Michael Davis, CEO, UK Commission for Employment and Skills

The phrase “experiential learner” is one that Michael Davis drops into conversation just as the interview draws to a close.

The reference, coming amid discussion of his management style, had been preceded by a notebook scribble that read: “Loads of learning experiences.”

The striking thing about this was not the interviewer’s perceptive (if somewhat simplistic) entry, but the open and informative nature of the interviewee’s responses. Plus, of course, their sheer volume.

This is because the UK Commission for Employment and Skills chief executive is a man on whom hitherto seemingly little information was available.

Internet trawls uncovered limited detail on the man, who, it can be revealed here, is a dad-of-two from Leicestershire.

It was a situation that, admittedly, led to presumptions of a relatively unrewarding interview.

In truth, quite the opposite was the case as conversation moved freely between the personal and the professional.

For example, throughout there were surprisingly easy references to his 11-year-old daughter, Charis, seven-year-old son, Luke, and 40-year-old wife, Julie.

In outlining his own varied career path, for instance, he explains the advice he gives Charis.

“She has just started middle school and it feels like she’s just grown up overnight. Suddenly make-up’s gone on and all that sort of stuff, and she’s started conversations about what she wants to be when she grows up. Suddenly, this seems to matter to her,” he says, having listed the police, an accountancy traineeship and a post with a friend’s marketing firm among his early workplace experiences.

“These conversations have gone along the lines of me saying: ‘It’s great to have ideas of what you want to be when you grow up, but don’t get too precious about them because where you finish up is probably nowhere that you thought at the start’.

“It’s easy to look back as a grown-up and see a plan or a sensible career, but in reality there’s probably quite a bit of luck.”

So what luck has played its part in seeing this 39-year-old economics graduate from Lancaster University, where he achieved a 2.1, end up at the top of a public body with a £74m annual turnover?

As you’d expect, it all comes down to experience.

He says he has been lucky to learn from “role model” chairmen in three of his jobs and chief executive at both the commission and Leicester-based Centre for Enterprise (CFE), and board director at lighting firm Lastolite.

It’s great to have ideas of what you want to be when you grow up, but don’t get too precious about them”

These are the commission’s Charlie Mayfield, who has also been the John Lewis Partnership chairman since March 2007; former CFE chairman Professor John Coyne, who is also vice chancellor of the University of Derby; and CFE founder and former chairman Martin Henry OBE, who also ran Lastolite.

“I’m very much an experiential learner so I’ve been lucky to have had three really exceptional chairmen to work for,” says Davis, who has also served as governors’ chair at Leicester College.

“Charlie is an exceptional person to work for. He is very inclusive and brings out the best of all of our different commissioners. But my two other chairmen, although not as well known, were equally brilliant.

“John is a brilliant economist and has a very dry sense of humour, but he’s thoughtful and analytical. He pushed on my thinking.

“The person who recruited me to the CFE was Martin. He had years and years and years of experience, but he would never try to have a conversation with me that included him saying, ‘In my experience.’ He would never say that to shut the conversation down.

“He would just gently, but constantly question me until I’d figured something out for myself and he did a lot to bring on my confidence.”

The effect of such inspirational characters on Davis’s own style of management comes out as an emphasis on positivity, similarity and conciliation crops up elsewhere in conversation — from a lack of ability at karate, to the unexpected revelation of a love of all things Triumph (the British motorbike firm) and the possibly-conflicting funding approaches favoured in apprenticeship reviews carried out last year by Doug Richard and Lord Heseltine.

“I was captain of a university karate club, but probably more for my management of it than competitive ability,” he says, continuing positively: “I doubt in competition I was much of an asset to the team, but when I left membership was up, money in the bank was up and we were paying our instructor more.”

Meanwhile, motorbikes are a source of similarity between, of all things, economists and engineers.

“I’ve always had motorbikes,” says Davis, who was raised in Redditch, Worcestershire.

“Around six of us friends go away for a week each year. They’re all engineers and we’ve been to Europe and Scotland. They say that if you ask ten economists a question you’ll get ten different answers, but it’s the same with engineers — if something goes wrong with your bike and you ask five engineers, there’ll be five different things wrong with it.”

But perhaps the most impressive leap of bridge-building faith is his analysis of the reviews of former Dragons’ Den investor Mr Richard, who wanted to see the tax system fund training, and Tory grandee Lord Heseltine, who called for Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to bid for training cash from a centralised pot.

“What both [reviews] did was to recognise the role of vocational skills and vocational education,” says Davis, whose time is divided between a South London flat for work and his East Midlands family home at the weekends.

“You can choose to interpret Heseltine and Richard as trying to do something different, but what they’re both trying to do is get employers and businesses much more involved in how the system works.”

And the commission itself figures as Davis evaluates his management style.

“I’ve been involved in business dealings prior to the commission where there was a risk of two parties falling out,” he says.

“My approach was to keep restating what they agreed on and then explore what they disagreed on and conclude by saying, ‘so we do all agree on this and these things we disagree on’ and keep going at it and over time the list of what we agreed on went up and what we disagreed on went down.”

He adds: “What the commission wants is a society in which people are highly-skilled, well-utilised and have good and meaningful careers.

“Nobody disagrees with the outcome we’re trying to achieve, so it’s always a question of how best to achieve that.”

“Central to the commission is creating the space where businesses, colleges and schools really work closely at every level, like designing courses and providing good work experience.

“And what the commission has is a fantastic leadership model. We work really hard in profiling our commissioners, which is why you won’t find anything on me.”

Until now, that is.

It’s a personal thing

What’s your favourite book? 

The Complete Works of Shakespeare because it only cost 79p on my Kindle. It was the first piece of fiction I’d read in 20 years, which is quite embarrassing

What did you want to be when you were younger?

A policeman

What do you do to switch off from work?

Take an interest in anything on two wheels

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

My late nan, Margaret Peagam. She was really quite influential with a very strong work ethic. That’s better than what my kids said. Luke said Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine and a Storm Trooper. And then my daughter, who has a brilliantly dry sense of humour, said: “Yoda, so I could offer him a booster seat.”

What would your super power be? 

A Sky Plus controller, so I could skip through boring meetings and slow down interesting times. Luke said he wanted one to skip through maths

A framework for Ofsted success

The fear an Ofsted inspection can strike into the hearts of principals is well-known in FE. But could that be changing under the new way of assessing colleges? Stuart Rimmer explains his experience of the revamped inspection framework and the improvements he sees within it.

“They are coming” — it was a simple statement from the principal on a Thursday morning that needed no further explanation.

The growing reputation of Ofsted’s new Common Inspection Framework (CIF) for being tough, added to conspiracy theories abounding about the downgrading of the sector, made it a nervous time.

So what was the inspection like? Anyone in a senior post within FE is acutely aware of the impact an inspection can have on reputation, stability, job security and the ability to deliver future improvements.

Overall, our experience of the new Ofsted framework was that it felt fair, collaborative and thoroughly focused on teaching and
learning.

This new focus on teaching, learning and assessment meant the range of teaching inspectors saw — including work-based learning provision — combined with the volume of students they manage to speak to, led to there being very few hiding places.

The old potential for entirely ‘stage-managed’ inspections has quite rightly gone.

The focus on success rates as the key performance measure remains strongly in place as the starting point for inspection.

The outcomes for learners is much broader now. The definition of teaching, learning and assessment within the handbook is also wide and varied.

The ‘seven pillars of wisdom’ (see page 45 of the handbook) are considered thoroughly and with equal importance. As a sector we should welcome this.

Leadership and management under the new regime feel entirely different and much better.

Instead of endless files and a schedule of pre-arranged, pre-prepared meetings, the new inspection allows the single question to be put and answered – ‘how does that impact on learners?’

Grandstanding by senior teams and governors on iconic buildings, college finances or their superb networks with the glitterati in the business or the FE sector gets short shrift.

It is much more grounded in solid performance management, self-assessment and improving learner experience and core teaching activities.

Consider in advance how performance management operates at your college”

As a good, small, northern college this was great and it allowed us to demonstrate how we meet our core college values on a daily basis and how we meet our community needs

To fully implement the nuances of the new CIF will take some time and, whereas the preparation for the new inspection regime requires just as much work, the difference is that it needs to be ready well in advance of the dreaded phone call.

There has been much Ofsted bashing over recent months. I would say, regardless of any philosophical viewpoint as to the purpose or effectiveness of the inspection regime, we found the team to be professional and highly-focused with a clear view of what good teaching and learning should look like in a college.

As for the outcome, the inspection team agreed with our self-assessment and we were judged to be a good college.

There are, however, some basic operational things to consider. Watch out for the BI06 form and ensure you have it completed in draft form in advance.

Leaving it until receiving notice of the inspection will be too late. As always be clear on your data, ensure it matches with all the Gateway reports and have validated sources ready — including destinations and value added.

Ensure an honest, rigorous and up-to-date self-assessment report is on the Gateway. It is the starting point for the inspection and a focus for leadership and management.

Plan the internal logistics of base rooms and inspection arrangements.

At college level, curriculum and service areas should have a short action plan of what to do once the call is received. The two days — plus the weekend — go very quickly.

Consider in advance how performance management operates at your college.

Have a well-briefed, well-prepared nominee. This role is even more important in the new framework to ensure the inspection team see the best the college has to offer and to ensure the inspection evidence base is representative.

Communicate with your students, parents, governors and employers and have these mechanisms drafted in advance. And finally, ensure college timetables are up-to-date, including work-based learning visits.

Stuart Rimmer is director of quality and enterprise at Lancaster and Morecambe College

What it means to offer a true apprenticeship

We need to send out a clear message about apprenticeships — don’t dumb down the brand, says Graham Hasting-Evans.

An independent review of apprenticeships published in November called on the government to improve their quality and make them more focused on bosses’ needs.

Its author, Doug Richard, entrepreneur, educator, former Dragon’s Den star and founder of School for Startups, was asked to consider the future of apprenticeships in England, and to recommend how they could meet the needs of the changing economy.

His subsequent findings recognised the good provision that exists today, but emphasised the need for greater ambition if all apprenticeships were to meet the standards of the best.

Commenting on the launch of his review, Doug said: “No matter who I speak with, everyone agrees that apprenticeships are a good thing – but only when they are ‘true’ apprenticeships. With the myriad of learning experiences which are currently labeled as apprenticeships, we risk losing sight of the core features of what makes apprenticeships work, so my conclusion is that we need to look again at what it means to be an apprentice and what it means to offer an apprenticeship as an employer.”

Although not everyone agrees with everything he said, he did make a few points that I personally believe make sense; including things that we, as a sector have been concerned about for some time.

He echoed debates that have been reported in these very pages. For example, that the title ‘apprenticeship’ should be reserved only for jobs requiring sustained and substantial training.

We need to avoid calling every programme of vocational training an ‘apprenticeship’. We risk undermining the true benefit of this key way of delivering the skills that industries need.

Earlier in November the Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) Committee also published a report on apprenticeships, highlighting areas of the government’s apprenticeships programme which needed to be developed.

Commenting on the report — the result of an 11 month inquiry — the chairman of the BIS Committee, Adrian Bailey MP, said: “The apprenticeship programme can play a key role in resolving some of this country’s most pressing issues. It can help us to create a more skilled workforce, to increase employment and to generate sustainable economic growth.” He concluded: “Young people in this country should be given every chance to fulfill their potential in school, in work and in life.”

While apprenticeships may need a new look for 2013, it would be well to remember that they have been around a long time. In the building industry they refer to apprenticeships for the “biblical skills” which gives you some idea about how long these have been in existence. Traditional apprenticeships, like those in building and other professions and trades, have a long and successful history. For generations they have given employers confidence that the person with the apprenticeship ticket can do what it says on the certificate.

Over the last decade an increasing number of apprenticeships have been developed for other skill areas. This is to be applauded in principle. We all  recognise that an apprenticeship needs to include:

• A period of working under supervision and being developed to be completely competent (work based)

• Theoretical knowledge and understanding;

• The common skills that employers look to for all employers – functional skills and employability skills;

• Employment rights and responsibilities;

• Safety; and

•Personal learning and thinking skills

All over this is very good BUT (and there is always a but isn’t there?) the apprentice needs a sensible period of time in which to gain all this knowledge and practical
experience.

We have to realise that this may vary between skills, but what is crucial is that employers have confidence in the time that the apprentice has been studying and learning in the work-based environment.

There is a major risk that funding and time pressures can result in corners being cut. Organisations try to get apprentices through the whole process in timescales that allow them no time to really achieve the required standards which an employer wants and needs.

Let’s not make the mistake of dumbing down apprenticeships and damaging a respected institution that has a long and successful track record. In short let’s not damage a great brand that’s been around for centuries by short-termism!

Graham Hasting-Evans is the managing director of the National Open College Network 

Clawback ‘possible’ on £91m overpayment

Providers who shared in a £91m Skills Funding Agency overpayment could yet be asked to hand back some of the cash while current allocations could also be reduced, FE Week can reveal.

The agency published details this month of providers who received funding for education in the 2011/12 academic year that they had not delivered.

The overall figure totted up to £91m and the agency said it was looking at cutting 2012/13 allocations — but it has since said it was also “in discussions” separately with a view to seeking clawback.

An agency spokesperson said: “The agency published figures for the end-of-year performance position for colleges and training organisations for the academic year 2011/12 in December 2012.

“Where the published data shows that a college or training organisation has funds against which it has not delivered, the agency is in discussions with each provider about the use or return of any funding not delivered.

“The agency continues to ensure funding is used for the direct benefit of learners and employers.”

The agency declined to name the providers affected and those who could be asked to pay money back.

Learndirect, Newcastle College and South Thames College topped the list of overpaid providers.

Learndirect delivered £117,132,144 of education, but was paid a further £5,333,722.

An agency spokesperson said it had been in talks with the Sheffield-based firm and that its funding was now assessed differently with it having turned private. It was bought from the Ufi Charitable Trust in 2011 by LDC for around £40m.

“While Learndirect is now a private provider, this did not apply to the whole of the academic year 2011/12,” she said.

“Discussions are taking place with Learndirect, as with all providers, about the use of or return of funding not delivered.

“Learndirect now operates under new terms and conditions and is paid like all other private training organisations on actual delivery.”

A Learndirect spokesperson said they “discuss regularly with the SFA the use of funding,” adding: “We have offered to use funding from last year to help support the current demand for Learndirect provision.”

Newcastle College received £38,197,511 of agency cash, £4,731,682 more than the value of the education it delivered.

A spokesperson said the overpayment was “a national issue and most FE providers did not fully meet their contracts, mainly due to a late change in the rules by the agency about who was eligible for fully-funded courses.”

He added: “We had the largest contract of any FE provider nationally, so naturally we also had one of the largest surpluses. However, when looked at as a proportion of our contract, the overpayment is 14 per cent, which puts us 44th in the table [based on percentage overpaid].”

However, he said it was “not appropriate us to comment further at this stage [on potentially paying the agency back].”

South Thames College was paid £19,297,14, £2,447,968 more than the value of education it delivered.

A spokesperson said it had nothing to add to its initial statement on the overpayment itself, which read: “Despite the college delivering 98 per cent of the adult standard learner numbers in 2011/12, it achieved some £2.4m less funding for the same volume of work compared with 2010/11.

“The reduced funding resulted from changes introduced by the agency for 2011/12, in particular the changes regarding benefits categories.”

Inspection ‘delight’

The principal of an FE provider said she led her centre to an outstanding Ofsted inspection result by focusing on teaching and learning.

Maria Gilling, 52, principal at Walsall Adult and Community College (WACC) (pictured right), said she was “delighted and really proud” of her staff for achieving grade 1 — outstanding — in 23 out of 24 Ofsted category areas.

The local authority provision centre which caters for around 8,000 learners and employs around 160 staff was inspected in December.

“I feel most proud of our teaching and learning results and delighted for our students and staff,” said Ms Gilling who oversaw a merger between of Walsall Community College and the College of Continuing Education which created WACC in 2009.

The centre was last inspected by the education watchdog in 2010 when it was deemed grade 2 — good.

“Because we were inspected in 2010 we were truly not expecting this. Obviously under the new inspection framework there is such a short notice period so what Ofsted see is truly what happens every day.

“During our previous inspection teaching and learning was deemed satisfactory but that’s not what we’re about so we focused on effectively shifting two grades in that area.”

She said her passion came from her own teaching background after working for a number of years as an English, communications and media teacher.

“I sent out the message really clearly that every day of every week the student comes first and I tried to develop a real pride in our teachers, recognising they have a really demanding job to do. I’ve invested in their support, training and development.

“We also have high expectations of our students,” she said.

Another area of which she feels exceptionally proud is equality and diversity which has also shifted from satisfactory to outstanding.  WACC is located in some of the most deprived areas of the country, she said and the borough of Walsall has one of the highest rates of unemployment. The number of people claiming out of work benefits is one third above average.

“We have dealt with this by cultivating a culture of inclusion,” she said.

“This college is for its community and reflects the community. We wanted to reach out to those with the least opportunity of success in the past, many of whom are adults not in education, employment or training (NEET).

“These individuals do not respond to newspaper adverts and posh brochures — they respond to human connection.”

She said they reached out to this group by working with eight partners across the borough such as local and social housing groups and drop-in centres and fostered a “very good” partnership with Job Centre Plus.

Under a new common inspection framework (CIF) introduced by Ofsted in September, at the time of going to press, no general FE college has been graded outstanding.

Let’s make the FE Guild representative

As the FE Guild goes through its early stages of formulation Robin Landman OBE considers an opportunity for the group to create a representative FE workforce.

As we approach the beginning of the brief consultation period for the proposed FE Guild we need to give some serious collective thought to what this new FE formation is for, and what it will actually do.

In his foreword to the guild prospectus, John Hayes referred to ‘.. a modern guild – an employer-led partnership, which brings together key sector interests including employee representatives’. He goes on to say, ‘it is crucial that the guild is truly of the sector, by the sector and for the sector’. A jaundiced observer might pose the question, if the latter statement is true, why did the call for the guild come from the minister of state, rather than from members of the sector?

However, since it is clear that the guild is now the only show in town, we must give substance to the former minister’s aspirations, rise to the challenge and ensure that the guild is fit for its eventual purpose.

Members of the Race Equality Workforce Action Group (REWAG) — a cross-sector group working towards an ethnically representative workforce — have been discussing the challenges inherent in working to achieve its goal at a time of massive budget cuts.

The recently-published census has graphically confirmed that Britain has changed more rapidly than most of us had anticipated, and this makes the development of a representative workforce vital, to reflect modern Britain and to recognise the fact that nearly a quarter of our students are from BME communities or from the rapidly growing ‘mixed’ category. Counter-intuitively, though, the FE workforce is, according to LSIS data, becoming less diverse, with the largest growth coming from the white British category, probably as a result of more redundancies amongst BME community groups.

It was an oversight to have an all-white, all-male panel presenting the bid”

The FE sector has a great story to tell the other education sectors. After the report of the Commission for Black Staff in FE, the Black Leadership Initiative (BLI) was created, and its work, initially alongside and subsequently as part of the Network for Black Professionals (NBP), led to a major improvement in representation at the most senior level. From four black principals in 2002, the number peaked at 16 in 2011, and is now 14. This makes FE leadership the most representative of all education phases, achieved primarily because the BLI was such a successful, and cost effective, positive action intervention, its consistent and high impact recently recognised by the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Award for Volunteering.

REWAG believes that this issue is a crucial one for the sector, and that it offers an important opportunity for those developing the guild to ensure that it is firmly on its development agenda. This would give substance to the vision for the guild that it is ‘ an employer-led partnership drawing in employee representatives organisations and sector bodies concerned with workforce development’.

As well as the longer-term, REWAG members were concerned about short-term considerations. LSIS will wind up in March, and the earliest date for the guild to become operational is August, so there is a risk that the implied hiatus could have serious implications for the BLI. REWAG members seek assurances that some bridging funding is earmarked for what could be a prolonged period of uncertainty.

We also want to see representation of the whole spectrum of FE membership organisations involved in the development of the guild. It was an oversight to have an all-white, all-male panel presenting the bid consortium at the AoC conference, and that needs to be corrected by the inclusion of the Women’s Leadership Network and the NBP in future discussions, so our sector is seen to be serious about a modern conception of professionalism.

In addition, the BLI Strategy Group – a powerful and representative reference panel, met last week and was clear in its view that the BLI model works well, that it needs to be retained and indeed there is clear scope for the approach to be utilised by the sector, with appropriate adaptation, in the other equality strands.

Robin Landman OBE, chief executive of the Network for Black Professionals (NBP)

Providers ‘anxious’ over growth cash

Training providers said they could be left thousands of pounds “out-of-pocket” after the government unexpectedly doubled functional skills rates.

The Association of Employment Learning and Providers (AELP) is currently in talks with the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) about the impact English and maths rates more than doubling has had upon growth requests from providers to the agency for the first quarter of the year (Q1).

SFA issues providers contracts and at each quarter assesses how they’re performing. If they’re underperforming they can deduct money and if they’re over-performing providers can put in a case for growth to get more money — a growth request.

Paul Warner, director of employment and skills at AELP, said many providers had expressed “anxiety and confusion” because the functional skills rate rose after Q1 growth requests had been submitted, meaning many providers had now “topped out their contracts”. This has led to some having to turn away apprentices with the loss of thousands of pounds.

Matt Garvey, managing director of West Berkshire Training Consortium, told FE Week the functional skills rates increase was welcomed but the “unintended consequence” was his not-for-profit organisation would have to use money from reserves so they didn’t have to turn away learners.

“We’ve got one group of 12 unemployed adults starting this week and we didn’t feel we could cancel them so we have paid out of our own pocket,” he said.

“We cannot put any additional starts on.

“We’re now having to remove learners from our contracts and having to find providers who are underperforming to see if they’ll take them off us which is giving us a competitive disadvantage,” he said.

“It feels uncomfortable but our priority is that the learner can continue.”

He said the issue would cost his organisation between £7,000 and £10,000 per group.

“So far we’ve had to pay £30,000 delivery that we can’t fund in the pipeline,” he said.

Mr Warner said: “We have had a good deal of anxiety and confusion over Q1 growth requests. Many providers have run out of their contracts faster than they thought they would. Some are now in a situation where because they’ve topped out their contract value they cannot afford to start further starts because there’s no guarantee they’ll get further growth in Q2.”

“We’re trying to work with SFA to figure out how to make the Q2 growth process get over this issue. Through no fault of their own some providers were caught out by a rates rise that they weren’t able to factor into their growth requests.”

The SFA said in their publication Performance Management of the Sector for Quarter Two 2012/13: “The agency will look at funding needed to support changes introduced for English and Maths. Then, where funding allows, we will continue to expand the offer to the unemployed and provide growth for Apprenticeships where there is clear employer demand.”

An SFA spokesperson said: “The updated allocation/maximum contract values will be published at the end of January.

“Following the quarter 2 review the agency will publish the updated allocations/maximum contract values during April.”

Audit exposes ‘£40m’ ESF error

European funding could be at risk after a government audit uncovered “potentially” £40m-worth of errors over money dished out by the Skills Funding Agency, FE Week understands.

The situation was described as “significant and potentially damaging” to the reputation of the UK government and the agency, according to correspondence leaked to FE Week.

Errors were said to have been recorded against more than 25 providers in a sample audit of applications for European Social Fund (ESF) money.

More than 80 per cent of the errors relate to just five of the providers.

“The collective error from this, of more than 7 per cent, represents a potential £40m error, of which the agency must cover £20m,” according to the agency correspondence.

“This is therefore a significant issue and might lead to a suspension of payments to the UK and damage to the UK government’s and agency’s reputations.”

It is understood a number of errors were clerical and agency officials have been told to go back to providers before a final audit report is produced.

“We may have an opportunity to affect the final report, and reduce the impact, by finding further evidence at these providers and reducing their errors if this is done quickly,” it is added in the correspondence.

And an agency spokesperson said it would take action against providers who could not “produce the necessary evidence and paperwork to support an ESF claim for funding”.

The audit on agency ESF spending by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which has overall responsibility for managing England’s pot of ESF cash, took place last year.

Allocations from the ESF, according to the DWP website, are “based on regional employment and skills needs — for example, the numbers of people not in work and who do not have good qualifications”.

The current ESF programme covers a five-year period from 2007.

It is distributed through public agencies such as the agency, the DWP itself and the National Offender Management Service.

The agency match-funds ESF money, from the European Commission, at 25 per cent and would therefore be responsible for, FE Week understands, £10m of the possible overall error.

An agency spokesperson said: “The programme, like all programmes, is subject to a cycle of regular and routine auditing.

“These audits ensure providers have the necessary controls and evidence in place to support claims made for funding.

“The ESF programme is also audited by the DWP on behalf of the European Commission.

“If as part of one of these audits a provider cannot produce the necessary evidence and paperwork to support an ESF claim for funding, the agency will take action to recover those funds as part of our routine controls and procedures.”

Union strike threat over new dismissals

A bitter dispute over the sacking of lecturers at a Midlands college looks set to worsen.

The University and College Union (UCU) balloted members at Halesowen College, near Birmingham, on strike action on Friday over the dismissal of three lecturers — all active UCU members.

The union had already staged one protest when just before Christmas maths teacher and the union’s branch secretary David Muritu was “unfairly” dismissed from his job.

Union bosses said Mr Muritu was told he was sacked due to students’ results, but they say they are above the national average and the college was to blame for any poor results.

Nick Varney of UCU said: “This is the first time in all my years’ experience where a disciplinary procedure has been used to dismiss people over national benchmarking.”

He said all four teachers had good records and it was the college’s failings such as refusal to pay for specialist cover for long-term sickness and lecturers expected to teach two different classes in two different rooms at the same time, that were instead to blame.

He added that groups of students were being pushed together even though they are supposed to be studying different material, non-specialist staff regularly covered maths sessions and there was failure to provide teaching for students in the run-up to exams.

“Selective use of information” is what allowed Halesown to get rid of the staff, according to the union.

Mr Varney added: “There is now a question over whether teachers in FE colleges can be dismissed purely on students’ attainment making it a national issue.”

Halesowen College denied it acted improperly and said action to address concerns about performance was not “undertaken lightly”.

Principal Keith Bate said it would not be appropriate to comment on the details of the situation but that they “completely refuted” “allegations of improper conduct being made against the college which appear to be associated with this situation”.

“The college will not condone consistent failure to deliver expected standards of performance including the need to be accountable for outcomes in accordance with established values and codes of conduct,” he said.

“Where there are any exceptions to a picture of strong performance being maintained across the college, it is vital that action plans are put in place with additional support and resources in order to prepare students to achieve expected levels of attainment.

“I wish to make clear to all staff that action to address concerns about performance and attainment is not undertaken lightly.  In any such case, the college is committed to a
detailed investigation of the position including reference to performance data and individual meetings with the staff involved and managers who have worked with the relevant team; that is the approach that was taken in this case.”