Staff and students from across the FE sector gathered outside the Houses of Parliament in their hundreds today to protest against cuts to the provision of English for Speakers of Other Languages (Esol).

Demonstrators, said to number around 600 in total, joined the rally to protest against the government’s decision in July to cut funding for a £45m programme of English courses for foreign language speakers, run with Jobcentre Plus.

The crowds were brought together by campaign group Action for Esol and the University and College Union (UCU) London branch, which organized the event. As well as protesting with banners and chants outside Parliament, students and staff from a range of colleges attended talks and debated inside Westminster.

Speakers included Liz Lawrence, UCU president; Jenny Roden, from the National Association for Teaching English and Community Languages to Adults (NATECLA); Shakira Martin, NUS vice president for FE; and Sue Pember, director of policy and external relations at the Holex network of community learning and skills providers.

A handful of brave Esol students also faced the audience themselves to express what the language learning had meant to them, but no government representatives were present to respond to the concerns.

According to reports from the UCU, Bradford College has already announced it will cut one-third of its Esol classes with the loss of nine jobs, while Brent Adult and Community Education Service is to get rid of two-fifths of its Esol courses, leading to the loss of five jobs.

Two thirds of courses will go at Ealing, Hammersmith and West London College, where 25 jobs will be lost, and Hackney Community and Tower Hamlets colleges have said their Esol courses are not guaranteed to run after Christmas.

See edition 151 of FE Week, dated Monday, Octbober 19, for further coverage and click here for our rolling coverage today from Twitter

Main pic: Alix Robertson

The proportion of 25+ apprenticeships has gone back up to levels last seen before the failed 24+ apprentice loans system, provisional figures out today have revealed.

The figures, published in the Statistical First Release (SFR), suggest a full-year growth in apprenticeship numbers across all age groups — but the biggest growth was among those aged 25 or above.

In 2014/15, the number of apprenticeship starts was provisionally put at 492,700 [click here and view table 20.1]. Of these, 210,100 were aged 25 or above — a rise of 33.2 per cent, or 52,400, from the same figures last year [click here and view table 18.1].

And further comparing provisional figures, the 25+ age group made up 42.6 per cent of all apprenticeship starts last year, versus 36.5 per cent (157,700) in 2013/14, and 44.9 (222,200) the previous year.

Final figures for 2013/14 showed that 36.7 per cent (161,600) of all apprenticeship starts were in the 25+ group, which was was lower than in previous years — 45.1 per cent (230,300) in 2012/13 and 44 per cent (229,300) in 2011/12. Final figures for 20145/15 are due out next month.

The troubled, and ultimately scrapped, 24+ advanced learning loans for apprenticeships are widely acknowledged to have been responsible for the 2013/14 fall.

In quarter four 2014/15, the 25+ age group was provisionally behind 50.9 per cent (55,900) of all starts, up from 49.1 per cent (58,000) in 2013/14.

Meanwhile, quarter four starts across the ages were down 1.5 per cent on the same period last year to 109,900 (from 118,100).

However, the overall number of apprenticeship starts in 2014/15 rose provisionally by 13.9 per cent, from 432,400 in the same figures last year to 492,700 this year, which halts the decline of the previous two years.

Skills Minister Nick Boles said the government was committed to “making sure apprenticeships deliver for individuals, businesses and the economy”.

The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has yet to comment on the rise in 25+ apprenticeships.

Apprenticeships will this week come under the spotlight in a House of Lords debate focussing on the quality and accessibility of the programme.

Lady Prosser (pictured above), former deputy general secretary of the Transport and General Workers’ Union and ex-president of the Trades Union Congress, is to open a debate on Thursday (October 15) looking at the importance of apprenticeships to the UK labour market.

The Labour life peer said she was worried about the number of apprenticeships falling and that “diminishing funding for the FE sector is also a real concern, and the mismatch of skills to future jobs needs to be addressed”.

Other speakers were expected to include Liberal Democrat business, innovation and skills spokesperson in the upper house, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, former Ofsted chair Lady Morgan (pictured below right) and Lady Sharp (pictured below left).

The debate follows concern that, in its drive to create 3m apprenticeship starts by 2020, the government was in danger of sacrificing quality for quantity.

As reported recently by FE Week, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) consultation on the proposed apprenticeship levy, which closed October 2, raised the possibility of allowing employers to use providers that are not subject to an approval system or even Ofsted inspections.

And although Skills Minister Nick Boles has outlined his view that employers’ apprenticeship levy money could only be spent on Skills Funding Agency-registered providers, and that Ofsted would have a continued role in inspecting these providers, his shadow, Gordon Marsden, also expressed concern about the fall in apprenticeship success rates, from 74.3 per cent in 2011/12 to 68.4 per cent in 2013/14.

But the Enterprise Bill, which had its second reading in the House of Lords on Monday, includes a number of measures that are intended to boost apprenticeships.

Measures include a target for apprenticeships in public sector bodies, and a measure to protect the term ‘apprenticeship’ from misuse, making it an offence for a provider to offer an apprenticeship that doesn’t meet certain strict rules – such as a 12-month minimum duration.

However, as reported by FE Week, employers who run their own in-house apprenticeship schemes would be exempt from this legislation and could run ‘apprenticeships’ in less than a year, ignoring rules that apply to the statutory scheme.

Details of the apprenticeship levy, which was first announced as part of the summer budget, are expected to be set out in the government’s Spending Review, due November 25.

“I strongly believe that apprenticeships, in providing specialised and career-relevant training, offer a unique and immensely valuable way to get people’s careers off the ground,” said Lady Prosser.

“But it’s vital that the apprenticeship ‘brand’ is taken seriously and is a fully supported strand of a wider employment strategy, and we are not there yet in this country.”

The debate, which Lady Prosser described as a “great opportunity to explore the issue of apprenticeships, their availability and quality, and how we can ensure they continue to play a pivotal role in the labour market of the UK”, is due to start at 11.30am.

Further contributors to the debate were expected to include Lord Bhattacharyya, professor of manufacturing, director and chair at Warwick Manufacturing Group, Warwick University; Lady Garden of Frognal, former manager at City & Guilds of London Institute; Lord Mawson, social entrepreneur, and director of Andrew Mawson Partnerships; Lady Wall of New Barnet, chair of Milton Keynes University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.

Lord Aberdare is also due to take part, along with Lord Addington, the Bishop of Derby, Lord Haskel, Lord Haughey, Lady Humphreys, Lord Lisvane, Lord Macdonald of Tradeston, Lord Snape, Lady Warwick of Undercliffe, Lord Watson of Invergowrie, and Lord Young of Norwood Green.

The Earl of Courtown is expected to respond on behalf of the government.

A House of Lords library note has been produced for the debate (click here to download), which will be broadcast live on www.parliamentlive.tv and covered by FE Week on Twitter.

Concerns the FE sector is heading for “financial meltdown” are set to be investigated by the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).

The committee will next week “challenge government” as it picks up on the findings of the National Audit Office (NAO), which in July reported that the financial health of the FE college sector had been in decline with 110 colleges recording an operating deficit in 2013/14, up from 52 in 2010/11.

The NAO report, entitled Overseeing financial sustainability in the FE sector, further said that in the same period, the number of colleges assessed by the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) to have ‘inadequate’ financial health rose from 12 (5 per cent of colleges) to 29 (12 per cent).

The SFA, it said in the NAO report, had been too slow to spot problems with colleges’ finances because of failures to check the “realism” of their “over-optimistic” forecasts, and that the SFA’s formal interventions, once it finds a college’s financial health is ‘inadequate’, “has often lacked sufficient impact”.

The findings drew a stark warning from PAC committee chair Meg Hillier, who said at the time: “I do not believe it is any exaggeration to say the future sustainability of the FE sector is at risk of financial meltdown.”

And her committee will be looking further into the issues raised by the NAO report with its own inquiry, taking evidence from a number of high-ranking sector figures (see gallery below) including Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) permanent secretary Martin Donnelly, Department for Education permanent secretary Chris Wormald and SFA and Education Funding Agency chief executive Peter Lauener.

A PAC spokesperson said: “This inquiry will challenge government on whether it is taking responsibility for protecting the taxpayers’ money invested in the sector; examine whether the balance between ‘prevention’ and ‘intervention’ is correct when responding to financial sustainability issues; and obtain assurances that government has robust plans in place for creating a sustainable college infrastructure for the future.”

They added: “The SFA anticipates that the number of colleges it assesses as having inadequate financial health will continue to grow. On current trends, it could be around 70 colleges by the end of 2015/16.

“The financial support that the SFA offers to struggling colleges has increased significantly since 2010, but most has not yet been repaid. The outstanding balance, including new advances, stood at £45m by February 2015, relating to 13 colleges.”

The PAC’s first evidence session takes place on Monday, October 19, at 4pm. In addition to those already listed, committee members will hear evidence from Sarah Wright, principal of Central Sussex College, Stuart Laverick, principal of Heart of Worcestershire College, and Ian Ashman, principal of Hackney Community College.

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Main image, top: PA