Starts on level 7 apprenticeships have surged, prompting warnings about a “totally predictable” run on the stretched apprenticeships budget before government funding is axed.
FE Week analysis of official figures reveals a 24 per cent spike, year on year, between August 2024 and April 2025.
The figures, based on the latest available data from the Department for Education (DfE), show that new starts rose by 5,000 to reach 25,799 for the first three quarters of the last academic year. There were 1,939 more starts than for the entire 2023-24 academic year.
The biggest surge came this spring, when starts rose by 65 per cent year-on-year, while in March alone they more than doubled, from 1,457 in 2024 to 3,023 this year.
Monthly spikes in starts are expected to intensify further this autumn as employers, training providers and universities scramble to beat the levy cut-off in January 2026.
The ‘big financial headache’
The DfE recorded its first overspend on the apprenticeships budget last year. Despite a record £3.075 billion allocated for 2025-26, ministers are relying on headroom saved from axing level 7s for over 22-year-olds to fund new schemes such as foundation apprenticeships for young people and short non-apprenticeship ‘growth and skills’ courses in priority sectors.
Tom Richmond, an education policy analyst and former adviser to DfE ministers, said the growth in level 7 provision had “placed a huge strain on the apprenticeships budget for years”.
He added: “If, as these numbers suggest, many providers have piled into level 7 apprenticeships before the axe falls next year, then it will present ministers and officials with a big financial headache.”
Baroness Alison Wolf called the rush “totally predictable” and said she was “astonished DfE didn’t move to prevent it”.
She told FE Week: “It will put huge extra pressure on the budget at a time when NEET numbers are high, and when apprenticeship openings for the young have been falling fast.
“Many of the organisations increasing their senior leadership numbers could be creating openings for young people and should be ashamed of themselves.”
Level 7 data deepdive
Much of the level 7 surge has been driven by senior leader apprenticeships, which climbed from 5,866 starts in the first three quarters of 2023-24 to 8,670 over the same period this year – a 48 per cent rise so far. By April, there were already 1,500 more senior leader apprentices than in the whole of last year.
Accountancy and taxation professional apprenticeships also grew by just over 1,000 starts. The only major programme to shrink was the advanced clinical practitioner, down by 539.
Data covering the final quarter of academic year 2024-25 isn’t due until November, and the picture for August 2025 to December 2025 won’t be clear until March 2026.
Individual training providers have seen a significant increase in level 7 starts.
Corndel started 1,334 level 7 apprentices in the whole of 2023-24, but had already enrolled 1,875 in the first three quarters of 2024-25. Comparing year-on-year for quarters one to three, its numbers jumped by 993 extra starts. FE Week asked Corndel how it was resourcing the training for such a large increase in level 7 apprentices, but it declined to comment.
Ian Prentice, CEO of Fuel Learning, which grew from 8 to 162 senior leader starts year-on-year, is confident his learners experience no drop in quality. He told FE Week growth was “always planned” with employers, enabling him to recruit facilitators, coaches and learning managers he needed.
“We will reach a point where we won’t take any more. It’s not possible to grow by thousands and maintain quality,” he said.
Petra Wilson, policy director at the Chartered Management Institute, which does the vast majority of the end-point assessments on senior leader apprenticeships, was confident CMI could scale its operations to meet rising demand.
“We do not foresee any challenges in meeting the needs of education providers and learners who are embarking on senior leader apprenticeships,” she said.
The Department for Education said it will “not hesitate” in intervening if a provider’s quality falls short.
A spokesperson said: “Apprenticeship starts by young people under 25 fell by almost 40 per cent over the last decade. That’s why through our plan for change we have asked more employers to invest in upskilling their staff aged over 22 at level 7, to enable levy funding to be re-balanced towards young people and training at lower levels.
“All current level 7 apprentices and any who start before 1 January 2026 will be funded through to completion. We gave this degree of notice because employers and providers needed time to plan their future skills provision.
“We will continue to hold providers to account through our rigorous apprenticeship accountability framework, and where performance falls short we do not hesitate to intervene.”
Your thoughts