Alison McGovern

Alison McGovern

Labour — Birkenhead

Speaking in the House of Commons on 10 February 2025

Debate

Community and Third Sector Organisations: Employment

Contribution

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I think he has described the approach that the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster has recommended to us all: testing and trialling things quickly and reviewing what works and what does not work, and trying to respond swiftly and change quickly, rather than setting out a huge great plan that takes years to develop. That is an approach that the DWP is trying to model now. Only this morning, I was in Bolton with some work coaches who have developed a jobcentre on wheels—a van that we can take out to communities. They have done that pretty swiftly, and as my hon. Friend has described, they are trying to work out what works on the ground there so that they can feed back to us. I will conclude now, Madam Deputy Speaker, because I fear that collectively, all of us in the Chamber could probably speak about this topic for about three hours uninterrupted. We had better not do that, but I want to finish by saying how important it is that we have had this debate this evening. The “Get Britain Working” plan sets out the requirement for all places to have such a plan for themselves, so that they can work out where their employment challenges are and work collectively to address them. Everywhere in our country must have a plan for growth, and our reforms nationally are in the spirit of the local action that we have seen in the north Birmingham area. Economic growth needs us all to pull together, and we know that when we do so, the benefits will be widely spread. Question put and agreed to.

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