Skills minister Jacqui Smith introduced a 12-page bill in the House of Lords yesterday which will transfer all of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education’s (IfATE) powers to the Department for Education, paving the way for Skills England.
Here’s your trusty FE Week explainer on what’s in the bill, and what happens next:
What’s new?
Skills England itself is not mentioned in the snappily titled Institute of Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill, but accompanying documents reveal the new body will be established as an executive agency within the DfE rather than an independent or cross-government organisation.
This is a departure from what was announced at the King’s Speech earlier this year when we first learned of IfATE’s demise. Number 10 said at the time a Skills England Bill will “transfer functions from IfATE to Skills England” suggesting the latter would have some statutory footing of its own.
Instead what we got was what’s called “amending legislation,” a rewiring of legal powers and responsibilities rather than any fundamental statutory reforms.
The bill also gives the secretary of state some “exceptional” powers to bypass employer groups to design and approve standards and apprenticeship assessment plans in a move touted to make the skills system more “agile” to employer needs. More on that further down.
Lords will get the chance to debate the bill and its wider implications for the skills system on October 22. MPs won’t get a chance to debate the bill until it’s been debated and amended by the Lords. Predictions are that the government wants Skills England, which is currently a “shadow” body, to be fully operational by April.
Hopes had been high among skills leaders for the new body to work in partnership with the sector to close debilitating skills gaps and create a more coherent system for learners, providers, regional governments and employers.
Labour has also claimed Skills England will be central to achieving the government’s five missions and relies on it to work cross-government in areas like industrial strategy and reducing immigration.
Much of that hope rests on Skills England’s clout across the government as the latest in a long-line of further education quangos.
Bringing skills in-house
We now know more about what kind of organisation Skills England will be and where it sits within government.
IfATE is legally established as a non-departmental public body (NDPB) whereas Skills England will be an executive agency. While both are types of quangos, there are some important differences between an NDPB and an executive agency.
As an NDPB, IfATE has some operational independence from the Department for Education. That’s because its functions and responsibilities have been set out in legislation approved by parliament. Skills England will instead be a defined team within DfE.
This is different from organisations like Ofsted, which are non-ministerial government departments (NMGDs) – established in law and accountable to parliament, not the government, which gives them greater clout.
For example, until this bill is passed, the law of the land states that IfATE decides how occupational standards and apprenticeship assessment plans get developed, it can approve or reject those standards and plans, quality assure apprenticeship assessments, commission the development of technical qualifications, run procurements and, for T Levels specifically, award and manage the awarding organisation licenses. It also approves higher technical qualifications (HTQs) and advises the government on apprenticeship funding.
The bill means all of those functions get absorbed by the education secretary, who will decide which bits to delegate within Skills England’s wider remit around skills strategy, planning and restricting level 7 apprenticeships.
As an executive agency, Skills England will legally be part of the Department for Education, so not as notionally independent as IfATE was. The Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) is also an executive agency, and as such could be easily abolished without debate or parliamentary debate.
It also means whatever strategy that emerges for Skills England, will in essence be a DfE strategy. This could feasibly spell an end to IfATE’s ‘employers first’ approach to developing policy and qualifications in favour of whatever strategy the education secretary of the day prescribes.
DfE’s spin on this is that: “The transfer of IfATE’s powers to the secretary of state may enable closer integration of employer input with broader government strategies and policies.”
Consider that alongside previous announcements about Skills England’s role in convening education providers, employers, unions and regional governments, all the signs point to the sort of social partnership approach sector bodies have been pushing for.
Interviews for a permanent chair and board members for Skills England take place early next month.
The government is taking steps not to spook employers too much though. DfE recognises its new approach “could lead to a perception that employers’ influence and centrality within the system is being diluted.” However, “extensive external engagement with employers” has been promised to reassure businesses.
Continuity with change
While the face of the bill suggests it’s simply transferring IfATE’s powers to DfE, it also changes “overly prescriptive” functions DfE thinks can make the skills system “more responsive and agile”.
Currently, IfATE convenes groups of employers through its trailblazer and route panels to develop and approve apprenticeship standards and assessment plans.
DfE said its “default” approach will still be for “groups of persons” to produce standards and plans. But the bill allows the secretary of state, and presumably later Skills England, to intervene and directly develop and approve standards and/or assessment plans where they are “satisfied this is more appropriate”.
The theory is this will speed up amending or introducing standards and assessment plans, bypassing what can currently be an arduous exercise of lengthy reviews involving employers, awarding organisations, training providers and multiple layers of officials.
Policy notes suggest these powers wouldn’t be used as a matter of course. The example given is if a standard required “minimal update due to a regulatory change or obvious knowledge-based changes” then the secretary of state could intervene. DfE said: “Giving the secretary of state this flexibility will enable the skills system to be more agile.”
Another “agility” change in the bill gives the secretary of state the power to bypass third-party “examination” of new standards and apprenticeship assessment plans before they’re approved.
Should the secretary of state use any of these new direct powers around standards and assessment plans, they will uphold “a high level of rigour” and consult with stakeholders, DfE said.
Another change is the way the government wants to review technical education qualifications. Current legislation stipulates technical qualifications should be reviewed “at regular intervals” against a published timeline. This bill keeps the requirement for reviews but removes any requirement for a regular timetable. Instead, the secretary of state can determine when to review qualifications. According to DfE, this gives “flexibility” to the government to prioritise reviews “which will have the most impact”.
A final change in the bill closes a loophole left by the abolition of IfATE which means Ofqual can step in to accredit technical qualifications “should the secretary of state consider it to be appropriate”.
Should any of that go awry, the bill helpfully gives the secretary powers to make “consequential” changes using secondary legislation.
Transition dangers
Transferring IfATE’s most learner-facing responsibilities could cause confusion and disruption, a Department for Education impact assessment on the bill has warned.
For example, apprenticeship standards and technical qualifications currently going through IfATE’s various approval processes could be delayed while IfATE shuts down. There will also need to be “a clear framework” for end-point assessments (EPA) during the transition period to avoid “periods of uncertainty” when IfATE’s EPA responsibilities are moved to DfE or Skills England.
Learners aged 25 and over have been flagged as potentially at risk from a slowdown of new apprenticeships and technical education courses because they are more reliant on local options than younger learners who have “greater mobility and fewer conjugal responsibilities”.
Training providers may be concerned about a raft of new or expensive compliance processes as DfE takes over IfATE’s regulatory functions. DfE acknowledges “there could be a cost” to training providers but expects it to be “negligible” given there are no plans to deviate too from IfATE’s current requirements.
DfE said any possible temporary disruptions affecting learners and apprentices during the transition were “limited” and “speculative” and promised to address any impact on affected groups with “the correct mitigations”.
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