Alan Milburn

Careers advice is, again, I mean, it's actually improving.

That's got to be much more part of what schools do.

Making sure the kids, by the time they leave, are work ready and not just academically qualified is the third thing that they've got to do.

But the fourth thing, which is the one that you point to, Steph, is education.

You know, there's been a big emphasis, and look, I'm a chancellor, as you know, of a university, actually the university where I went to as a student over in Lancaster, and I'm very proud of it, and I think higher education's a brilliant route for a lot of kids.

But the truth is, we need more vocational skills, you know, and particularly, as I say, migration is falling now, so we've got to plug a big gap in the skilled labour market.

Think about construction.

The government wants to build a million and a half homes.

We've got to

We've got to have sparkies and we've got to have plumbers and we've got to have bricklayers and all those type of skills that are desperately needed.

And so schools have got a really important responsibility, not just to assume that it's the higher education route that is the destination for students.

Yes, so I think that's exactly one of the things that we're looking at, which is, is the regulatory environment that schools are subject to through Ofsted, and is the financial incentive environment, which they're subject through the Department for Education, are they pointing in the right direction?

So, and if they're not, then obviously that will come to that in time, then that needs to change.

It takes forever.

Okay, so there's lots of reasons for pessimism, right?

I mean, and I've recited quite a lot of the statistics and all the things that are going wrong.

I'll give you two reasons for optimism.

One is...

or three, actually, young people themselves, okay, when you meet with them, honestly, talk to them, listen to them about their lives.

Sure, there's issues that they've got, but honestly, energy, aspiration, appetite, it's there.