Good morning and thank you Alan (Tuckett – Director of NIACE) for your kind introduction. I am delighted to be here today with so many representatives from learning communities throughout the country and from across the regeneration field to share and celebrate the pioneering work of the testbed learning communities.

 We live in exciting but competitive times. Times where we compete in an increasingly global market place; in the face of ambitious emerging economies such as India and China, who are investing massively in skills. Today’s world economy means, more than ever before, that businesses and people can’t afford to stand still. This economy demands flexibility, application, innovation and enterprise.

 That is why the work you are doing is so important, because responding to those demands means the skills of our people become our most precious national asset. That is why skills and employability remain a high priority for the Government, with more innovative approaches like learning communities becoming critical to achieving social cohesion and economic success.

 We want a country where every person can achieve their full potential and make their own distinct contribution to their community and our economy. A country where people get the high quality education, training and qualifications they need for fulfilment in employment and life. And a country where someone’s future isn’t determined by their background or where they live, but by their abilities and what they can offer.

 By working alongside people to make sure we are meeting their needs and those of their communities - tailoring support and learning to engage people that may be harder to reach; raising confidence levels, aspirations and expectations for their lives and those of their families - we are starting to address the issues of underachievement and exclusion faced by some of our most deprived communities. This is exactly what the learning communities approach is tackling.

 Today I am going to tell you about some of the successes coming out of the testbed work. We would like to see these built on as part of other regeneration and renewal programmes.

 But first I want to tell you about our plans for learning and skills.

 There are two main groups of people we want to reach through our strategy for raising our national skills performance - young people progressing from education to employment and adults either in work or preparing to join the workforce.

 Firstly I would like to talk about young people. The simple fact is that if we are to successfully address our national skills gap and foster a real culture of lifelong learning we have got to keep young people engaged in learning.

 Today, although there have been considerable improvements, still less than 50% of all 16 year olds gain five A* - C grades at GCSE including English and mathematics and we still have one of the highest drop out rates from education and training of 17 year olds of any country in the developed world. We have got to make sure many more – we would like all - of our young people aged under 19 are engaged in learning of some kind.

 We are reforming 14-19 education to provide young people, in schools, colleges and in work-based learning, with truly personalised education built around their needs and aspirations. These reforms include, for example, rationalising the existing myriad of vocational qualifications into 14 specialised Diplomas routes - high quality vocational training in 14 major sectors of the economy - which will help equip young people with skills that have real currency in the labour market. We also need to ensure that when young people leave education they are equipped with the good interpersonal skills that they need to flourish and contribute.

 The Youth Green Paper ‘Youth Matters’ sets out measures to give all young people the opportunity to achieve their potential. The paper proposes both putting more power in the hands of young people – giving them purchasing power through Opportunity Cards and Opportunity Funds - as well as encouraging teenagers to get more involved in their communities. Apprenticeships have been a great success with numbers tripling since 1997 with over a million young people joining the programme since then. We have a new target to increase the numbers completing Apprenticeships by three quarters by 2007/08 and completion rates have already risen from just 24 per cent in 2001/02 to 40 per cent now.

 Moving on to our strategy for adult learners, our aim is to ensure we have adults with a foundation of employability skills. We are putting employers’ needs centre stage and enabling colleges and training providers to be more responsive to both employers’ and learners’ needs.

One of the main challenges we face is helping adults who lack basic skills for employability. Skills for Life has enabled over one million adults gain a nationally recognised qualification in literacy, numeracy and language. But today 5 million adults still lack the literacy skills expected of an eleven year old and the figure is higher for numeracy at some 15 million. It is important that we build the confidence of individuals and communities to develop and use these skills in every aspect of their lives.

Building on this is the Government’s aspiration to raise the proportion of adults with Level 2 skills. In order to achieve our goals for sustainable employability we need everyone who is capable, to gain at least Level 2 skills. This is generally accepted as the fundamental platform for employability. By 2010 we want to reduce by 40% the number of adults in the workforce without a full Level 2 qualification.

 To help us achieve these challenging targets the Government is introducing an entitlement to free tuition to study for a full Level 2 qualification for all adults of working age who are not already qualified to this level. This entitlement will be available to eligible adults in work through a new National Employer Training Programme – called ‘Train to Gain’ - and to those who are not currently working, through FE Colleges and other providers. I appreciate that reaching our Level 2 target will be challenging and we will need your help – in particular in reaching out to those who are disadvantaged and in hard to reach groups.

 We are currently trialling a skills coaching service working in partnership with the LSC and Jobcentre Plus. This service offers enhanced support to disadvantaged individuals to improve their skills and opportunities of sustainable employment.

I am pleased to say that in Exeter and Broxtowe in Nottingham there are active links between the skills coaching and the testbed learning communities with the promotion of each other’s services and joint events.

Information, advice and guidance are critical to helping people make informed choices about learning, career and employment options. Earlier this month I was pleased to launch the learndirect telephone guidance trial. This offers us the opportunity to take another giant step forward for people seeking their first Level 3 qualification or looking to return to work after a career break. I hope you will encourage all those who may benefit to use this new service.

 Importantly, alongside vocational learning we also remain committed to learning for its own intrinsic value; learning for interest, stimulation and personal fulfilment. This is why we have allocated £210m in 2006/07 for learning for personal and community development. This is a deliberate and conscious commitment to learning which isn’t directly about skills, qualifications or progression; although I’m sure we all know someone who has been engaged through this type of provision and then continued their studies at a vocational level. We will maintain this level of funding in 2007/08.

 We know that current provision of learning for personal and community development is very variable in its range, level and quality. We want to see:

 We have asked the LSC to renew its planning arrangements to coordinate the planning of all similar learning programmes to achieve better balance and coverage; and to involve local communities to ensure people have their say in the planning process. This is a really good opportunity for groups like yours to be involved as the new arrangements are formed this year.

 We also welcome Sir Andrew Foster’s recent report which sets out a vision for the FE sector and a compelling set of arguments for reform. The skills imperative identified in Sir Andrew’s report is absolutely essential – it meets the aspirations in our 14-19 and skills strategies. Our response to the Foster review will be taken forward alongside the findings from the Leitch review, which is looking at the longer term skills needs for the UK in 2020.

 What we have learnt from the Testbed Learning Communities

 Of course, traditional approaches to learning and skills development don’t work for everyone. We need to stimulate demand for learning from a wide range of adults who perhaps disliked school or left school at the first opportunity with few or no qualifications. Some of these people are now unemployed and many are in low paid jobs with little opportunity to progress. They and many others want to achieve more for themselves and for their families.

 In response to this need the 28 ‘testbed’ learning community projects have been trying out some new approaches to tackling some of the big issues around low achievement and aspirations in their communities.

 I think Testbed Learning Communities have strengths in 4 main areas:

I would like to give you 3 examples of the testbed approach. You will be hearing about many more during today:

 The Rother testbed in the South East has put the emphasis on helping people into jobs. Working in partnership with Rother Homes, a local housing association, and with the LSC, local residents have taken the first steps into work via DIY courses and a project to decorate a primary school. Free taster courses in construction, a prevocational training programme and sponsored job placements are also on offer. A further venture is ‘Changing Rooms’ courses aimed at jobless people who want to gain practical skills in decorating, carpentry and maintenance. 140 people took part in 2004-05 and over 70 of them gained employment. Amongst other activity the testbed is running taster courses tailored to the needs of the rural community including basic food hygiene for stall holders.

 In the urban environment of Haringey, the voluntary sector-run Selby Centre provides a base for dozens of local community groups, many of them catering for people who are refugees or asylum seekers. The centre provides both an employment advice and information centre and a basic skills and an ICT centre that has been endorsed by the Adult Learning Inspectorate. The number of learners taking part in ICT and employability courses has tripled between 2002 and 2004 to 1500.

 The DfES is currently encouraging all schools to develop as a family and community resource. Building better links with families and communities can help raise pupil’s motivation and achievement. By the end of the decade we want all schools to be providing access to extended services. Schools providing access to extended services can benefit from help in integrating their work with other service providers, to minimise duplication and take advantage of local marketing networks. Hadden Park High School in West Nottingham, part of the Broxtowe Testbed area, has been able to ensure that what it plans to offer complements existing provision, by working through the local learning partnership. The School is collaborating with local partners in delivering first rung learning, family learning, basic skills and IT training.

 One of the main aims of testbed learning communities was to make more effective use of existing funding and partnership working to regenerate communities. And I think many of the testbeds have been very successful at doing that.

 Strong partnership working is a key to their success. Local Authorities are leading around a third of the projects. And in many cases the LSC, Local Strategic Partnerships, Learning Partnerships, voluntary and community sector organisations, Colleges, schools and local employers are also actively involved

 Many testbeds have already carved out for themselves a vital role in their localities, complementing the work of their mainstream services. They are offering new models of local delivery, often linking learning and skills activity with the wider cross government agenda on regeneration including health, housing and crime. For example in Barnsley the testbed has encouraged all providers to come together to make better use of existing resources and improve progression pathways for adult learners.

 There have also been some successes with securing funding. Testbeds have worked through their partners to ensure they are drawing on a range of funding sources beyond the initial funding made available to them.

 The success of these learning communities is clearly demonstrated by the fact that the majority plan to continue their work when the project officially comes to an end in March.

 In the Wirral the testbed model has been so successful, there are plans to roll it out to 7 other districts in Cheshire and Warrington. In Shropshire the Craven Arms model is being rolled out to other towns in the county. These are just 2 examples of successes – there are many more.

 All of this means a joined up approach to planning and delivering learning and skills for all ages which works. It means that we are starting to see that the support Government is providing for employment and skills is responsive to local needs and integrated with local work on regeneration.

 How we plan to build on these successes

 We need to build on this and other similar community learning initiatives.

 And I think we all have a part to play in making this a success:

 Launch the Skills for Life pack and Testbed Learning Communities Review document

 In support of DfES’s work with community learning I am now pleased to launch two excellent new resources:

The Skills for Life pack, ‘Skills for Communities’; and ‘Testbed Learning Communities Reviewed’.

 The Skills for Communities Guide is designed for people working in and with communities in a wide range of agencies including extended schools, children’s centres, and homelessness hostels, and in communities where there are particular unique challenges such as former coalfield areas. This guide will help them understand more about how literacy, language and numeracy issues may affect the people they work with, the services they offer and what they can do to make a difference.

 Testbed Learning Communities Reviewed provides a record of the learning community experience; identifying emerging approaches through a wide variety of case study material. It also puts forward some proposals for sustaining and building on this work.

Copies are available for everyone.

 Conclusion

 Finally, I want to thank you all - managers, participants and supporters of learning communities - for your hard work and many achievements in support of this demanding agenda. I welcome the contribution of all the inspirational programmes you have developed and established and to ask you to continue your excellent work.

 People and their communities are critical to achieving social cohesion and economic success and we all need to work together to ensure they continue to benefit – as they deserve to- from the testbed learning communities experience.

 Thank you and I hope you enjoy the rest of your day.

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