Government ‘is wrong to cull qualifications simply because of their size’

The government cull of publicly-funded adult qualifications comes under the critical gaze of Martin Tolhurst
Readers will doubtless agree on two valuable features of FE: its roots being in local communities and its ability to tailor provision to local needs and demands.

Protecting this role and value has never been more important than it is in times of public spending austerity.

In areas like Newham, East London, meeting the needs of employers and individuals, and doing so in a customer-focused way, is vital. Experience has shown that what works in the most demanding and challenging situations, works as the template everywhere, as long as it retains that key element of flexibility.

Also, there is often little point in national prescriptions because these decisions are made too far from the experience and needs of real communities and employers (the majority of whom are small and medium-sized enterprises whose voices are under-valued in national policy making).

Instead, we must constantly develop the training which local businesses need, and which local people demand.

Short and flexible qualifications for adults play an absolutely central part in supporting a more dynamic and demand-led response to the labour market.

They offer numerous advantages. Firstly, they can be tailored to meet precise needs in the local or regional economy in a way which longer, linear qualifications cannot.

We’ll end up with fewer skilled and qualified people, and more people left behind

A credit-based system of qualifications, in particular, enables providers to work closely with employers and individuals to design a bespoke package of education directly relevant to their needs and interests.

Secondly, short or flexible adult qualifications are vital for widening participation (and this applies equally to both people and employers, who are hard to reach).

Although many of our learners could, and do, achieve success on full programmes from entry level to postgraduate, many cannot do so without the facility to build their achievement and success through smaller bites, and often also through a discontinuous, rather than a linear, pattern of learning.

Flexibility, rather than outdated and outmoded large/linear qualifications, is the way forward, as is changing how people learn and the contexts in which they do it.

Our experience at Newham, doubtless replicated across the country, has demonstrated over more than two decades that flexibility and customisation fuel and support learner progression, and engage employers and sectors of employment in qualifications and skills and development.

More urgently, we have a range of important vocational and professional development programmes at levels two to four, which are ‘culled’ next year by the 15-credit cut-off.

Mostly, they’re designed to encourage adults back into skills training and to achieve fuller qualifications and progression to level three.

Their removal will mean that we will take fewer risks with uncertain and as yet uncommitted learners, which means we’ll end up with fewer skilled and qualified people, and more people left behind.

Learners and employers may have had negative previous experiences of education, may find the school year irrelevant to their circumstances, or may be bemused by the demand that learning has to be linear in a world that now favours ‘on-demand’ and ‘just enough and just in time’ as key features of high quality services.

The government is wrong to cull qualifications simply because of their size. Indeed, it is pushing our skills system in the wrong direction.

In proposing such a cull, ministers and their advisers fundamentally misunderstand our sector and its wider role in society.

Skills Funding Agency interim chief executive Barbara Spicer may claim, writing to this paper, that the proposals will ensure “rigour within the offering”.

In fact, the problem is that ‘rigour’ has been misidentified and interpreted on the basis of old models (long, inflexible and linear qualifications), which, despite the rhetoric of ‘gold standards’ are rapidly losing their relevance to the modern world.

Martin Tolhurst CBE, interim principal Newham College (formerly principal of the college from 1991 to 2010)

 

Traineeship figures ‘deeply disappointing’

Figures showing that an average of just 127 people started on the government’s new youth unemployment traineeship scheme every week have been described as “deeply disappointing”.

Shadow Junior Education Minister Rushanara Ali hit out after official figures showed that the programme saw 3,300 starts in the six months following its launch in August last year.

It is the first time traineeship numbers have been published and comes after statistics showed 912,000 young people aged 16 to 24 were unemployed in November last year to January — down 29,000 on the previous quarter.

The government said the traineeship figures may not be reliable, and insisted the programme was “off to a good start”.

However, Ms Ali told FE Week: “It is deeply disappointing that despite there being 912,000 young people unemployed, there have only been 3,300 traineeship starts in the last six months. These latest figures show David Cameron and Michael Gove are neglecting young people and failing to provide access to high quality vocational education.”

The numbers were published as part of the latest Statistical First Release (SFR), which came out on Thursday, March 27.

Julian Gravatt, AoC assistant chief executive,
Julian Gravatt, AoC assistant chief executive,

A Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) spokesperson said: “Provisional data show traineeships are off to a good start with young people reaping the benefits.”

Traineeships, which combine work experience with maths, English and employability training, were designed help to 16 to 24-year-olds without experience or qualifications into work.

The government has previously said it had not set any targets for the number of traineeships, but in November — before any figures had been released — Ofsted’s FE and skills director, Matthew Coffey, nevertheless described uptake to the programme as “disappointing”.

The Department for Work and Pensions later relaxed a 16-hour rule that limited the amount of time Jobseeker’s Allowance claimants could train every week and keep their benefits.

Julian Gravatt, assistant chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said: “There’s been a slow start with traineeships, but the removal of the 16-hour rule will help make a difference.”

An Association for Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) spokesperson agreed amending benefit rules was important. He said: “We need to increase the opportunities available and improve on these numbers.”

The SFR also showed the provisional number of 25-plus apprenticeship starts for the first half of the academic year plummeted from 93,300 last year to 49,100. The BIS spokesperson linked the drop to the abandoned apprentice FE loans system. She said: “It was clear from application and starts data that 24+ advanced learning loans were not the preferred route for employers or prospective apprentices.”

The number of 19 to 24 starts also dropped, from 82,000 to 76,000. However, the number of under 19 starts rose to 71,100 from 69,600, but still down on 2011/12’s 79,100.

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Editorial 

Break traineeship barriers

Most will have had a feeling that the numbers would have been low and so it proved.
Just 3,300 traineeship starts is far from a successful opening six months.
Despite great fanfare to get the programme up and running, problems were never fully ironed out.
Right up until March 1 — eight months after the programme had started — 19-plus trainees faced losing their Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) if they did more than 16 hours of training a week.
Meanwhile, a 12-hour rule limiting the amount of training that 18-year-olds can do every week and still claim remains in place.
And there’s also the issue of an eight-week rule, which limits the amount of time JSA claimants can spend on any work placement — although it can be extended to 12 weeks if a job offer is likely.
But with Neet figures remaining stubbornly high, and with the marker of 3,300 starts in six months laid down, the government needs to act to break down traineeships’ barriers to success.

Mary Bousted, general secretary, Association of Teachers and Lecturers

Dr Mary Bousted’s route to the top job at the Association of Teachers and Lecturers was (ATL) entirely unconventional.

This is no stereotypically duffle-coated, megaphone-wielding trade union leader.

The former teacher and university lecturer always considered herself a trade unionist, but never imagined she would lead the ATL.

Teaching initially in Harrow, West London, she joined the National Union of Teachers because “if you are a teacher, you are automatically a member of a trade union”.

“I was the school rep,” she says. “I used to go to branch meetings, I took part in the national industrial action in the 1980s and I was involved in the union but I wasn’t a major activist. My primary concern was, as an English teacher who got promotion quite early and became head of English, I worked extremely hard. I did go to union meetings but the hours were spent in curriculum preparation, marking, measuring progress, the busy work of being a teacher.

“I did not look to the unions for a career. I looked to make my contribution, but I was pursuing a career in teaching. I saw the work of my parents, and I also thought I had been taught, many times, not well. I was possessed with a very strong desire to do it better.”

Born in Bolton in 1959 to Edward and Winefride Bleasdale, Bousted became a self-confessed expert in “warfare and diplomacy” as the second youngest of eight children.

Her father, a Liberal supporter who would choose articles from the Guardian to inspire constructive debate at the dinner table, was the headteacher at St Osmunds Roman Catholic Primary School, where Bousted spent her early years. Her mother, a Labour supporter, was also a teacher.

“My father has always been the biggest professional influence on my life,” she says.

“He was headmaster of a school in the middle of a big council estate in Bolton, which is a highly deprived area. The 11-plus was operating in Bolton and he got the highest rate of passes of any school because he was absolutely determined that those children should get the educational and life chances that he thought they deserved.”

After leaving primary school, she followed what she calls a “very traditional” route — first to grammar school, then to the University of Hull for an English degree and to the University of Durham for a PGCE.

mary-photo-inset-e982
Dr Mary Bousted as a child with father Edward Bleasdale

Her first teaching job, at a girls’ school in Harrow, provided her with a wake-up call in terms of diversity, after a Roman Catholic education and higher education in very “monocultural” places.

“I had gone to a Roman Catholic school, so we saw the Asian population on the bus, but we didn’t go to the same schools,” she says.

“Then I went to Hull and then Durham, very monocultural higher education institutions. I started teaching in Harrow and immediately I was teaching in a school where a majority of girls were Asian, and that was a big cultural learning for me.

There was a big Afro-Caribbean population within the school and that is where I began to learn the importance of respecting and understanding difference

“There was also a big Afro-Caribbean population within the school and that is where I began to learn the importance of respecting and understanding difference, and not being threatened by difference. It is also where I learned the importance in education of children and young people seeing themselves in the curriculum. It was during the 1980s and the beginning of coursework in GCSE.

“There was a huge amount of work around teaching educational literature, teaching and dialect and around tackling issues of social justice through good prose and through poetry. It was a tremendously exciting and innovative time to be teaching, and I was tremendously involved in that and enthused by it.”

After 10 years in North London, Bousted joined the University of York and set up their teacher training programme in English. She then moved to Edge Hill University in Lancashire, running their secondary teacher training programme, before moving to Kingston University as head of education. She also gained an honorary doctorate from Edge Hill along the way.

She got the top job at the ATL in 2003 after seeing an advert in the Guardian, and said she was surprised when she was offered it.

“I became general secretary having never been a member of the ATL, and having not gone through the usual union route of being elected through the executive,” she says.

“I encountered a lot of people who were unpleasantly shocked, and there was a clear belief in the first two or three years that I had come a major cropper because you couldn’t possibly run a union if you hadn’t been involved in the executive and hadn’t been a long-time staff employee.

“What I could do was see the union losing membership, losing profile, and seeing how it needed to be addressed and turned around. I am very proud of leading a modern union in the 21st century.”

Bousted is, like her counterparts in other teaching unions, scathing of the Coalition and its “encroachment” on areas of policy she says should be firmly in the hands of the profession.

She also makes no secret of her distain for the vocational education credentials of the current governement. She says: “This government has not been interested in vocational education. Vocational education and training has come after, in their terms, sorting out the school curriculum, it is always an add-on. [Skills Minister] Matthew Hancock makes a lot of going to an FE college, which he did on a very temporary basis, and he is always on shaky ground when he talks about skills. They just don’t get it. I think [Business Secretary] Vince Cable probably does, because he’s a clever bloke.”

She sees FE as having an “absolutely essential role”, especially for those from working-class backgrounds who don’t want “the debt or far-from-home aspects of higher education”.

She adds: “If as a society we are serious about raising skill levels, then the current neglect of FE will have to stop. I think many in the FE feel and could argue legitimately that promises [ring-fencing of school budgets] have been made at the expense of decent funding for FE and for the agenda the government says it wants to promote, particularly when you get all the noise about apprenticeships, traineeships and youth unemployment.

“FE plays an absolutely key role in that, but it is clear that key role is not being backed by proper funding.”

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It’s a personal thing

What is your favourite book?

A Room With a View — EM Forster. I think it is delightfully written and it re-acquaints me with the importance of difference. Mrs Honeychurch is one of the great comic creations in literature. She is delightful

 

What did you want to be when you were growing up?

I did flirt with being a nun. I did like going around with a towel on my head and I thought I would look very good with wimple. Once I hit adolescence that lost its allure

 

What is your pet hate?

Being in a crowded train carriage, when someone takes a phonecall and seems to think that the rest of the carriage is as interested in why they can’t access their bank account as they are. I know people have to take phone calls on trains, but just keep the volume down

 

If you could invite anyone to a dinner party, living or dead, who would it be?

William Shakespeare, Jane Austen, Gregory Peck and Hilary Clinton

 

What do you do to switch off from work?

I am a keen cook. I like home cooking. I am a keen viewer of Nordic noir drama — like The Bridge and The Killing — and I also cycle

 

Indies could face FoI ‘requirements’

Independent learning providers could become subject to Freedom of Information (FoI) Act “requirements” under government proposals.

Firms that “carry out public functions” figure in the plans of Justice Minister Simon Hughes (pictured), meaning that Skills Funding Agency contractors, along with Education Funding Agency contractors, could be affected.

He told MPs in the House of Commons: “We intend to publish a revised code of practice to make sure that private companies that carry out public functions have freedom of information requirements in their contracts and go further than that.”

He said the government wanted to extend the FoI Act “as soon as is practical,” but a spokesperson for the Association of Employment and Learning Providers said he did not expect “significant” change.
It was unclear whether the proposals applied to subcontractors.

Mr Hughes revealed the proposals in response to a question from Lindsay Roy MP, who asked: “What benefits have accrued to the government and citizens from the implementation of the act, and when does the minister plan to extend its scope further?”

It came on Tuesday, March 18 — just days after the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) denounced the “veil of secrecy” around contracts awarded to large companies like G4S, which is currently an Ofsted grade four apprenticeship employer provider, and called for FoI legislation to cover government contracts.

The AELP spokesperson said: “We understand that providers won’t be made directly subject to FoI and as they already cooperate with the SFA, which is subject to requests, it doesn’t appear that we are looking at a significant change.”

The Freedom of Information Act currently requires any government or publically funded organisation to give out any information on request but does not currently include private firms.

The PAC report Contracting out public services to the private sector was published on March 14 and among its recommendations was for the Cabinet Office to “explore how the FoI regime could be extended to cover contracts with private providers, including the scope for an FoI provision to be included in standard contract terms”.

Agency wants online delivery data

Providers will have to say how much of their courses are delivered online in their individualised learner record (ILR) data returns, the Skills Funding Agency has announced.

The rule will be in force next academic year. The news comes just weeks after the Further Education Learning Technology Action Group (Feltag), recommended that 10 per cent of all publicly-funded courses should be delivered online by 2015/16, with incentives to rise to 50 per cent by 2017/18.

An agency spokesperson told FE Week: “The Skills Funding Statement 2013-16 set out that the government wants to see ‘many more radical approaches to the use of available educational technologies’.

“The agency was tasked with working with the sector to ‘look at how we can put in place appropriate funding mechanisms to better facilitate online learning’.
“The new data will enable the agency to work collaboratively with the sector to understand how this activity can be measured.”

However, he did not say whether the move had been prompted by the Feltag report.

He added: “Recommendations from Feltag will be considered as the agency and the sector progress with this work.”

Association of Colleges technology manager Matt Dean said: “Given the Feltag recommendation, it’s a good idea to work out how to collect data via the ILR, but it’s important to check the accuracy and validity before taking significant decisions on the basis of the information.

“Colleges will also be keen to know more about how to go about developing 10 per cent of a course or programme for online delivery, the inherent cost implications… and what’s meant by ‘incentives’ to push for the 50 per cent online delivery figure by 2017/18.”

Stewart Segal, chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, said: “We supported many of Feltag’s recommendations but we are concerned about making online delivery a mandatory element of course content because it may not be appropriate for all learners in all programmes.

“Providers require flexibility to deliver the most appropriate programmes for their learners and employers, and we should not be making elements of those programmes mandatory.
“This can only lead to yet more measurement of inputs rather than the focus on outcomes of the learning.

“We should encourage more online learning where it works but not setting targets and measuring programmes on a learner by learner basis.”

Steve Hewitt, management information system officer at London’s Morley College, said the move was “practical in the short term, but it depends on how they define ‘delivered online’ — especially if there’s some spurious 10 per cent threshold that everyone has to meet”.

He said: “The idea of a minimum threshold of online delivery seems a pretty 20th Century way of looking at things.

“If a tutor shows the whole class something they’ve found on YouTube, is it online delivery if the tutor emails them, but not if everyone’s sat in a classroom watching it all together?

“Students will be doing almost all of their research for any given course online anyway, even things like dance and plumbing, so why would we want to reduce the practical, hands-on experience that only high quality vocational education can deliver, by setting an arbitrary threshold?”

Kirstie Donnelly, UK managing director of City & Guilds, which took part in Feltag research, had mixed feelings about the new ILR requirement.

She said: “I fully support any move to ensure that the sector recognises the valuable role online delivery can play…to me, it’s a no-brainer.”

She added: “However I still have some concerns… For this to work, providers must be given the help and support they need to become more digital.”

College to close former Pearson in Practice centres

West Nottinghamshire College has announced plans to shut almost half of the training centres it bought under last year’s Pearson in Practice deal.

The college, which struck the deal with Pearson last spring for an undisclosed amount and now runs it under the name Vision Workforce Skills, wants to close centres in Romford, Newcastle, Bristol and Southampton.

It claims they are all losing money, along with an admin centre in Banbury, North Oxfordshire, which it also plans to shut.

The closures could mean redundancy for 21 full-time and one part-time member of staff, but college vice principal and Vision Workforce Skills managing director Graham Howe has vowed to keep the centres open until all current apprentices had completed their classroom-based training.

Mr Howe said the decision was being taken to “future-proof” the rest of the former Pearson firm, which he said was capable of turning a profit. He said: “We have found it difficult to achieve the right numbers in some of the centres. First and foremost we need to create enough opportunities with employers, and we have not created enough in each of these regions.

“Clearly in terms of our original business plan we were very ambitious. I wouldn’t say we were over-ambitious because we are aiming to keep six of the centres open, but we have to look at the fact that, for four of the centres, we have not got enough business.”

Mr Howe said the current deficit in the running of the company stood at £1.5m, which he said could be turned into a surplus of £2m on an annual turnover of £11m without the pressure from the four centres.

Pearson in Practice was previously called Zenos. The renaming, in 2012, followed criticism of the apprenticeship scheme delivered by Zenos in the Panorama programme The Great Apprentice Scandal, broadcast on BBC One.

The ICT apprenticeships delivered by Zenos, which had been acquired by Pearson in 2010 when it paid £99.3m for vocational training company Melorio, were said to be entirely classroom-based and could not guarantee learners a job at the end.

And Mr Howe said a subsequent change in government preference towards employer-led apprenticeships was a concept the original company had struggled with, and that Vision Workforce Skills had changed the format of the apprenticeships to be more employment-focused, but said this had not translated into success at all 10 of its centres.

He said: “We acquired what was a very large training provider. It had two parts. One part delivered training to employers in the workplace and that side has been very successful and will probably become bigger than it used to be under Pearson in Practice.

“The other side was the IT apprenticeships, which were programme-led and learners were not necessarily employed at the end of the apprenticeship.”

He said the 72 apprentices enrolled at the centres, along with any others recruited this month, would be able to fully complete their 12 weeks of classroom-based learning before any closures took place and would continue to be supported in the workplace.

But consultation on the future of 21 full-time jobs was ongoing.

He said: “I think it is fair to say of the situation they are in that if a reasonable alternative is not found, then it is going to mean compulsory redundancies. While redundancies are always regrettable, any action we are taking is to future-proof the business, and we are committed to ensuring all existing learners complete their training.”

Lingfield reveals FE institute plans

Chartered status for FE providers is just months away, the chair of the new Institution for Further Education has exclusively told FE Week.

The not-for-profit limited company has been given responsibility by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) for developing and launching the quality mark.

Its chair, Lord Lingfield, confirmed to FE Week that it was awaiting royal permission before it could start granting chartered status.

He said: “The acquisition of a charter is not a swift process and many criteria have to be fulfilled.” But, he added: “We expect negotiations to be completed within months.”

The Tory peer said the institution had leased offices in Victoria Street, Westminster, and appointed senior civil servant Ed Quilty as its chief executive. Lord Lingfield confirmed he had consulted earlier this year with 80 large and small providers on plans developed by the institution, which was launched before Christmas.

He added that a “small group” had been chosen from providers who responded to the consultation to “develop and refine” the proposals, but would not reveal their identities. One of the proposals consulted on was possible subscription fees, but Lord Lingfield declined to comment on how much each provider might have to pay. However, FE Week understands fees of up to £10,000 are being considered.

The Association of Colleges declined to comment on fees, but deputy chief executive, Gill Clipson, said last year that she “looked forward” to working with Lord Lingfield in developing chartered status.

“This work will build on his recommendations in last year’s report on professionalism within FE and, in this context, we will be interested to see how the charter will relate to his other recommendations concerning the establishment of a guild [Education and Training Foundation] and the role of inspection within FE,” she said.

Stewart Segal, chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, warned many smaller providers might not consider it worth their while applying for chartered status if the subscription fee was too high.
He added official approval for providers could already be achieved through Ofsted reports and financial support from the Skills Funding Agency. He said: “It is hard to see what added value chartered status would bring.”

Chartered Status was originally supposed to have been launched at the start of this year and concern had been growing over the delay.

John Hyde, executive chairman of HIT Training, said: “Hopefully the delay in introducing it is because BIS is seeking to align the responsibilities of all the relevant bodies to improve the sector with joint quality criteria.”

Government in childcare qualifications ‘neglect’

Concerns have been expressed after a “key aspect” of recommendations on the future of childcare qualifications was “neglected” by the government.

The Council for Awards in Care, Health and Education (Cache) has spoken out after the government said it would not implement suggestions made by Professor Cathy Nutbrown for a minimum level three qualification for early years practitioners counted in child to staff ratios.

It would have meant that practitioners would only have counted as staff in ratios if they had a level three qualification.

She wanted a minimum of 50 per cent of staff at level three by last September, increasing to 70 per cent from September 2015 and 100 per cent by 2022.

The Department for Education (DfE) has said it listened to Professor Nutbrown’s advice and had implemented some of her suggestions, but it would not adopt the minimum standard.
But a Cache spokesperson said this did not go far enough.

She said: “Any change may appear to neglect a key aspect of the Nutbrown Report.

“It is important to focus on how any real difference to early years education and care can be measured through the introduction of the early years educator level three qualification. The outcomes for babies and young children, as well as their families, are the real business of any proposed change and must remain so.

“We have responded enthusiastically to the Nutbrown recommendation concerning qualifications at level three, in order to provide those that are ‘rigorous and challenging’.

She added: “We have developed full and relevant early years qualifications in partnership with our stakeholders and through employer engagement that are much more up to date, fit for purpose and appealing.”

Professor Nutbrown also criticised the government’s decision, calling it “hugely disappointing”.

She said: “This decision denies opportunities for many babies, toddlers and young children; for their families, and for the women and men who seek a worthwhile career with enhanced status and career prospects.

“The quality of the experiences offered to the youngest children, depends greatly on the quality of the staff working with them; and robust qualifications is one way to ensure that staff are well equipped to do this important work. Level two qualifications are starting points to work with young children but this level is only an introduction.

“The decision not to opt for a workforce with a minimum level three qualification threatens the future status of the profession, limits career progression and denies some of the most vulnerable children the best that we can offer.”

A DfE spokesperson said: “We accepted many of Cathy Nutbrown’s recommendations on childcare qualifications and share her ambitions to ensure the highest standards of quality in early education and childcare.

“That’s why we have introduced the level three early years educator qualification, and early years teacher status for graduates, both of which have tougher entry requirements to ensure high quality staff are working with children and giving them the best start in life.”

In its original response to the recommendations, the Association of Colleges (AoC) said it supported Professor Nutbrown’s view “that level three qualifications must deliver the necessary depth and breadth of knowledge, be rigorous and challenging, and require high quality work experience placements”.

However, it declined to comment on the DfE’s rejection of Professor Nutbrown’s suggestions.

Councils face Hancock’s wrath over teen tracking

Nine more councils are to get a slap on the wrist over their tracking of 16 and 17-year-olds, just six months after a dozen other local authorities were deemed to be failing.

The Department for Education has revealed that Skills Minister Matthew Hancock is to write to the nine authorities about their recording of teenagers’ employment status.

A DfE spokesperson declined to name the councils because he said the letters had not been sent out yet.

He also said that they had not been decided upon because they had the worst figures, but instead were authorities “we think could do better”.

A dozen other councils received similar letters last October, in which Mr Hancock expressed his dissatisfaction with the proportion of 16 to 18-year-olds whose activity was “not known”.

In the latest figures, the 12 authorities with the highest rates of “not known”, excluding the ones contacted last year, were Oxfordshire, Wiltshire (both 10.8 per cent), Barking and Dagenham (11.2 per cent), Lambeth (12.3 per cent), Lewisham (12.7 per cent), Rutland (18.9 per cent), Croydon (21.6 per cent), Worcestershire (26.5 per cent) and City of London (46.6 per cent).

It comes after the proportion of 16 and 17-year-old Neets (Not in education, employment or training), rose by half a percentage point at the end of last year to 4.5 per cent (38,000).

Nevertheless, Mr Hancock remained optimistic about the announcement, and concentrated on a claim that 35,000 more 16 to 18-year-olds were in education or training at the end of last year than at the end of 2012 – taking the total to 1,168,410.

He said: “Tens of thousands more young people in education or training is welcome news. We have introduced new traineeships, have reformed apprenticeships and have raised the participation age to help more young people into the world of work.

“This shows good progress. We have a clear programme of reforms to improve the quality of young people’s education to ensure, through traineeships and apprenticeships, that all have the chance to reach their potential.”

Last year, Mr Hancock wrote to local authorities in Birmingham, Poole, Derby, Gloucestershire, Derbyshire, Herefordshire, Lincolnshire, Shropshire, South Gloucestershire, Stoke and the London boroughs of Tower Hamlets and Waltham Forest to raise concerns about monitoring of participation.

At the time, councils’ responses included blaming issues with computer systems, or social and geographical challenges specific to their area, while a few acknowledged the problem and said they were working on it.

Several councils said there had been problems in transferring the responsibility for collecting the data from the Connexions service, which was closed by the government in 2012.

Speaking at the time, Derbyshire county councillor Damien Greenhalgh, deputy cabinet member for children and young people, said: “There were some initial teething problems with the upgrades to the system which meant we were not able to track what was happening with complete accuracy for a short period of time. However we are confident now that the system failures have been rectified.”A few, including Stoke-on-Trent, questioned the statistics, saying they did not match their own data.

Speaking to FE Week last October, Stoke’s assistant director of learning services Dave Perrett said: “Unfortunately, there are errors in the letter which attribute the wrong figures for Stoke-on-Trent to 16 to 18-year-olds. We are performing well when it comes to properly tracking this age group, with an encouraging figure of only 3.2 per cent unaccounted for.”