Alison McGovern

I thank and pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham Erdington (Paulette Hamilton), who brought the debate to the House this evening. All hon. Members will agree that her passion and commitment to her constituency and this subject shine through. I can only say what an absolute honour it was to visit her constituency to discuss the work of the north Birmingham economic recovery board. I will come shortly to the situation in Birmingham and the approach that my hon. Friend recommends that the Government take. I hope that her remarks at the end of her speech on the purpose of politics and the role we all must play in giving everybody a chance and an opportunity in our society would be supported across the House, but she makes the case well for that approach. And so to Birmingham. This debate is important for many reasons, not least because some parts of our country suffer much worse than others with poor employment outcomes. The Government are committed to our ambition of moving towards a goal of an 80% employment rate, though some places in our country are already there. Unfortunately, that is not the case in Birmingham where the employment rate is around just 66%. That is not acceptable because when some parts of our country fall behind economically, it is bad for those places and bad for all of us, because it means that some people in our country cannot play their full role in our economic growth. Economic inactivity is also higher than the average, and that is why our reform plans take a different approach. We are no longer doing the same thing everywhere, but trying to tailor and personalise our employment support to where people are and what they need.