Prime minister Keir Starmer has appointed the former home secretary Jacqui Smith as a minister of state at the Department for Education.
FE Week understands Smith will take the skills, further and higher education brief, though this has not yet been confirmed by the Department for Education.
Smith served in several ministerial roles in the last Labour government. She was the country’s first woman to serve as home secretary and was the minister for 14-19 learners and schools between 2005 and 2006.
Smith will lead on Labour’s skills reforms from the House of Lords.
Labour’s winning manifesto committed the party to replacing the apprenticeship levy and setting up Skills England, a new “cross-government taskforce” to co-ordinate a national skills strategy.
Bridget Phillipson was officially appointed education secretary yesterday. Further members of the DfE ministerial team are to be announced in the coming days.
Posting on X, formerly known as Twitter, Smith said:
“I am incredibly proud to be returning to @educationgovuk [Department for Education] working with the enormously impressive @bphillipsonMP [Bridget Phillipson] in a job which is crucial for ensuring opportunities for all and contributing to the government’s central mission to deliver growth.”
This means Starmer has merged the skills and higher education ministerial portfolios. Until now, Seema Malhotra has led on skills and Matt Western has led on higher education.
Western said Smith “brings huge experience of government at a time when the HE and FE sectors are facing their greatest challenges: bringing the roles together makes much sense.”
Starmer and his newly appointed cabinet will be beginning preparations for their first King’s Speech, taking place on July 17.
Legislation announced in the King’s Speech could include a bill to replace the current apprenticeship levy with a skills and growth levy and set about establishing Skills England.
Jacqui Smith CV
1997-2010: Labour MP for Redditch
2005-2006: Minister for schools and 14-19 education, Department for Education and Skills
2006-2007: Government chief whip
2007-2009: Home secretary
2013-2021: Chair, University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust
2018-2024: Presenter, For The Many podcast
2021-2024: Chair, Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust & Barts Health NHS Trust
“If you focus on quality, the rest will sort itself out”, says John Evans, the outgoing chief executive of The Cornwall College Group, shortly after the Department for Education lifted his college out of intervention after eight years.
It’s a guiding principle this principal keeps coming back to when he reflects on a college leadership career that started by heading up motor vehicle provision at Bridgwater College nearly 35 years ago.
His focus on “the product” and “the customer” has led to three ‘outstanding’ Ofsted inspections at three colleges and revived the fortunes of The Cornwall College Group with stabilised finances and a repaired relationship with the county’s residents.
But it hasn’t been easy.
By the time Evans made the move from Yeovil College to Cornwall in 2019, he was the third principal since Amarjit Basi resigned just after the college was placed in intervention over its finances.
Cornwall’s staff had “had enough” and “too many people had not had a great experience” with the college. “There were buses taking students everywhere else”, Evans says, with staff jumping ship to neighbouring colleges.
A financial health intervention in 2016 and a damning report a year later pointed to high debt servicing costs being a “major drain on cash”, exceptional financial support payments from the government needed for working capital and breaches to loan covenants.
Officials from the DfE and the FE Commissioner were all over the college imposing strict conditions in return for £30 million “fresh start” bailout funding.
If you focus on quality, the money will follow
A few months before Evans joined, the college was downgraded to ‘requires improvement’ by Ofsted and an FE Commissioner-led review of post-16 provision in Cornwall had been published, pushing for a merger with Truro & Penwith College (which never materialised).
He says: “People in Cornwall needed something better. I’m passionate about change and getting it right for young people. We had this constant decline of, how do we save money? But at some point you have to break out of that cycle. If you focus on quality, the money will follow. You’ve got to be brave to make that decision when you haven’t got any money.”
There are many ways that Evans is an unusual college leader.
He’s stayed in his home region, even his hometown of Bridgwater, throughout his leadership career which shows how deeply invested he is in the southwest.
For someone brought in to recover a college once on the verge of financial ruin, he is unapologetic about his passion for teaching, rather than spreadsheets.
During our interview, I feel I’m sat opposite an educator running an education institution, and I needed little convincing that this gave him the currency and credibility to bring Cornwall’s battered staff with him when he took the reins in 2019.
Evans is also rare in that he must be one of a handful of college principals who started their technical education career as an apprentice.
And as someone who worked as and trained mechanics… he drives a Tesla.
Technical principals
Some people can pinpoint a moment, an event or a conversation that changes the trajectory of their life in an unexpected way.
For Evans, it was a moped that kept breaking down.
“I was brought up in a family corner shop and I think everyone assumed I would just go into retail,” he recalls.
Working as a trainee manager at Sainsbury’s, he became “fascinated” with how to repair that moped. A garage opposite was recruiting for an apprentice and Evans got the job.
He loved it so much he stayed for seven years, but recalls watching his lecturers during training and thinking “what a fantastic job that must be”.
After a year’s teacher training at Garnett College in London, he got his first motor vehicle teaching job at Farnborough College of Technology where he stayed for four years.
Asked if he would make the same decision to teach in FE today, Evans said it would be a “much more difficult decision”.
We’re paying less and relying a lot on goodwill
It was an “easy choice” in 1984 because “the salaries were more than you would get in industry” and the “conditions of service with the silver book were a lot better”.
The silver book (apparently named after the silvery-grey clip that held together its 94 A5 pages) of nationally agreed salaries and employment conditions for FE lecturers was in place from 1975 until the early 1990s when colleges came out of local authority control. Some argue that abandoning the silver book led to the decline in lecturer pay and conditions that has contributed to the sector’s teacher shortages.
“We are now paying significantly less than anybody out in industry and we rely a lot on goodwill and people wanting to give back. It’s a much more difficult conversation today.”
It makes me wonder whether Evans’ path to principalship, from industry to lecturer then up the college ranks, is even possible anymore.
Road to Cornwall
Bridgwater College beckoned and after a few more years of teaching, Evans was made head of motor vehicle, engineering and construction, simultaneously growing the motor vehicle department and achieving his first ‘outstanding’ from inspectors.
“At the time we had four motor vehicle lecturers. When I left we had 31 lecturers and 1,400 students coming from all over the country. It was just massive. If you get the product right, because we’re a people business, it’s the same as any market forces. People will come.”
Evans spent 14 years at Bridgwater, seeing through incorporation and the turn of the millennium.
His next role, head of technology at South Devon College, taught him “there were different ways of doing things without having to spend money” – setting him up, although not known to him at the time of course, for what was to come later at Cornwall.
South Devon’s 2002 inspection report described its provision as ‘inadequate’ with six of the fourteen inspected curriculum areas rated ‘unsatisfactory’ as well as leadership and management.
Evans as Yeovil College principal
If you get the product right, people will come
Evans joined the college in 2003 and describes this role as “starting a new college from scratch”. A “great grounding” from the leaders he worked with at Bridgwater helped him and the new team at South Devon score top ‘outstanding’ grades at its next full inspection in 2008.
Next came five years at Swindon College as vice principal curriculum and quality, taking the college from ‘satisfactory’ to ‘outstanding’, and becoming an Ofsted inspector himself, before taking the leap to principalship at Yeovil College.
Cutting for quality
Evans’ time at Yeovil between 2014 and 2019 “is very close to my heart” but was a “slight disappointment” in that the college “only” improved to ‘good’ on his watch from the ‘satisfactory’ he inherited.
He says he “always wanted to finish at City of Bristol College or Cornwall College, because both of them had been problem childs for a long time in the south west and I wanted to finish with a big one”.
From his office in Yeovil, Evans could see what was unfolding 130 miles away at Cornwall College.
One of the bailout conditions on Cornwall was that the FE Commissioner, Richard Atkins at the time, had a say in who the next Cornwall principal would be.
But if Evans had plans for the fresh-start cash once he got the job, he’d have been disappointed.
“You get fresh start, you give the college £30 million, of which £20 million is debt admittedly, but there’s £10 million to spend, and you give it to the same senior team to spend it? So by the time I got here, that’s gone with no discernible change.”
Evans got to work before he officially started at Cornwall, touring the college’s campuses in the summer before his October start to meet staff and introduce his ‘challenge 90’ initiative to get attendance, pass rates and retention all at 90 per cent. Achievement rates were 71 per cent the year before he joined.
Then it was time for the hard yards.
There were rows with an MP over dropping A Levels in St Austell, a controversial campus closure in Saltash affecting around 500 students, and a phased 40 per cent drop in staff FTE from 1,600 to 956.
The college itself is spread across 113 miles with seven campuses, two zoos, two equine centres, three farms, Golf academies in Spain and Portugal plus training sites at the Eden Project and the Falmouth Marine School.
Evans says: “It’s a myth you cannot reduce the cost base and improve the organisation, it has worked every time!”.
“I said two things when I arrived to the staff: you teach too much, and we teach too much.”
Evans at college’s Eden Project centre
Average learning hours were around the 880 mark, he says. “What happens in colleges, especially when driven by finance people, is contact time starts shooting up. I have this philosophy where anything above 828 and your quality will go down. Even 828 – 23 hours a week – doing it properly, good or better, is close to impossible.”
Some courses, he says, were teaching hundreds of extra unfunded hours “and no one really knew because MIS was so poor. We were just giving it away”.
But the tough message for staff was this: “Yes, you’re going to teach less. But there’s going to be a lot less of you.”
Staff were “desperate for somebody to follow that they believed in” following years of intervention and bad press over large payouts for former leaders.
The culture shift at Cornwall College was rapid and profound.
“Actually, culture changed really quickly. I think whoever would have come in that had a clear vision they believed in, the staff would have followed. Because they’d had enough. Staff saw I took pride and enjoyment in rolling up my sleeves and pitching in directly with improving teaching & learning, with estates, painting walls, with manning marketing stalls,” Evans explains.
Governors “backed me 100 per cent” he says. Their faith in him was reflected recently in the way he treats his senior team.
His deputy Kate Wills resigned last year having been appointed to the top job at Weston College. But the job offer was mysteriously withdrawn shortly after. Even though Evans had already filled Wills’ post at Cornwall by then, he took her back.
He reflects on his journey with a sense of accomplishment and no regrets.
Cornwall’s inspection grade was improved to ‘good’ in 2022 and its government notice to improve was finally lifted after eight years in May.
Evans is now handing over to former Exeter College deputy CEO, Rob Bosworth, but wants to carry on training teachers through his teaching and learning conferences, albeit at his own pace.
New education secretary Bridget Phillipson has told Department for Education staff she’s in the “greatest job in government”, but warned of the “scale of the challenge ahead of us”.
Speaking to staff at Sanctuary Buildings, Phillipson said it was the “proudest day of my life”. But she said driving the change the party wants while “simple to describe”, is “vast to deliver”.
“The Labour Government that is taking office today will be focused, relentlessly, on improving the life chances of all of our children.
“On driving high and rising standards throughout education, on ensuring that all of our people, in all of our communities, our businesses and our country, have the skills that they need to drive the growth that we can and must see, to build a better future not just for each of us, but for all of us.”
In a nod to the previous government, Phillipson said she is “focused on delivering, on building of the work the last government did, and on which so many of you will be justly proud of the work that you did, and I recognise that, to raise standards for our children, to deliver a better future for young people today”.
But she added: “I want to be clear: I do not underestimate the scale of the challenge ahead of us, the mountain we must climb to build the better Britain our young people deserve.
“That is the work ahead of us, the task to which we must all rise.”
In separate comments sent to press this evening, Phillipson added “opportunity should be for all – not just a lucky few. That’s why education is at the heart of the change this new government will make and will be at the forefront of national life.
“Education is key to improving children’s life chances. Lives are shaped by opportunity but too many people of all ages, in too many parts of this great country, simply don’t have the opportunities to succeed – this government will make sure they do.
“We’ll break down those barriers to opportunity through supporting children to get the best start in life, high and rising school standards for all and skills training to support growth, so that everyone can achieve and thrive.
“Government can’t do this alone. From day one we will reset the relationship between government, families and our education workforce; our dedicated teachers and school staff, early years staff, university and college professionals and social workers.
“Education will be at the heart of our national story, and it’s our workforces who are at the heart of education.”
Phillipson’s DfE speech in full
Thank you so much, and thanks to you all. It is truly wonderful to see you and I’m going to struggle to hold myself together. I think it’s such an emotional occasion for all of us.
I won’t speak for long: we’ve all got a really big and important job of work to do.
Just earlier this afternoon, Keir Starmer, our new Prime Minister, asked me to take on the role of Secretary of State for Education, in the Labour Government which the British people elected on Thursday.
It is the greatest job in government, the proudest day of my life, and I am so honoured to be here with you all today.
I’ve just been speaking with the Permanent Secretary, and I know in the days, weeks and months ahead, I will meet so many of you, and I cannot wait to have those conversations as together we begin to drive the change, that Labour is determined to bring.
And that change is both simple, and vast. Simple to describe, vast to deliver.
You will have heard, again and again, these last few weeks, that Labour wants to deliver a mission-led government.
And the greatest mission of this Labour Government, the greatest mission any government can have, will be to break down the barriers of opportunity, which hold back too many of our children, which scar the life chances of too many of our young people.
That mission will be at the heart of the work of this Department in the years to come.
You will have heard me repeat – again and again – over the recent weeks, some of what that will mean:
giving all of our children the best start in their early years
delivering breakfast clubs and excellent maths teaching in every primary school
expanding speech and language support
more teachers, stronger training for staff and leaders alike,
a comprehensive review of curriculum and assessment,
a reformed Ofsted alongside regional improvement teams in the Department,
professional careers advisors and compulsory work experience,
a new skills landscape and reforms to the existing Levy,
and improving mental health support for all of our children.
And the values that underpin that mission, the values that drive me every day, that drive our new Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, and every Minister in our new government, will also be at the heart of our approach as we tackle the issues that you all know well, but that have had rather less attention in recent weeks during the election campaign.
the support and outcomes for children with SEND and their families,
the need to bring reform to children’s social care and to build opportunities for our most vulnerable children,
the state of university finances, the challenges that we face within further education.
We must be a Department for every child, for every young person, for every learner in our country.
The Labour Government that is taking office today will be focused, relentlessly, on improving the life chances of all of our children.
On driving high and rising standards throughout education, on ensuring that all of our people, in all of our communities, our businesses and our country, have the skills that they need to drive the growth that we can and must see, to build a better future not just for each of us, but for all of us.
Our new focus means new objectives and a new direction, which will come round soon to you all.
And of course, this will also involve a new ministerial team which will be confirmed in the days ahead.
Now I know that elections are a time for focus on the key issues that divide our country, where I and my party have disagreed with the past government in the years now behind us.
But today, and in the years ahead we are focused on delivering, on building of the work the last government did, and on which so many of you will be justly proud of the work that you did.
I recognise that, to raise standards for our children, to deliver a better future for young people today, and I want to be clear: I do not underestimate the scale of the challenge ahead of us, the mountain we must climb to build the better Britain our young people deserve.
That is the work ahead of us, the task to which we must all rise.
And because we want to end governing by picking fights, the way that we do that must and will change.
So, I am determined that we will drive change together. Together across government.
Together with staff across education, together, where we can, with the trade unions who represent the education work force, and above all, and most importantly, together with every one of you.
Now the last thing I want to say just before I wrap up, is that great departments are not made by their Secretaries of State, but by all of the people who work in them.
I know that whether the government of the day is Labour or Conservative, no-one comes to work in this Department unless they are driven by the determination to deliver a better future for all of our children.
So I am so deeply proud that I will be working with all of you.
I know that in the Civil Service you are bright, committed people who put public service first, you chose to work here, on the greatest of our causes, our children, their education, shaping Britain’s future.
And I want this Department – our Department – (that’s going to take a bit of getting used to!) to be a place where every one of you is proud to come to work every day.
Where your contribution is valued, from the Permanent Secretary and the Secretary of State down, where your commitment, your contribution, the difference that you make every day is central to everything that we do.
I cannot wait to start. I can’t wait to meet all of you.
Plans to integrate apprenticeships into the university admissions points system are a “missed opportunity”, university groups have said.
Under the proposals people with level 3 apprenticeships are awarded up to 112 points in the University and College Admissions Service (UCAS) applications system from September.
Points would be calculated based on the duration of an apprenticeship set out by the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE).
But in its response to the consultation, which closed on June 20, the University Vocational Awards Council (UVAC) said the plans were “well-meaning” but had “pitfalls”.
And the University Alliance, which represents 16 professional and technical universities, called the proposals “an unforced error”.
Both bodies prefer the model used in Scotland which applies credit values to apprenticeships.
UVAC’s formal response to the proposed UCAS points system, shared with FE Week, suggests a system that gives one credit for 10 hours of teaching. It argued UCAS should build an apprenticeship’s credit number into the standards development process.
UVAC, which represents around 90 universities, HE institutions and awarding bodies, added: “Sadly the proposal, while well-meaning, is a missed opportunity to align apprenticeships with the rest of higher education provision that the sector will regret.”
The University Alliance agreed, and said following the Scottish model would take longer but provide a “better and more sustainable system”.
Other sector bodies such as Universities UK, the Russell Group and MillionPlus did not submit views to the UCAS consultation.
The Association of Colleges told FE Week it submitted supportive comments in the consultation but said apprentices could be demotivated from achieving merits or distinctions if those ratings were not recognised in the points system.
Both UVAC and the University Alliance also raised concerns that grade bands such as merits or distinctions would not be recognised in the proposed UCAS system.
UCAS said the omission was necessary to “ensure fairness” across all four nations in the UK.
But the University Alliance said: “Applying a credit value (a means of quantifying and recognising learning whenever and wherever it is achieved) to all apprenticeships would provide a much more accurate and fairer basis for assigning UCAS tariff points and go some way towards negating the inherent disadvantages of using pass/fail grades in the UCAS tariff.
“We should be striving to reach the same situation in Scotland – where there is a credit value as well as a credit level attached to apprenticeships – in England, Wales and Northern Ireland too.
“This would require a concerted and joined-up effort across the three nations, but there are existing frameworks to build on and opportunities that could be exploited.”
The Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP), which represents hundreds of apprenticeship training providers, said it supported the proposals.
Lindsay Conroy, head of apprenticeships at UCAS, said: “In response to sector calls to allocate UCAS tariff points to level 3 apprenticeships, we developed a model in line with existing tariff methodology and following input from over 60 organisations across the education and skills sector, including universities, apprenticeship providers, employers, schools and colleges.
“We recently invited public engagement on our proposal and received over 200 responses, which we are now reviewing. We will share this feedback with the sector, along with next steps, in due course.”
Writing in FE Week in May, Conroy said UCAS recognised the proposals were not a “silver bullet” but she hoped they would make pathways between apprenticeships and higher education “more visible”.
— UK Prime Minister (@10DowningStreet) July 5, 2024
Here’s what we know about her
She was born in Gateshead in 1983. At 40, she is one of the youngest people to have held the role, but not the youngest. Ruth Kelly was 36 when she was appointed in 2004. Michelle Donelan was 38 when she was appointed – for just 35 hours – during the political crisis in 2022.
Phillipson has been an MP since 2010. She was elected to represent Houghton and Sunderland South. She is the first MP representing a north east constituency to be education secretary since Edward Short, who served under Harold Wilson in the late 1960s.
She was appointed as shadow education secretary in November 2021, replacing Kate Green. Before that she served as shadow chief secretary to the treasury. She had previously served on the back benches for the first decade of her Parliamentary career.
Phillipson was comprehensively educated. This is fairly unusual for education secretaries throughout the history of the role, although it has become more common in recent years. Justine Greening was the first education secretary to be fully educated in the state comprehensive system when she was appointed in 2016.
She is Oxbridge-educated. Phillipson read modern history at Hertford College, Oxford, graduating in 2005. Attending an Oxbridge university is also not unusual among education secretaries. Damian Hinds, Nicky Morgan and Ed Balls are among the other postholders from the past 20 years to have attended Oxford or Cambridge.
Politics is in her blood. Phillipson has spoken about how she attended Labour meetings as a child with her mother, Claire, a party official. After graduation, she went on to work in local government and then for the charity Wearside Women in Need, which her mother founded.
Phillipson has spoken about how her own experience in education shaped her vision for the sector. She wrote in the Guardian earlier this year that “the brilliant state education I received set me up for life and led the shy, quiet girl with the long plaits in the corner of the classroom to where I am today”.
The new education secretary made childcare, rather than schools policy, an early priority while she was in opposition. But she has also spoken of the need to address serious issues in schools, such as crumbling school buildings and the SEND crisis.
NHS staff who become apprentices with the employer will not suffer a pay cut under a deal struck with trade unions.
The policy, which came into force on July 1, means existing staff no longer risk a “detriment” to their wages if they begin an apprenticeship with any NHS employer.
The move comes four years after formal negotiations on pay and employment terms for apprentices between unions and NHS trusts stalled.
Apprenticeships are key to the NHS’ long-term workforce plan, published last year, which aims to increase the number of clinical staff it trains through the schemes from 7 per cent to 22 per cent by 2031/32.
A breakthrough came after the pay deal between the government and trade unions that ended NHS-wide strikes earlier this year.
UNISON head of health Helga Pile said: “Previously, existing NHS staff wanting to progress their careers through apprenticeships were put off, or forced to drop out, because some employers expected them to take a cut in pay.
“Now this will no longer be the case, more staff will be able to take up these opportunities.
“Unions will now push the government and employers to go further and agree national pay rates for those starting out as apprentices.
“This would boost the numbers choosing to come into the NHS over other currently better-paid apprenticeship options.”
Prior to the deal, local health trusts could decide what pay rates to set for staff who became apprentices.
However, FE Week understands NHS England does not collect data on how many staff took a pay cut after becoming apprentices.
A summary of earlier talks on the issue, published in 2021, revealed they hit an “impasse” because England’s health trust representative body NHS Employers was concerned about costs.
Employers had argued “high demand” for apprenticeships that resulted in good future career prospects meant lower pay should not be a “barrier” to recruitment but trade unions insisted pay “should not drop” for current employees.
The dispute was referred to the NHS staff council which issued guidance to trusts that staff pay would only be protected if they were “required” to become an apprentice. Pay for staff who voluntarily chose an apprenticeship was “a matter for local agreement”.
The Department for Health and Social Care declined to comment when asked whether it knew how many staff were impacted.
A spokesperson for NHS Employers also declined to comment, citing pre-election restrictions.
NHS England confirmed this month’s policy change was made as part of the pay deal earlier this year.
Cash prizes should be considered for winners of WorldSkills awards to bring the UK into line with other countries, industry bosses have said.
An FE Week investigation has uncovered how some countries give money to medallists, including India which has paid up to £7,500, while Chinese and South Korean champions are rewarded with exemption from military service.
Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief executive Ben Rowland called for the government to “play its part” in honouring competitors with tangible rewards.
He said: “This would raise the profile of WorldSkills and celebrate the achievements of our successful entrants.”
WorldSkills is a global biennial event that involves thousands of young people up to age 25 competing in skills competitions from cabinet making and mechatronics to cooking and landscape gardening. The next competition will be held in the French city of Lyon in September.
Haydn Jakes, who was awarded an MBE a year after winning a WorldSkills gold medal for aircraft maintenance in 2019, admitted returning home felt “somewhat anticlimactic” after being named the world’s best in his field.
He told FE Week: “The level that we are competing at is recognised, and yet very few people outside of my family, friends and employer at the time fully realised the scale of my achievement.”
In previous years Team UK has received good luck messages from education ministers and the prime minister. The team has also been invited to Parliament and Downing Street for send-off and welcome-back receptions.
Asian countries reward big
But in India, which ranked fourth at the WorldSkills 2022 special edition, medal winners and their training managers get cash prizes.
The country’s two silver medallists were awarded 800,000 rupees (£7,500) each and their trainers received 300,000 rupees (£2,800).
Meanwhile, the Malaysian government has agreed to award 40,000 ringgit (£6,700) to its competitors who win gold in Lyon, while 20,000 ringgit will be given for a silver medal and 10,000 ringgit for bronze.
Singaporean education ministers presented their 2023 national final winners with cash prizes of up to 3,000 Singaporean dollars (£1,750) while winning teams were awarded up to 4,500 dollars (£2,600).
In Japan, FE Week discovered a medallist was awarded one million yen (nearly £5,000) by their employer. Japanese winners generally don’t receive government money but are given a certificate and medal from the prime minister.
FE Week understands South Korean and Chinese medallists are granted exemption from compulsory military service if they win gold.
South Korean medallists also get to swerve qualification exams and receive an unspecified monetary reward. And competitors receive annual financial benefits from the “grant programme for continued employment” if they stay in the same field.
In Europe cash awards are less common.
French medal winners are in a similar position to their counterparts here and receive a message of thanks from their country’s president.
However, in the French national finals some regions awarded between 100 and 200 euros to winners.
Germany does not hand out standardised prizes to winners but champions are celebrated with a post-competition event and a personal invitation to the Federal Chancellery.
Cash prizes not ‘main motivation’
Haydn Jakes, WorldSkills Kazan 2019
UK winner Jakes said financial incentives could be attractive but wouldn’t be the “main motivation” for competitors.
Rewards would require funding but WorldSkills UK, the group that organises competitors, has suffered an 8 per cent drop in its government grants in the past five years to £7.6 million in 2023.
A source close to the government told FE Week that finding a budget “however small” needed someone high up at the DfE to “make the effort”.
They added Downing Street officials were “genuinely keen on skills” but “even if Number 10 suggested it, it would pretty much die unless someone in DfE was proactive”.
The source said they “couldn’t see why anything would change post-election”, and added “DfE is basically a schools place”.
Team UK is due to take 31 competitors to the 47th WorldSkills event in Lyon from September 10 to 15.
WorldSkills UK chief executive Ben Blackledge said: “We want to use WorldSkills Lyon and Team UK to show everyone in the UK why they should be excited about the opportunities technical education brings and give every apprentice and student who studies for a vocational qualification the prestige they deserve.”
The DfE declined to comment.
FE Week is the official media partner for WorldSkills UK and Team UK.
Stopping a ‘bonfire of the BTECs’ and boosting FE teacher pay must be top priorities for the new government’s first 100 days in office, sector leaders said.
On the eve of the election FE Week asked key bodies representing the sector what should top the ministerial in-tray.
Also high on their list was delivering Labour’s proposed apprenticeship levy reforms, establishment of Skills England, and an English and maths resits rethink.
Here are the five top immediate asks from the sector in detail:
Pause and review level 3 cuts
As it stands, 318 qualifications, including popular BTECs, will lose funding from the Department for Education next July as part of level 3 reforms.
Tory ministers believed this would “simplify” and “streamline” qualification choices, steering learners towards A Levels and T Levels.
Labour pledged to “pause and review” the reforms, although this was not mentioned in its full manifesto.
The Sixth Form College Association said the new government must pause the reforms and push the defunding date to August 2027 while it carries out a “streamlined and refocused” review of level 3 qualifications.
The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) told FE Week defunding BTECs, which are “tried and tested”, would cause more young people to quit education.
Leaders also want Labour to quickly outline whether it plans to implement or bin the Conservatives’ idea of an Advanced British Standard, which is proposed as a baccalaureate to replace A Levels and T Levels.
Funding rates and the teacher pay gap
Unsurprisingly, the sector wants more funding. Cash is wanted to address real-terms cuts in funding since 2010, a shortage of FE teachers, growing numbers of post-16 students, special needs demands and inflation pressures.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates the next government must find £400 million to sustain 16-to-18 education funding at current levels.
It forecasts funding would remain 9 per cent lower in real terms than in 2010 if per-student rates were maintained.
The Association of Colleges (AoC), which delayed its pay recommendation for college teachers until after the election, said the recruitment and retention crisis in FE was driven by a “£9,000 pay gap” between college and school teachers.
It added: “For colleges to deliver on the government’s ambition for skills and the economy, extra funding must be provided to support better pay, to close those gaps and to attract industry experts and trainee teachers into further education.”
The ASCL agreed, warning that colleges were setting “deficit budgets and planning further cuts” due to unsustainable cost demands.
University and College Union general secretary Jo Grady said Labour must treat the teacher pay gap as a day-one priority to “show it cares about further education”.
Apprenticeship levy expansion: When and how?
Questions remain over Labour’s pledge to reform the apprenticeship levy as the “growth and skills levy”.
The rebrand, announced by the party’s skills commission in 2022, would mean flexibility for businesses to spend up to 50 per cent on non-apprenticeship training – but details are absent.
The Federation of Awarding Bodies (FAB) told FE Week any changes Labour made should ensure the interests of all learners and employers are “protected”.
HOLEX said Labour should “rebalance” which age groups are able to access the levy.
The Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP), whose members deliver the majority of apprenticeship training, is most concerned about what the government does with some of the collected funds.
It said Labour should “commit to all levy receipts going to the apprenticeship budget from April 1, 2025”. FE Week previously revealed the levy is set to generate £800 million more than the last government allocated for spending on apprenticeships.
Establish Skills England
Another key Labour pledge is to set up Skills England, a body that will “bring together” businesses, training providers and unions with regional and national government.
It would oversee development of a strategy to create a “highly trained” national workforce that meets the economy’s needs.
AELP said the new government must publish a timetable for its establishment that includes time for “consultation on its purpose and structure”.
FAB said all four UK nations need a “long-term, future-ready” skills plan.
Sector bodies also want Labour to quickly appoint a Skills England leader.
And HOLEX wants the government to give the new minister for skills a “government-wide role” that extends beyond the Department for Education.
English and maths
In February, the Department for Education announced plans to introduce additional conditions attached to English and maths funding, including mandating minimum hours for those forced to resit the qualifications and removing a 5 per cent tolerance.
The AoC called for the reforms to be immediately withdrawn ahead of a full review of the resits policy.
The AELP said the new government should also remove functional skills qualifications as an exit requirement from apprenticeships.
Previous Job: Chief Executive, Lincolnshire and Rutland EBP
Interesting fact: In her 50th year, Elaine had the opportunity to backpack in Thailand. She discovered the importance of Rough Guides, learned poker from students, and found out how to protect a beach hut during storms when snakes wash down the mountain. Essential life skills!
David Higham
Managing Director, SFJ Awards
Start date: July 2024
Previous Job: Head of Growth and Innovation, Nottingham College
Interesting fact: David is passionate about things with two wheels, so if he’s not out mountain biking in the peak district, he can be found working on his vintage motorcycle that was produced in the year he was born (though he’s not keen on being labelled vintage himself!)
