dealing with such issues at a European level? This morning we heard that we have a very localised problem—or perhaps a challenge—in the west Highlands, because of natural cultural differences. We can tackle issues of equality and quality of employment if we consider them in a local context.

There is a practical answer to that. If we design Scottish solutions to Scottish problems within the European framework—

So we just let them know how we are getting on?

No. The paper says that the structural funds will continue to play a major role. It will allow us to make use of the structural funds—that is the key.

So if the people in the west Highlands learn to be rude, they will get money.

The issue of structural funds is quite important in this context. The funds go towards projects in the 2000-06 programme. We have objective 3 money—which is €500 million or £300 million—which aims to provide support for work-related training, employability and lifelong learning throughout lowland Scotland. How that programme is developed will be important; local partnerships will propose projects.

There was a fairly good outcome for the Highlands and Islands—we got €308 million, which is about £180 million. That money will support various measures including business support and training, rural development and targeted support for infrastructure, which involves ICT training. The words in the documents and the projects that will come out of them are just what the committee was discussing earlier.

I suggest that the clerk picks out the words that you like, convener, in preparing the paper.

I have two suggestions. First, I suggest that we write to the Scottish Executive with the questions that Simon Watkins raised. We would hope to receive a response by the time we meet in January to consider the new economy and European issues. Secondly, it might be useful if Mabel Hildebrand were to offer some input into Simon Watkins's paper. Members will bring their input, too. I suggest that we focus on key issues for Scotland, particularly in our lifelong learning inquiry. Members should bear it in mind that if we put that in the European framework—I was going to say jargon—it will help to leverage some investment from European structural funds, which is something that we would all want to happen. Do members agree?

Would it be possible to speak to the MEPs who have a particular interest in the matter?

That will be covered by item 5 on the agenda.

I was thinking of the MEPs coming to us, rather than the other way round.

That will be arranged as part of item 5.

The subject is rather too complex to address in a few minutes. It would be a good idea if Simon Watkins and I produced a paper for the committee to simplify some of the issues.

Good. In the meantime, do members agree that Simon Watkins should pursue those questions with the Executive?

Members indicated agreement.