Dame Ruth Silver is making her FE and skills return with a new sector leadership thinktank funded by money left over from the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS).

The Further Education Trust for Leadership (FETL) has a budget of up to £5.5m from LSIS, which counted Dame Ruth as its chair until it ceased to exist last July.

The former Lewisham College principal is FETL’s founding president and said that although many LSIS functions were transferred to the Education and Training Foundation (ETF), LSIS board members had identified the need for a thinktank.

She said: “I think the assumption was that the LSIS work, staff and money would transfer over to the ETF.

“Because the ETF had had difficulty recruiting a permanent chief executive and chair, and because the word then was that it only had two years of funding, we couldn’t transfer the money.

“So we started to look around and the
idea of an independent thinktank for the sector came up.”

According to an FETL policy paper, among its possible “distinctive activities” were sponsorship of an annual lecture on FE leadership; and the funding of an academic chair at a university to bring “stature to the sector”.

It could also “promote and disseminate” a body of knowledge about leadership theory and practice in the FE sector.

Dame Ruth said FETL’s work would start with an invitation to those who wanted to carry out research, with a sub-board dishing out fellowships, grants and bursaries.

She said: “The idea is we will publish invitations in September to ask people if there is anything they would like some time off to research.

“We will then send these scholarships and we will fund their research and a website where all the papers will be published, and have an annual lecture from a thinker on leadership.”

But she insisted that FETL would not necessarily become a permanent organisation, but that it could merge with the ETF or another organisation following a review in two years.

She said: “It’s about getting the sector to think about its own agenda and its own pre-occupations, and in two years we will ask ‘is this working? Should this be placed elsewhere?’ We have absolutely no agenda around keeping it as it is.”

David Russell, ETF chief executive, said: “We have been in discussion with FETL about how best to align our work. Quick convergence is obviously the most efficient and effective option, but it is perfectly sensible for FETL to set up as an independent fund this year as they have a mission which is outside the ETF’s core priorities as set by our board and informed by the sector.

“In the short to medium term though, both ETF and FETL agree that convergence is the most sensible route and we will continue discussions with them about how best to implement that.”

Dame Ruth said FETL would not employ its own staff or rent premises, and said clerk services for the board would be provided by Gloucestershire-based The Trust Partnership at an hourly rate. Its website, fetl.org.uk, is due to go live shortly.

More than 30 employer bodies joined forces to call for greater control over apprenticeships just days after a technical consultation on proposed reforms that drew more than 1,200 responses, closed.

The Confederation of British Industry (CBI), the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES), Nestle and Crossrail were among those behind a letter published in The Telegraph on May 5 in support of reform put forward in a two-month technical consultation.

It closed May 1 having asked what issues should be taken into account in implementing the apprenticeship reforms inspired by Doug Richard’s 2012 review, which called for employers to have more influence.

The letter said: “Placing employers in control of the design, delivery and funding of apprenticeships is essential. Control over funding would give us the opportunity to work directly with training providers and build relationships which allow us to design apprenticeships which are more relevant to the needs of the British economy.”

The main funding method suggested in the technical consultation, to give employers more control, was based on the PAYE system where employers claim back the cost of apprenticeships through the tax system, although a second ‘apprenticeship credit’ model — where employers buy apprenticeship provision from an online bank account paid into by government — was also covered.

The PAYE option was one of the least popular put forward in the first consultation, which ran from July until October last year, where respondents favoured maintaining the current system of channelling funding through providers.

One of the letter’s signatories, CBI chief policy director Katja Hall told FE Week: “Businesses strongly support the move to a demand-led apprenticeships system — and employer-directed funding is an integral part of this.

“However, we need detailed information on levels of co-investment and how the system will work in practice to judge the proposed funding mechanisms. A well-designed system based on PAYE may work best for many firms, but the government must deliver for everyone. For apprenticeships to flourish the system must be simple, work for businesses of all sizes and must be thoroughly piloted.

“Only once both options have been properly tested, and the wider policy has been established, can we decide on the most appropriate route forward.”

Sir Charlie Mayfield, chair of the John Lewis Partnership and UKCES, who also signed the letter, told FE Week: “The UK Commission believes that the most effective way to put employers in the driving seat is to use HMRC systems. Using PAYE has the potential to hard-wire recruitment of young people into everyday business processes.

“Using the tax system would also send a signal that the aim is for a long-term stable system that employers can rely upon.”

The message behind the letter was welcomed by Skills Minister Matthew Hancock, who said: “I welcome the strong support shown for the direction of our reforms by leading large and small businesses and the organisations that represent them in this letter. We will be looking carefully at the feedback we have received on our recent consultation and will work closely with employers, providers and other experts on the detail of implementation.”

However, many of the technical consultation responses from FE sector bodies were sceptical of the need for and impact of the PAYE system.

Nevertheless, a spokesperson for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills said the technical consultation had received more than 1,200 responses from a wide range of respondents, but warned the figure had not yet been officially confirmed. “These responses are in the process of being analysed and the results and next steps will be announced in the autumn,” she said.

Further education and skills bodies share their responses to the technical consultation with FE Week.

Also pictured are sector figures