asked the Minister of Labour if he will state the relationship between the inter-departmental committee on industrial training and retraining which he has appointed, and the Central Training Council established under the Industrial Training Act, 1964.

The inter-departmental committee is a part of the machinery of government for securing co-ordination between the Government Departments concerned on important training issues. It is in no sense a substitute for the Central Training Council. The Council will remain the principal forum in which the views of leaders from industry and the educational world can be focused and brought to bear on the development of policy in the field of industrial training. Discussions on the inter-departmental committee will, of course, be very much influenced by the views of the Council, and both I and my colleagues will give the greatest weight to these views in the decisions we have to make.

While welcoming the emphasis which the Minister has placed on the importance of the work of the Central Training Council, which I fully endorse, may I ask whether it is not some-what unusual to publish formal details about an inter-departmental committee and particularly its terms of reference? The right hon. Gentleman and I know very well that there are many interdepartmental committees at all levels of Government which meet all the time, and they are not usually given this formality. Does not this announcement give special importance to this committee? Can the right hon. Gentleman inform us that the Central Training Council will continue to be, as intended, the main forum for the discussion of these problems?

I considered it important to inform the House of the establishment of this committee in view of the announcement in the Queen's Speech of the Government's intention to improve arrangements for industrial training. Having said that, I again emphasise that the Central Training Council will be the main forum.

In the light particularly of the first part of that answer, is it not true that this is really a piece of window dressing on behalf of the Prime Minister?

No. The right hon. Gentleman is far wider awake than that. He knows very well that when the machinery of Government for education and for labour is inter-mixed, it is necessary to have a co-ordinating body. It is not a piece of window-dressing. It is a very important piece of co-ordination in industrial training. I again emphasise that it will perform a useful function, but the Central Training Council will still be the main forum.