YP Comment: Colleges are key to Powerhouse

Cuts compound skills shortage
Protests over funding have taken place outside colleges in recent weeks.Protests over funding have taken place outside colleges in recent weeks.
Protests over funding have taken place outside colleges in recent weeks.

FOR years, education policy under successive governments has focused on the performance of individual schools – and whether universities are producing graduates with the expertise to inspire a new era of innovation and ingenuity.

Yet this has been invariably to the detriment of colleges – and those institutions which play an invaluable role in the provision of vocational courses or helping the less academically-gifted to improve their GCSE qualifications.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Unlike schools which have seen their budgets ring-fenced, further education colleges have not enjoyed this luxury and many are beginning to pay a heavy price for a lack of long-term political foresight as they are forced to merge and reduce the number of courses available to prospective students.

This is borne out by today’s disturbing Public Accounts Committee report which accuses the Government of taking insufficient steps to safeguard the interests of the four million people who benefit from college learning each year.

This state of affairs is not helped by further education transcending Whitehall departments – it is clear that a culture of buck-passing exists at the highest levels and this needs to be reconciled in the next 12 months as Ministers respond to this report.

Yet it is also abundantly clear that the voice of employers is still not being heard with sufficient clarity. They repeatedly complain that young people are completing their education without an adequate grasp of those skills, whether it be numeracy, literacy or technology, which are vital in a 21st century global economy – and that the Northern Powerhouse will only fulfil its potential in Yorkshire, and elsewhere, if the workforce is both dynamic and well-qualified. In short, colleges hold the key to this region’s future and Ministers need to start recognising this.

Health warning: No more blank cheques for NHS

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

by COMMITTING a further £8.4bn to the National Health Service to fund the Stevens reforms, the Tories were able to convince sufficient sceptics prior to the May 7 election that the NHS was safe in its hands – health policy has long been the party’s Achilles’ heel.

Yet, while this approach enabled David Cameron to outflank Labour on this divisive issue, the challenge now is making sure that this money is not frittered away as the financial position of NHS hospital trusts deteriorates markedly prior to the worst of the winter weather when demand for care is always at its greatest.

However the National Audit Office, one of the guardians of the public interests, clearly has its doubts judging by the conclusions of today’s investigation which questions whether the NHS has the management capabilities – nationally, regionally and locally – to bring its finances under a semblance of control so hospitals no longer lurch from one crisis to another.

After all, the centrepiece of the Stevens plan is a desire to introduce new practices so people lead healthier lifestyles so the major hospitals can focus their care, and resources, on those patients with the greatest needs.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Yet this will not happen if this additional money is being diverted to other aspects of NHS, such as the recruitment of agency nurses to plug staff shortages or the shortcomings in community care which make it difficult for hospitals to discharge elderly patients.

At some point, there needs to be a realisation that the Government can no longer afford to issue the NHS with a blank cheque. Today’s report represents a final health warning.

Man of courage: Ben Parkinson out of this world

TO kayak 250 miles down the Yukon River in the untamed wilds of North America is a gruelling physical challenge for even the fittest and most experienced canoeists. To do so having lost both your legs, and survived a severe brain injury, is near miraculous.

But ever since Ben Parkinson returned home to Yorkshire in 2006 having suffered terrible injuries following a bomb attack while serving in Afghanistan he has been defying the odds and achieving the seemingly unthinkable. The former paratrooper has spent the past nine years on a slow road to recovery and his latest challenge, in which he was accompanied by other injured veterans, is testament to his bravery.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The word “hero” is bandied around all too freely these days, but in Ben Parkinson’s case it actually fails to do justice to his courage and determination. He is quite simply a super- hero and living embodiment of the human spirit’s ability to overcome adversity.