Unions to play greater role in Government's skills agenda, says Vince Cable

The skills agenda is fundamental to achieving economic growth and unions must play an even greater role in boosting the workforce's skills, adult education and apprenticeships, Vince Cable, Business Secretary, said today (July 12)

Addressing the 400 delegates attending unionlearn's annual conference at the TUC's headquarters in London, Dr Cable said that while unions were feeling their way in how they should respond to the coalition government, it was not the time to resort to 'tribal stereotypes'. He said that he wants a business-like dialogue and told Brendan Barber, TUC general secretary, that he wanted to speak to him regularly.

Vince Cable, Business Secretary addressing the unionlearn conference
Photograph © Rod Leon

He said that his department was going through the 'bloody business of cuts' because the previous government had left the country with an unsustainable deficit. He said: 'So far we have not felt the pain, and one of the main reasons was that the Labour Government had absorbed many of the costs of the recession by putting them on its own books.' But now, he said, the painful discussions about cuts have to be had. 'Whatever your political take is, my department had to find 25 per cent cuts even if the last government had remained in office,' he said.

He said that skills in the private sector had to be improved to replace the contraction of the public sector over the next few years. He said the skills agenda is fundamental to achieving economic growth and that unionlearn has an even greater role to pay in boosting workplace skills, adult education and apprentices. He said: 'You have developed a powerful model in unionlearn, reaching out to businesses and giving individuals a chance they never would have had. I want you to build on what you have already achieved.'

He described unionlearn and the Union Learning Fund, which receives a grant from his department, as a 'good story'. He said: 'I am here to support the work of unionlearn and the Union Learning Fund, which my department supports. The figures show that last year it helped more than 230,000 people and, of those, 32,000 were people who needed help with basic things such as literacy and numeracy. An evaluation by Leeds University shows that of 80 per cent of people on unionlearn projects said they got good value, but also two-thirds of employers said they were extremely useful for their businesses; and I think that is a very good story.'

Responding to questions from delegates on the coalition government, he said: 'We are not a merger, we are two parties with quite different takes on issues and we approach every issue through a way you in the union movement understand, through bargaining and trying to reach a compromise agreement. That is what we tried to do over the coalition agreement and over the budget. We are two parties with different perspectives trying to work together in the national interest.'

He said he was as committed to adult education as he had been when in opposition - he told conference how his mother had been 'saved as a human being' by adult education when she was recovering from a serious breakdown. He said that when making cuts to his department's budget, he and his colleague John Hayes had not raided adult education money.

John Hayes, the Minister of State for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning, became the first Conservative minister to address a TUC conference since the mid-1990s, when he presented the unionlearn Quality Awards for organisations which work with unions in learning.

He said that he made no apologies for praising unionlearn, now that he is in Government. He said that his father had been a shop steward and his grandfather a branch secretary and he himself was a member of the TUC-affiliated Association of Teachers and Lecturers.

He told conference: 'High-quality learning is so important. It is a vital component in helping to build and maintain a strong and competitive economy. Employers cannot stay in business without people with the right skills for the job. While people can't hope for a good job without the skills employers are looking for.

But the case for learning is not just the economic. Raising educational and skill levels is fundamental to creating a fairer society, founded on social mobility, social justice and social cohesion. Learning should indeed be the point where the interests of individuals, their unions, their employers and of the government converge.'

Mary Bousted, general secretary of ATL, who co-chaired the conference with Frances O'Grady, TUC deputy general secretary, said she had been pleased to hear the messages from the ministers, 'but the proof would be in the pudding' when the cuts begin to bite.