IfATE loses 30 staff in DfE cash cuts

The government’s apprenticeships quango has lost 30 staff after being ordered to find savings by the Department for Education.

Headcount at the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE) has reduced to 282 following a voluntary exit scheme launched this year.

One of the big-name departures is second-in-command Rob Nitsch, IfATE’s current delivery director and a former chief operating officer. He stepped down to take over as chief executive of the Federation of Awarding Bodies next month.

IfATE did not share information about which other departments had lost staff or how much their exits would save the organisation.

Staff costs at the quango ballooned from £14.4 million in 2020-21 to £21.5 million in 2022-23 as additional responsibilities were handed to the institute through the Skills and Post-16 Education Act.

In that period the institute’s hiring spree led to its average full-time equivalent staff figure growing from 200 to over 300.

The institute told FE Week in March it was embarking on a “reorganisation in line with wider civil service efficiency savings”.

FE Week understands the new Labour government is gearing up for further changes to IfATE’s workforce as it embarks on its plan for a new body called Skills England to oversee its skills strategy. Restructures could come as soon as next week.

Launched in 2017 to spearhead the government’s apprenticeship reforms, IfATE, then known as the Institute for Apprenticeships, has seen its responsibilities and workforce expand in the past seven years.

“Technical Education” was added to the quango’s name and brief in 2019 as the authority also took over the content of T Levels and procurement for awarding organisations.

The institute had around 80 full-time staff in its first year of operation.

IfATE was handed new powers as set out in the 2021 FE white paper and skills bill, such as defining and approving new categories of technical qualifications as well as reviewing those already on offer and withdrawing their approval where they were no longer performing as expected.