Adam Jogee

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I will be sure to raise that with the Secretary of State for Education at the next opportunity. As I said, we do not just need the vacancies; we need to make sure that our young people have the skills that employers are looking for. A shortage of quality jobs, or the lack of skills required for the jobs that are available, means that so many of our talented young people feel forced to leave the community they call home to seek and find meaningful work elsewhere. Communities like Newcastle-under-Lyme lose out not just on economic growth, but on the dynamism and skill that bright local people bring to the jobs market. Those who choose to stay in their community face the entrenched inequalities typical of our industrial heartlands. Communities such as Silverdale, Knutton and Cross Heath have higher levels of health inequality and lower levels of life expectancy. So many interconnected factors are at play in communities when it comes to the challenge of ensuring that local people get the jobs they need. In the summer, I welcomed my hon. Friend the Minister to meet the North Staffordshire citizens advice bureau in Newcastle town centre. He had the opportunity to hear all manner of things from the people he met, but particularly from young people who were struggling to deal with their money and to navigate entering the job market. Yes, we need our businesses to employ people, but if people cannot get to work, what is the point? That is the situation facing many traders and their employers in Newcastle-under-Lyme thanks to the sheer incompetence of Staffordshire county council.