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Newsroom & speeches
49/05
18 May 2005
"In the mid-eighties, 350,000 young people were unemployed for more than a year. Today the figure is not 350,000, not 100,000, not even 50,000, but fewer than 7,000.
Every time a young person denied a job previously gets a job today we should be proud of the New Deal - that this is what can happen when we work together.
And I can report to you today – the day of the new unemployment figures just published – that there are more people in work now than at any time in our previous history.
And that the total number of extra jobs Britain has created since 1997 is more than 2.2 million.
Unemployment in the 1980s was as high as 3 million. Now in some areas of the country we are close to having full employment communities.
This was the purpose and now the achievement of the New Deal.
So when people say politicians are all the same and don’t make any difference, tell them the advance to full employment is the difference this Government is making in every community.
We should take pride that no other UK employment programme has been so comprehensive and so successful for so long.
But our achievement is not a reason for complacency; it is a call to do more.
Let us send the message from this conference: that the next stage is to do even more to create jobs, to create skilled jobs, to create well paying jobs.
When we cannot save jobs we help people into the next jobs. That is why we will not allow the New Deal, the rapid response force, the help available form the employment service to be cut.
So I promise you that in our third term we will help one million more through the New Deal and other employment programmes - as we advance further and faster to full employment.
But when, just as they did in the 1980s, people ask again whether any longer it is possible amidst the scale of global restructuring, when we see the rise of China and India and vast technological change, when we are faced with overcoming challenges like the loss of jobs at Rover, when people doubt whether there are jobs enough in Britain for all who need them, and then ask can we hold to the vision of a full employment economy.
When they ask whether to succeed in the global economy we have to sacrifice full employment in our national economy, when they ask again whether for global success unemployment is a price worth paying, I have to tell you that we will not only hold fast to our goal of full employment, but I make this pledge to you: that as long as there is poverty, unemployment and deprivation in any part of our country, as long as one community, one family one individual is unjustifiably denied opportunity, we will never rest or relax in our efforts.
Let us now explain to the people of Britain how when new technologies, new industries, and new trading relationships – as I found in China a few months ago – are set to transform what we produce, what jobs we do, and what skills we need, the people of this country will need a Government standing with working people, on their side – not standing in the way of change but making sure every young person, every worker is equipped to cope with change.
So having been winning the employment battle, we must win the battle for industrial success - winning the productivity battle for Britain and British industry – and in particular creating modern manufacturing strength.
And I say to you today: let no one think that manufacturing will be allowed to be a sector of the past, to be praised for its historic role but somehow not relevant to the future. Our aim is modern manufacturing strength.
And let no one tell you otherwise, for this government manufacturing not only has been, but remains and will always be, critical to the success of the British economy:
So let us remember when some are pessimistic, I am not. Our aim is not to replace manufacturing by services but to build modern manufacturing services.
Manufacturing exports for the few months of 2005 increased by 5.2 per cent compared with the same period a year earlier.
And in the last few months of 2004 manufacturing productivity rose by 3.8 per cent compared with the same period the year before.
And while I understand that we have lost manufacturing jobs in Britain since 1997 and suffered the devastating blow at Rover, let us understand that nearly 3 million manufacturing jobs have been lost in America and another 3 million in Japan as the global economy restructures. And our share of manufacturing output today is higher than manufacture’s share in the US economy.
Let us celebrate the many successful manufacturing businesses in Britain - world-beating firms from aerospace and pharmaceuticals to motor vehicles and general engineering: our high tech expertise in steel engineering is exported to 200 countries around the world and our pharmaceutical industry contributes £15.4 billion to our national income.
So let us be proud that high-skilled, high-tech modern manufacturing is what Britain does best and none of this would be possible at all without the essential contribution of this union.
I know that what manufacturers and manufacturing workers fear most is a return to the old boom and bust - they saw what happened in the eighties and early nineties when boom and bust cost Britain 1 million manufacturing jobs.
So stability is the essential pre-condition.
That is why since 1997 we have rejected short-term free for alls – the take-what-you-can irresponsibility – and have put faith in our values of economic responsibility, building from solid foundations and looking to the long term.
With Bank of England independence, tough decisions on inflation, new fiscal rules, and hard public spending controls, we today in our country have economic stability not boom and bust.
And as people can see in the Bank of England's vigilance we are taking no risks with inflation.
We will impose although fiscal discipline with lower rates of spending growth in the coming period. And we will meet our fiscal rules.
The figures from Tuesday showing inflation on target and the figures today showing employment rising are confirming that the economy is on a course giving us stability and growth. We will always be vigilant but even in challenging times of high oil prices, global current account imbalances and a slower growth rate in the euro area, it is not the weakness of the British economy but its continued resilience that enables us to look forward to continuing stability.
And public sector reform and wage discipline will at all times match our investment, as we replace input and process targets by far more local, on-the-ground accountability.
Because 50 per cent of our trade is with Europe and because through increased trade an extra 1 per cent of growth in the eurozone can give an extra fifth a per cent of growth in Britain – and because economic reform matters – I have to tell you that we will resist the opt out being removed to the 48 hour week and will demand that British companies are no longer denied contracts and markets across all key sectors of the European economy and that British industry secures a fair deal.
And as we agreed with you at Warwick we have set up and are expanding the manufacturing advisory service which has generated over £112 million of added value for companies and which Alan Johnston is looking not to contract but to expand.
In industries such as automotive, aerospace, biosciences and electronics we have set up the innovation and growth teams to identify the challenges and opportunities they face.
And we have introduced the technology strategy making grants available to support R&D – which have led to 70 successful projects announced with funding of around £60 million – and we are ready to do more in this area too.
In the regions - as you pressed for at Warwick - we are developing regional strategies and I want your Union to play an even bigger role in the Regional Development Agencies, the science and industry councils now being established in each region, and the work of supporting manufacturing investment region by region with Regional Development Plans.
And to ensure that small businesses - particularly those in manufacturing - are able to apply new innovations to create new products and processes and then new jobs for the future, we have set up the Cox Review which will report soon.
We must be prepared to implement any necessary new laws, introduce any necessary new incentives, be prepared to make any necessary changes to make our country the most adaptable, flexible, innovative, enterprising and skilled in the global economy.
And when I tell you that China and India are not just producing 4 million graduates a year to our 250,000 but producing 125,000 computer scientists to our 18,000. When I inform you that they will have 270,000 qualified engineers to our 100,000, when they are training millions of skilled workers then you and I will agree that to meet the Asian and global challenge we cannot now afford to waste the abilities of any child. we cannot any more afford to write off the talents of any teenager. We cannot any longer afford to leave untapped the potential skills of any adult.
Not only is full employment a necessity for our country in the modern world but we must now make the transition from a low skilled to a high skilled economy. It means that instead of the old system of investing in some of the potential if some of the people our manifesto commitment will be to invest in all of the potential of all of the people.
It is because you recognise that rights for working people in the modern world must mean the right to acquire and benefit from skills that this Union has been at the forefront of vocational development, the leading supporter of apprenticeships, the prime mover in the development of trade unions in lifelong learning.
When I left school 250,000 young people were serving an apprenticeship and learning a trade for the future.
By 1997 it had fallen to just 75,000, just half the level it was in 1979.
But already apprenticeships - which a few years ago were dying – have risen to 255,000 today.
Nearly a third of these apprenticeships – 70,000 – are in the manufacturing sector.
We have set up the national modern apprenticeship task force - to which the TUC is making a crucial contribution - because we know we must not only provide high quality training when we have the recruits but ensure that more young people know about the opportunities available and are encouraged to consider careers in a wider range of trades
And I want to congratulate you on the important work you do bargaining for skills and equipping your members with the skills and qualifications they need opening up new opportunities.
And I want to congratulate the 1,700 trade union learning representatives from AMICUS who know that jobs for the future mean skilled jobs and an education and training policy to make us the most skilled, best educated country in the industrialised world.
We should be proud that there are now nearly 8,000 union learning representatives – and particularly pleased that over half of these are women - and that these 8,000 learning reps are now operating in more than 3,000 workplaces – bargaining for skills and convincing workers and management of the importance of training.
In every region union learning projects are developing in partnership with employers like First Group, TNT, Manpower, Unilever, local authorities and those in the agricultural industry.
And supported by the union learning fund, 190 union learning centres have been set up – focusing particularly on providing training for previously excluded groups of employees such as part-time workers, freelance or shift workers, and those with basic skills needs.
I believe that union learning representatives themselves can play a greater role too – negotiating with employers to bring in apprenticeships and acting as mentors, offering advice and support to the young people.
And to back up your efforts we will guarantee free of charge the chance for every adult to gain a first level 2 qualification and increase the financial support for people studying for level three qualifications – technician, higher craft or associate professional level – in areas of sectoral or regional priority. So we are increasing the Learning and Skills Council's budget from £9.3 billion this year to over £10 billion by 2008.
But in all these areas let's set our ambitions higher, go further and faster. Let's make the trade union movement truly become a huge army in the battle for skills.
And as you raise your sights higher, so too I promise the Government will do more to support you – and not only have we introduced but we will also expand the union learning fund as we agreed at Warwick.
And I can tell you today - building on the 190 learning centres as the foundation for the next stage in the advancement of work based learning, we will also support the formation of a union academy to make it easier for all employees to access learning and skills in the workplace.
This is the vision of the future as it should be.
Remember what we pioneered before with Ruskin; with workers education associations; ideas that grew into reality. And it can be the same with the Union Academy.
So I can tell you that our promise to the British people: for the first time in Britain not just some but every teenager after 16 given the right to education, training or work, in the next Parliament so no teenager should ever again be unemployed.
And for the first time in Britain every low skilled adult with the guarantee of training for work, no adult ever again denied the chance of basic skills for work.
Having in 1999 won the first stage of debt relief – writing off the bilateral debt owned to Britain - I want us to work together as we also tackle corruption lack of transparency and push forwards economic reform to achieve for the first time ever full 100 per cent multilateral debt relief for all the poorest countries.
And I want us to work together, at Gleneagles and the September UN summit, for the boldest anti poverty plan, to tackle global poverty and to call on other countries to join us to set, as we have already set, a timetable for 0.7 per cent of our national income to be paid to the poorest countries in development aid.
We are in discussions with and making progress on a European initiative on international development and aid for Africa and all poor countries - an initiative that will honour our ambitions for a new deal for Africa, provide debt relief, introduce a new finance facility and could reach, by July, an historic agreement to increase aid.
This follows discussions at the weekend in Luxembourg, and subsequent discussions to take place in the run up to the next meeting of European Finance Ministers where Luxembourg and the UK will submit a joint paper on our proposals.
And I can tell you that after my visit to Africa earlier this year, what we need to do at Gleneagles takes on, for me, a new urgency."
