Delayed: Lifelong learning entitlement pushed back to 2026

The Department for Education has quietly delayed the introduction of the lifelong learning entitlement.

Students won’t be able to apply for LLE funding until September 2025, seven months after the planned February launch of the first LLE applications.

Teaching of courses funded through the LEE will now not start until at least January 2026, rather than September 2025.

In a letter sent to providers today, seen by FE Week, new skills minister Luke Hall said the Student Loans Company (SLC) needed more time to develop its systems.

“Having worked closely with the SLC on the delivery of its new LLE application and payments system, the government understands the great challenge of changing finance systems whilst at all costs ensuring a seamless transition for learners and providers,” Hall said. 

It follows a prolonged full roll-out of the flagship scheme, which won’t be fully in place until at least 2027.

On its current timetable, full years of study of level 4 to 6 HE courses and higher technical qualifications will be available through the LLE from January 2026.

But its main selling point is the ability to access loan funding for shorter courses and modules.

Funding for some smaller courses currently funded through advanced learner loans will be available from January 2026, but the government plans for the bulk of modular courses to be available to learners in the 2027/28 academic year. 

The Department for Education’s chief civil servant, permanent secretary Susan Acland-Hood, warned of “significant delivery challenges” to the LLE’s planned 2025 launch back in August. 

Acland-Hood specifically highlighted SLC systems among possible delivery challenges at the time, stating: “The programme depends on good partnership with the Student Loans Company and the OfS [Office for Students] and their delivery of new systems and processes.” 

Alex Proudfoot, chief executive of membership body Independent Higher Education, said: “The LLE represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform the ways in which students learn and access financial support for learning. No-one likes to see delays, but it is essential that we get this right, and that students and providers experience a smooth transition to a new funding system, which commands confidence from day one.

“IHE has called for a system of funding by credit since 2015, so that more students across the country and from every background can access the high-quality short and modular courses that independent providers offer to industry in different specialist disciplines. A decade on, we can wait a few more months for the future to arrive.”

Hall plays it safe

Pushing back the initial LLE roll-out means the SLC can test its new application and funding systems with a smaller volume of students. Fewer people apply for courses starting in January than in September. 

Hall said: “This phased approach allows SCL to test their systems with smaller volumes of applications in January 2026, so that we can more safely introduce the system and ensure its reliability ahead of the full academic year volumes in September 2026, and full modular roll out in September 2027.”

The delay also gives providers more to prepare, the new minister said. 

Hall promised a “provider preparation guide” in the coming weeks. 

The LLE is a new system of student finance, covering tuition and maintenance, for courses at levels 4 to 6 for students up to the age of 60. 

The government has pinned its hopes on reversing the decade-plus-long decline in part-time learning and higher-level technical training on the policy.

Potential lifelong learners will now have to wait until September 2025 before accessing their online account which will show them how much loan funding they are entitled to, and which courses and modules they can spend it on. 

The loan entitlement will be worth the equivalent of four years of undergraduate tuition fees – currently £37,000 – minus the amount of any past student loans. 

Providers in the dark

Providers hoping to deliver LLE-funded courses are still in the dark about who can deliver precisely what, when, and how much they can charge.

For example, training providers currently delivering courses that are advanced learner loan funded, but will become LLE funded, are still waiting for details on how they can register with the Office for Students’ so-called “third category”. This isn’t expected until the summer of this year.

For independent training providers, the delay could mean more time for them to finally gain OfS approval and deliver LLE provision from day one.

Simon Ashworth, director of policy at the Association of Employment and Learning providers, told FE Week: “In a roundabout way, this delay should lead to a slightly more level playing field for all types of providers by reducing the period from the start of LLE to when ITPs will be able to join. AELP will continue to push for those providers who are ready to become [OfS] approved and join the LLE sooner rather than having to wait unnecessarily.”

Hall’s letter promises “further details on maintenance” despite the government announcing maintenance loans for LLE learners over a year ago.

Providers can expect details of an “additional entitlement for priority subjects and courses” in the coming months, Hall said today. 

And a long-awaited technical consultation on funding for modular courses isn’t likely to take place until this summer. 

A DfE spokesperson said: “We remain committed to rolling out the Lifelong Learning Entitlement in academic year 2025/26 and we believe that this phased approach is the best way to deliver for learners, providers and the existing student-finance system.

“The journey towards the LLE’s introduction is ambitious and we want  the Student Loans Company and providers to have the preparation time they need to adapt their systems to be ready for launch.”

East Coast College names new principal

East Coast College has announced a familiar face as its new permanent principal.

Paul Padda (pictured), who has worked at the college for over a decade, has taken up the post after doing the role on an interim basis since January.

He replaces Stuart Rimmer, who suddenly quit as principal on December 31 after 10 years in post.

There have also been recent changes to East Coast College’s board, with several members leaving earlier than planned and four new governors being appointed this month.

David Blake, chair of East Coast College, said: “Paul has many years of experience working in the further education sector and we are extremely pleased to have him leading our college. Paul was appointed following a robust appointment process that included panels of staff, students and stakeholders, followed by a final governor interview in which Paul’s passion for the college and education shone through.

“The board and I are looking forward to working with Paul to develop and improve our amazing college for the good of our staff, students, employers and community.”

Before joining what was then Great Yarmouth College in 2013, Padda worked at South and City College Birmingham as assistant director for business and IT.

At East Coast College, Padda has been a programme manager, director for integrated learning and deputy principal for curriculum, quality and learner experience.

The college said he “consistently helped to improve standards of teaching, learning and outcomes for students” across the college’s Lowestoft, Great Yarmouth and sixth-form campuses. 

His leadership was also “fundamental” in the college receiving a ‘good’ rating from Ofsted.

Padda said: “I am honoured and thrilled to have been appointed as principal and CEO for East Coast College. I’ve had the privilege of working at the college since 2013 having held a number of different posts, and every day I am amazed by the work our college does for our students and our communities, delivering better opportunities as an inclusive organisation. I am excited to continue working and developing our college.”

New FE VP to ‘rebuild trust’ in NUS

FE’s new student leader has pledged to reconnect the National Union of Students (NUS) with further education students whose needs have been “marginalised” and “overlooked” by the union and sector.

Qasim Hussain, currently the full-time students’ union president at Leeds City College, part of Luminate Education Group, was elected by NUS members to be its next vice president for further education (VPFE) on Friday. 

The former history, geography and politics A-levels student pledged to work with sector bodies to campaign to “protect the resources and support services that students rely on” alongside making FE issues more of a priority in the national union. 

Hussain said NUS has become “disconnected” and “inaccessible” to its further education members with financial constraints in the sector blocking students from taking part in NUS’ campaigns and democratic decision-making bodies, like its national conference.

“As a result of this, the FE voice is marginalised and our concerns are overlooked in national educational discussions and decision-making. This is why I would argue confidence and trust has been lost, particularly for our FE membership,” Hussain told FE Week. 

The Leeds SU president, one of only a handful in colleges in a full-time, paid role, saw off competition from one other candidate in the VPFE election, defeating Dudley College Students’ Union president Jack Stokes. 

“Sadly, many FE members feel left out by NUS, but I want to change that,” Hussain’s manifesto said. 

Trust and funding

In 2022, the government instructed ministers and civil service officials to cut ties with NUS amid internal antisemitism allegations which later saw its then-president sacked. But FE Week could find no government agency at the time that had any routine engagement with NUS on FE issues.

“We can’t lock anyone out. It is very important that as a national union, we rebuild trust with our members including addressing islamophobia and antisemitism on our campuses,” Hussain told FE Week.

Despite FE making up the majority of NUS’ membership, an FE Week investigation uncovered how poor financial resources and under-developed structures gave higher education students more of the limelight in the union. Hussain’s own experience at NUS events reflects this. 

“At last year’s national conference, I felt like FE was an afterthought with more or less all policies being heavily focussed on higher education. We are a diverse sector with sixth-form colleges, FE colleges and apprentices. Without a strong national voice, we will continue to be at a disadvantage,” he said.

So as well as campaigning for increased education and student support funding, Hussain wants a new national student voice system for FE with a regional structure to mobilise FE student representatives and provide training. 

Every FE provider should have an independent and funded students’ union with dedicated support staff and paid student leaders to “create more engagement and enhance student representation”.

Cost-of-living pressures and the rising “crisis” in student mental health concerns are also on Hussain’s radar. 

And politicians are “not going far enough to meet the needs of apprentices,” Hussain said, in his pledge to campaign for a “real living wage” for apprentices.

Influential and inspirational

Further education representation will be debated at the NUS national conference, taking place in Blackpool later this week. 

Hussain has co-authored policy proposals alongside students’ unions at Dudley College, The Sheffield College and the National Society of Apprentices which, if passed, mandates NUS to “encourage and support a vibrant national voice for college and vocational learners”.

The college unions also demand NUS fights cuts to BTEC qualifications, returns to paying for conference accommodation for FE delegates and reserve conference space for FE issues.

Bill Jones, executive principal of Leeds City College and deputy CEO of Luminate Education Group, said: “We are proud to see one of our students be elected to this key national position with an organisation that represents hundreds of students’ unions all across the country.

“Qasim was an influential and popular president of our students’ union and I have no doubt that he will carry those traits into his new role.

“His success is an inspiration and shows other students just how far they can go with the right focus and determination.”

Hussain will be working alongside new NUS president Amira Campbell, elected from the University of Birmingham Guild of Students. 

Campbell’s manifesto calls for a “new model” of post-18 education funding, investment in FE students’ unions to “attain similar democratic and representative rights to that of the HE sector”, free bus services for students and “rebuilding and repairing” NUS’ relationships with Muslim and Jewish students. 

Hussain will begin his two-year term in office on July 1, succeeding Bernie Savage. 

Extract from VPFE manifesto
Extract from VPFE manifesto

‘Stronger’ apprenticeship accountability measures revealed

Controversial accountability thresholds that “unfairly penalised” larger training providers have been replaced in an update to the apprenticeship accountability framework. 

But thresholds on how many apprentices can withdraw or be on a break in learning at a training provider before triggering possible intervention action have been reduced. 

The Department for Education published changes to four of the ten intervention thresholds that it monitors to “drive-up quality” of apprenticeships this afternoon. 

Previously, training providers would be identified as ‘needs improvement’ if more than 250 apprentices withdrew, past their planned end dates or were on a break in learning. 

Today’s update replaces each 250 threshold with a percentage of the total number of apprentices at a training provider. For example, under the latest framework, a training provider would be ‘at risk’ if more than 20 per cent of their total number of apprentices withdraw, down from 35 per cent. If 15-20 per cent of a provider’s apprentices withdraw, they will be considered as ‘needs improvement,’ down from 15-35 per cent. 

A provider will now be ‘at risk’ if 10 per cent of their apprentices are on a break in learning for over a year. The previous threshold was 15 per cent.

The DfE said its “stronger approach” will come into effect in performance monitoring of apprenticeship training providers from June 2024. See table below for full list of changes. 

Today’s update said: “Now that the framework is established, we’ll be taking a more robust approach in its application. We’re retaining the same indicators, but we’re introducing higher thresholds for three of the ten indicators and removing the 250-apprentice threshold that applied to three of the measures.”

A threshold for apprentice feedback has been introduced for the first time. From June, training providers will be considered ‘needs improvement’ if their apprentice feedback score on the find an apprenticeship service is less than 2.5 stars out of 4. Apprentice feedback is only published when at least ten apprentices have submitted their scores.

Accountability thresholds on achievement rates, Ofsted inspection outcomes and off-the-job training remain the same. 

The 250 apprentice thresholds hit the headlines last year after being increased from 100 following an outcry from training providers. The Association of Employment and Learning Providers said the threshold would penalise the largest training providers operating in sectors such as care, retail and hospitality where withdrawals are persistently high. 

Training providers falling foul of the quality thresholds could face severe consequences.

Following a “management conversation” with a DfE case manager, officials can suspend funding, order an improvement plan or terminate a provider’s contract if they believe there is “provider failure.”

Last month, the then skills minister, Robert Halfon, warned the training sector the government will use “contractual” measures to crack down in cases of “insufficient improvement.”

Complete the picture: Remove the eight-week time limit on apprenticeship English and maths flexibilities

There are some very welcome proposed changes to the apprenticeship funding rules for 2024/25, including some significant moves to remove barriers that those with learning difficulties can experience in accessing the support that they need.

The ability to conduct learning support assessments at any time during the apprenticeship makes perfect sense and is long overdue.

Similarly, the rollout of the SEND flexibilities pilot allowing those without education and health care plans (EHCPs) to access learning support funding is very welcome. 

But there remains an arbitrary and unjustifiable eight-week time limit to file an English and maths flexibility for apprentices with disabilities, special educational needs or learning difficulties.

The EHCP system, whilst well-intentioned, is cumbersome, and lengthy, and the criteria that local authorities use to formulate them vary so widely that their use as a common framework for access to national funding has not been fit for purpose for some time.

In 2016 I was privileged to have been part of the Maynard taskforce that recommended flexing minimum English and maths requirements to entry level 3 for apprentices with learning difficulties, a recommendation the government accepted in full and implemented. 

But between 2017 and 2023, only around 1400 learners have been able to use this flexibility, which (given there were about 2.1m total starts over this period) is appalling – that’s 0.06 per cent of starts when other data indicates that over 7 per cent of apprentices have cognitive learning needs that should qualify.

The requirement for an EHCP to identify such learning difficulties has been a major reason, so dropping this requirement is a big plus. 

But it’s frustrating that there is one further logical move that could and should have been made to complete this picture that inexplicably has been missed.

Under these draft proposals, to flex minimum English and maths requirements to entry level 3, the assessment has to be completed within the first eight weeks of the apprenticeship. 

This makes no sense when only a few paragraphs prior, the rules accept that to qualify for support funding, a learning difficulty may be assessed at any time within the apprenticeship. 

If such an assessment found, several months into an apprenticeship, that the reason the learner has been struggling with maths and English was because of a previously unrecognised learning difficulty, why is it on one hand too late to be properly addressed, even though the provider can claim extra funding to address it? 

It would be more cost-effective for the training provider to acknowledge and work with the apprentice at an appropriate level than throw taxpayer’s money at trying to get them to pass at a level that they will at best have extreme difficulty in succeeding at. 

This just risks their completion altogether, whatever the level of vocational and technical skill they can otherwise display in their profession.

I don’t want to be overly negative because the moves that are proposed are the right ones to make. 

However, while we have the chance, let’s complete the picture by ensuring that a properly evidenced identification of a learning difficulty at any time in an apprenticeship can also mean the flexibility to change the minimum English and maths requirement – not just an assessment in the first eight weeks.

Surely we all want to make sure that those with learning difficulties in maths and English can still have the chance to demonstrate their technical and vocational skills on a par with everyone else.

New FAB boss suddenly resigns

The new chief executive of the Federation of Awarding Bodies has suddenly resigned with immediate effect, FE Week has learned, after just two months in post.

Kion Ahadi was appointed in November and officially led the awarding membership body from February.

Staff and members of the federation were told this afternoon that Ahadi had stood down for personal reasons.

A statement from the FAB board said: “Due to personal reasons, Kion Ahadi has made the decision to stand down from his position as chief executive at the Federation of Awarding Bodies. Kion has enjoyed his short time at FAB and recognised the fantastic contribution of its members.”

FAB is the membership body for more than 120 awarding organisations.

John McNamara, who has previously led FAB on an interim basis twice, will step back in once more as interim chief executive until a permanent replacement is found.

McNamara is the non-executive chair of Innovate Awarding. FAB’s new chair Charlotte Bosworth is managing director of Innovate Awarding.

The FAB and Innovate boards have agreed extra governance arrangements to mitigate any conflicts of interest. A full board meeting was held this afternoon to approve McNamara’s appointment as interim CEO.

At the time of his appointment, Ahadi said he accepted the CEO gig at FAB due to its “vision to improve the quality of technical, professional, and vocational education to support social mobility, and change lives”.

Ahadi was appointed following the resignation of Tom Bewick in May 2023.

AoC calls for new skills body and awarding powers for colleges

A new national body should be set up to help deliver a more “coherent” post-16 education system, the Association of Colleges (AoC) has said.

The call for a “social partnership body” comes in a new report that builds on the AoC’s call for a single tertiary education system for post-16 students, which would also see colleges accrediting their own apprenticeship assessments and higher-level qualifications.

Although it has not detailed the exact make-up of the national body, the association says the body’s role should be to set national priorities for skills through a “partnership approach”.

This would fill a space left by a lack of ownership over England’s national strategy on skills, the AoC’s chief executive David Hughes told FE Week.

He added: “The starting point is we have no post-16 education and skills strategy. It doesn’t sit anywhere and there’s nobody tasked with owning that – that is a problem.”

In its report “100% opportunity: the case for a tertiary education system” the AoC says the body could support strategies such as the NHS workforce plan, analyse workforce needs, work with mayoral combined authorities and intervene where there is market failure.

The AoC calls the current system “siloed and fragmented”, with disproportionate funding going “a small number” of people in the higher education sector while the number of apprenticeship starts has fallen by a third in the last decade and the number of people not in education, employment or training (NEET) is on the rise.

A new national body could also help to coordinate England’s 38 local skills improvement plans and its increasingly devolved control over regional skills spending.

The AoC’s proposal appears to echo Labour’s pledge to set up Skills England, a “taskforce” which would work with the government and devolved authorities to “develop outcome agreements” to ensure accountability for skills spending.

Like Labour, the association wouldn’t say whether its proposed new body would replace any of the existing organisations funding and regulating tertiary education, like IfATE, the OfS and the ESFA.

Hughes told FE Week: “The new body should make it clear who’s responsible for what and who’s accountable for what, so it’s a more coherent system. 

“It’s ensuring that the key partners have a say in where we want the system to go, and what the long-term challenges are.

“Currently, that just doesn’t happen in a systematic or consistent way – the messages are not being joined up.”

The body should not add “new layers” of complexity, he added.

However, although it describes the body as a “social partnership” that could include education providers, unions and others, it stops short of political choices such as how much power it would have.

It could be advisory or have more formal powers like the Office for Budgetary Responsibility, which analyses and scrutinises the UK’s public finances.

Other countries such as Norway, Australia and Ireland have already set up skills bodies which bring together groups such as education providers and businesses to advise on priority needs.

Ben Rowland, chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP), said his membership body agrees with the need for an “effective, efficient and fair further education system”.

However, he added: “It is also worth pointing out that conspicuous by its absence in the report is any talk of the role of independent training providers (ITPs).

“ITPs deliver the majority of apprenticeships and 89 per cent of Skills Bootcamps. As a result, they are a core part of any FE system and are as much anchor institutions as colleges.”

Colleges should be trusted

AoC wants a future government to “place more trust in colleges” to deliver priority skills needs, to fund every 16 to 18-year-old, including apprentices, through the same budget and “demand-led” funding for more adult learners.

Several proposals are made to build on colleges as “anchor institutions” including giving them powers to award their own higher-level qualifications and apprenticeship end point assessments.

Colleges should be able to set 30 per cent of the content of qualifications to meet local employers’ skills needs, the report states.

The AoC calls for “mission clarity” that schools, colleges and universities are signed up to, ensuring every 16-year-old has a complete education offer.

16 to 18-year-olds should be offered “more hours” of teaching from a broader curriculum and the government’s current English and maths GCSE resit policy should also be “urgently” reconsidered.

Funding should be set out for three years rather than one and should be based on outcomes instead of individual learner numbers.

The pay gap with schoolteachers should also be addressed, while lecturers in key sectors should see their pay lifted to “reflect the market rate”. However, the report does not set out how these proposals would be funded.

‘Inadequate’ provider slammed for ‘poorly planned’ training

A care work training provider that delivered “ad hoc and poorly planned” learning to apprentices has been judged ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted.

Excell for Training, an apprenticeship training provider in Chesterfield, Derbyshire, received the grade following an inspection in early February this year. A spokesperson said the provider lodged a complaint against the report but declined to provide details.

Inspectors from the education watchdog found that most apprentices learn “very little” from a maximum of one hour of online training once or twice a month.

A team led by His Majesty’s Inspector Vicki Locke said these online training sessions were “ad hoc and poorly planned” with apprentices rarely undertaking workplace training due to a lack of liaison with their employers.

The provider was rated ‘requires improvement’ for behaviour and attitudes and personal development, but ‘inadequate’ for the quality of education, leadership and management and apprenticeships.

Off-the-job activities were also “not carefully planned” and focused on apprentices complying with assessment objectives over “meaningful activity”.

A spokesperson for Excell for Training said: “All Excell for Training have to say in relation to the Ofsted report; is that we appealed the grading / report finding’s [sic] and we also put in a formal complaint.

“We would like to make no other comment.”

The spokesperson did not respond when FE Week asked whether the appeal and complaint had concluded, or whether their contract with the Education and Skills Funding Agency has been terminated.

At the time of going to press, the provider is still listed on the apprenticeship provider and assessment register. 

Excell for Training was founded by owner Stephen Boyd in 2010 and has about 125 apprentices in South Yorkshire and the East Midlands, mainly training in residential childcare and adult care.

Boyd also owns Excell Home Care, a Sheffield-based agency that provides care to older people and disabled adults.

But inspectors said “too many” apprentices leave their course early, with many failing to achieve their qualifications on time.

The report added: “However, very few achieve high grades. Of those apprentices who complete their course, just over two-thirds remain in paid employment at the end of their studies.”

Ofsted has ordered Excell for Training to undertake an urgent review of the planning and effectiveness of its apprentices’ off-the-job training.

The watchdog has also ordered “immediate action” to improve current teaching standards after finding apprentices failed to gain a sound understanding of key topics.

A key concern for inspectors was trainers’ focus on “assessment criteria” over teaching content that would help apprentices learn.

In sessions looking at laws around medication, tutors read out “a list of relevant acts” for apprentices to research themselves.

In another session, inspectors said tutors supported their verbal explanations with written resources that “merely contain information copied directly from course assessment requirements”.

They called apprentices’ written work “too basic and generic”.

Leaders did not ensure the quality of teaching was good enough, with teaching observation notes failing to identify “significant weaknesses”.

However, inspectors also found that safeguarding arrangements were “effective” and tutors had “positive relationships” with apprentices.

A recently appointed board of trustees was “appropriate”, but too new to have any impact on the standards of training, they said.

Ofsted found it was making “reasonable progress” during a monitoring visit on the provider in September 2022. Its report was largely positive, praising the “well-planned curriculum” and the range of methods used to ensure apprentices understand what they were taught.

Lecturer wins £44k payout after five-year safety row with college group

Capital City College Group has been ordered to pay over £44,000 to an art and design lecturer after it failed to act on classroom safety complaints, including regular flooding, causing him to resign.

An employment tribunal judge found the college group had constructively dismissed Kevin Hope, a former art and design lecturer at City and Islington College in London, when it failed to address flooding concerns raised by Hope over the years and failed to deal with a grievance with a lab technician.

The judge acknowledged that the college made “strenuous and repeated efforts” to stop the leaks but had failed for “many years” to consider applying for capital funding for renovations.

He also said that only a “major” renovation of the “old and dilapidated” Centre for Business, Arts and Technology building could permanently stop the flooding.

“[The college] strove to work within its limited budget as a public sector organisation and it was only after many years of failed attempts that it could justify a capital bid for over £2 million (the funds necessary to renovate),” the judge said.

The college group has been awarded £2.4 million of capital funding to completely renovate the CBAT building including the provision of a new roof. The project is currently at tender stage awaiting quotes from contractors.

The former lecturer won his complaint of constructive dismissal – whereby he resigned because of his employer’s inaction around the flooding and his working relationship with the lab technician.

For a constructive dismissal case to succeed, there must be a “breach by the employer of an essential term, such as the implied term of trust and confidence, and the employee must resign in response to that breach,” according to the tribunal.

The college was ordered to pay £44,068.33 to Hope as a compensatory award including loss of earnings and a 15 per cent ACAS uplift.

‘Last straw’

The flooding in the CBAT building at the college’s Camden Road campus began in 2017.

The court heard the flooding was caused by problems with the roof, windows and gutters as well as a Japanese Knotweed from the next-door building, which had damaged the foundations causing water to come up through the floor.

From then on, Hope reported the leaks as well as various problems in one of his workshops to a lab technician, such as the lack of resources and personal protective equipment (PPE).

But in September 2020, Hope addressed the failure to procure the protective equipment face-to-face with the technician, and three days later, the technician lodged a formal grievance against Hope.

Hope then lodged his own complaint against the technician and continued to email HR for the next 10 months about the lack of progress with the complaints.

The court heard that a further episode of flooding in August 2021 was Hope’s last straw, causing him to resign just a few days later.

The judge ruled that the both the flooding and the relationship with the lab tech were each an effective cause of his resignation.

“It follows that the grievance failure, being so concerned with these, was an effective cause of his resignation,” the judge ruled.

“In this context, it is plausible that a further episode of flooding on 8/9 August 2021 could have confirmed to the claimant that nothing was ever going to improve, thus acting as the last straw,” they added.

A Capital City College Group spokesperson said: “It is unfortunate that while Mr Hope’s claim for unfair dismissal was dismissed, the judge did award some costs linked to constructive dismissal. The amount to be paid is yet to be confirmed.

“We regret that attempts to prevent this building flooding, caused by Japanese knotweed, were not successful until the college was able to secure a significant capital grant from the government to make the substantial investment required. We are pleased to say these capital works are now underway and will futureproof the building for all staff and students.”

Kevin Hope was contacted for comment.