Apprenticeship starts rose 7 per cent in April despite warnings the chancellor’s tax hikes and rises to the minimum wage would wreck recruitment.
Department for Education data published today shows the number of apprentice newcomers increased from 21,100 in April 2024 to 22,600 in the same month this year.
The rise was driven by new apprentices aged 25 or older and higher level apprenticeships – in line with recent trends.
However, adverts on Find Apprenticeship Training over the last three months – April, May and June – have decreased compared to those in the previous year by 22 per cent, 17 per cent and 18 per cent respectively. For each of those months in 2025 the number of apprenticeship adverts sat at just above 4,500.
Meanwhile, overall vacancies in April and May increased – by 17 per cent and 21 per cent – but this was “primarily due to the British Army, who placed 2,840 vacancies in April and 2,880 in May”, the data states.
The 6,500 vacancies on Find An Apprenticeship in June 2025 were 33 per cent down on those in June 2024.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced £40 billion in tax rises in her autumn budget, which kicked in from April.
This included increasing employer national insurance contributions by 1.2 percentage points and a national living wage rise of 6.7 per cent from £11.44 to £12.21 an hour, while the apprentice minimum wage went up 18 per cent to £7.55 an hour.
Business secretary Jonathan Reynolds admitted the increases were likely to impact companies’ ability to hire new staff and an FE Week investigation in November found early signs that apprentices were either being let go or recruitment was being put on hold in industries like hairdressing and early years.
However, the government did remove English and maths functional skills requirements for adults aged 19 and older in February – hoping to remove barriers to apprenticeships and increase starts and completions.
Today’s data shows that for the first three quarters of 2024-25 – August to April – overall starts have risen 2 per cent to 284,190 compared to the same period for the previous year.
Apprenticeship starts in March – a month before the tax and wage rises – surged by 18 per cent from 23,570 in 2024 to 27,900 in 2025.
When are FE Week going to put some quality journalism into reporting upon the detail of the disastrous reduction, as a result of the civil service reform of apprenticeships, in apprentice starts with SME sized employers ? The headlines will be dramatic if you can be bothered to do the work! Not doing this makes you complicit in allowing the headlines to continue to hide behind public sector and levy numbers combined with the massive switch to higher level apprenticeships for already employed workers!
Hi Neil,
We’ve run many stories on dwindling SME apprenticeship numbers and the huge rise in higher level apprenticeships over the years (a few listed below). Happy to talk you through our coverage if you’ve missed anything. I’m on billy.camden@feweek.co.uk. Always bothered to do the work, just saying.
https://feweek.co.uk/dwindling-sme-starts-drag-down-apprenticeship-figures-in-2022-23/
https://feweek.co.uk/small-employer-apprenticeship-starts-rise-for-first-time-in-5-years/
https://feweek.co.uk/dfe-seeks-brokers-to-level-up-sme-apprenticeships-in-the-north/
https://feweek.co.uk/making-it-easier-for-smes-to-take-on-apprentices-at-top-of-skills-ministers-agenda/
https://feweek.co.uk/halfon-quizzed-on-levy-funding-gap-fsq-woes-and-5-co-investment-future/
https://feweek.co.uk/smes-frustrated-as-dfe-refuses-to-reset-non-levy-cap-on-apprenticeship-starts/
https://feweek.co.uk/itp-apprentice-market-share-hits-new-heights-and-more-from-23-24/
https://feweek.co.uk/halfon-encouraged-by-apprenticeship-trends-since-the-levy/
https://feweek.co.uk/apprenticeships-level-2-starts-lowest-in-four-years/
https://feweek.co.uk/degree-level-apprenticeship-spending-hit-half-a-billion-last-year/
Yes numbers have been mentioned but the “headline” reason for these rarely feature as detailed headline failures of policy and its implementation, is really the point!