Hansard

If Fiona Hyslop will forgive me, I will not give way at this point, as I need to make progress.

Recently, there has been a large influx of workers from eastern Europe to Scotland, particularly from Poland. We should have no hesitation in saying that that has been a positive development that has been to Scotland's benefit. Employers to whom I speak say that eastern European workers are highly skilled and well motivated, but the sad aspect of the situation is that many employers would take on people from eastern Europe rather than take on native Scots. The long-term implications of that represent serious cause for worry. Alex Neil referred to the 280,000 Scots who could be working, but I am sad to say that, for many employers, it is easier to take on eastern European workers than it is to try to bring those Scots into the employment market. I do not blame the employers—that challenge is for the Government to address.

The most significant problem we have is with young people who are not in education, employment or training. We believe that about 35,000 16 to 19-year-olds can be classified as NEET—the highest level in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. That is a significant problem for Scotland and it is a significant issue for the people who fall into that category. The Executive's NEET working group has identified that, by the age of 21, a young man in the NEET category is more than four times more likely to be unemployed, three times more likely to have depression or mental health problems and five times more likely to have a criminal record than one who is not in that category. The lives and life opportunities of far too many young people are being wasted.

To its credit, the Executive has recognised the problem and has established a NEET working group and strategy. The formation of the Smith group to progress that agenda is a crucial step. That approach is absolutely right and I commend the members of the Smith group, in particular its chairman, for their commitment and for the resources that they are devoting to tackling this appalling problem. It is only fair also to commend Duncan McNeil for bringing together and convening a cross-party group on young people in Scotland not in education, employment or training and for bringing the issue to the heart of parliamentary business.

Our amendment identifies the important role of the voluntary sector in addressing some of the concerns that I have highlighted—good work deserves to be supported by the Executive. The Deputy First Minister referred to support for groups such as the Prince's Trust. I am aware of the work that is being done in my parliamentary region by the YMCA in Perth, for example, which is reaching out to youngsters who are disengaged from education and employment. That sort of voluntary initiative should be supported.

Voluntary organisations often face hurdles: they regularly complain that they are drowning in bureaucracy and red tape and that they are spending hours on form-filling exercises. Every tranche of money that can be accessed is hedged around by a myriad of conditions. Often, organisations end up supplying the same information over and over again to the different arms of government with which they deal and from which they are trying to access funds. We need a streamlined approach that aims to reduce the bureaucratic burden on voluntary groups. We must also avoid excessive interference in their activities by the Government at the centre.

Members will be aware of the good work that is being done by the Hunter Foundation. It has done a lot of work on international comparisons on the NEET problem. There is nothing new about this under the sun—other countries have had and are tackling the NEET problem, so the Hunter Foundation is examining what has been done in other countries in order to find out what we can learn.

The Hunter Foundation accepts that it is a long-term problem and that decisions that we take today might not have their full effect for 10 or 20 years. Alex Neil said that many youngsters will be members of the second or third generation to face exactly the same problem. We must accept and be patient about the fact that a long-term solution is required. It might be another generation before the full effects of work that is done now come to fruition.

The provision of vocational opportunities for youngsters is an issue that my party has raised on numerous occasions. I believe that for youngsters who have an aptitude for technical subjects, there should be more opportunity than is currently offered to allow them to go down the vocational training route, through developing school-college partnerships or—dare I say it?—science academies. I do not believe, and I never have, that we should have a one-size-fits-all education system. If we can have specialist schools that deal with music or sports, as we do, why not have such schools for science or engineering? It is a pity that the Deputy First Minister was reluctant to endorse the initiative that was announced by the First Minister at the Labour conference a few weeks ago, because we could have built a consensus across the political parties that that is the way forward. Perhaps he will come round to that in due course.

Our further education colleges have a key role to play in tackling the NEET problem. They are already involved in a wide range of work with young people and the varied programmes and support that they offer suit the different and changing needs of individuals. One ambition for the merger of the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council and the Scottish Further Education Funding Council, which the Enterprise and Culture Committee dealt with, was that we should have parity of esteem between the university sector and the further education colleges. I do not know whether we are there yet, but that should certainly be our ambition. Our youngsters need to know, and their careers advisers need to be telling them, that it is as valid to go down the route of vocational training or an apprenticeship as it is to aspire to attend university.

There is much good work going on and I applaud all that is being done. At the core is a partnership with the voluntary sector, so I urge the Executive to consider what more it might do to assist that sector in tackling the serious NEET problem.

I move amendment S2M-5098.1, to leave out from "welcomes" to end and insert:

"is therefore deeply concerned that so many young people in Scotland remain disengaged from education, employment or training; is further concerned by recent remarks from CBI Scotland that companies are having ‘to invest an unacceptably high proportion of the £2 billion they commit to training annually on what is effectively remedial education'; acknowledges, however, that voluntary agencies across Scotland are working hard to engage young people who are NEET; congratulates the Smith Group, which is dedicated to empowering such agencies already involved in this work; welcomes the Scottish Executive's financial support provided to many of these agencies but, in light of the extreme difficulties voluntary organisations routinely face in terms of accessing secure funding, calls on it to reduce the bureaucracy involved in applying for funds and to ensure that long-term funding is available for successful and proven projects."