Design Engineer Construct Programme

Lord Baker of Dorking Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Baker of Dorking (Con)]

I thank the Minister for referring to UTCs. The decision to remove these two exams is a mistake. It reduces further the amount of technical education in our secondary schools. Design and technology has already fallen by 57% in the lifetime of this Government. T-levels in engineering will not come in until 2023 and 2025. University technical colleges are the only colleges in the country that every year provide employable technicians and engineers at 16 and 18. We should have many more of them.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie]

I thank my noble friend for his less than helpful reply; I was trying to be helpful to him. I hope he will understand that much effort and focus have gone into these particular Design Engineer Construct qualifications. At the end of the day, it was deemed that they were not up to the standard required.