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Can Kaynat Ahmad give FE students their voice back?

Kaynat Ahmad had every intention of becoming a doctor.

Three years ago, she was attending a private school in Lahore, Pakistan, where teachers were strict and examination papers, she recalls, “sometimes got leaked”.

She had completed her pre-medical studies and was preparing for a career in medicine when her mother, a hotel manager, married an entrepreneur and the family moved to the West Midlands.

Ahmad found herself navigating a very different education system in a new country. Continuing on a path to medicine would have meant paying to study the A Levels she needed. Instead, she enrolled at Dudley College of Technology, initially on a free level 1 course in digital programming and coding, progressing to level 2.

It was not quite the future she had imagined.

Nor did she immediately embrace college life. Ahmad remembers being “so shy” that the only person she spoke to was her teacher.

Then her brother and one of his friends dared her to stand in the students’ union elections.

Friendships developed, her confidence grew and she discovered a sense of purpose in representing other learners.

“I came out from my zone,” she says.

After a year as students’ union president, in July Ahmad became vice president for further education at the National Union of Students (NUS). She had gone from an anxious newcomer to the English education system to one of its most prominent representatives.

But the union now faces daunting challenges.

Colleges and universities are contending with financial pressure, blurring boundaries between the two sectors, students’ cost-of-living pressures and the disruption AI is causing to assessment.

Despite a greater need for student representation, the NUS is struggling to maintain its relevance as university students’ unions vote to leave, while the student representation that once flourished in FE colleges has diminished.

Ahmad has pledged to rebuild it. But has she inherited a national movement capable of doing so?

The missing student movement

At many universities, students’ unions employ professional staff, run substantial budgets, organise political campaigns and support elected sabbatical officers. In FE, student representation is often much less visible.

Many colleges have student councils, course representatives or learner voice groups. But these are not the same as an independent students’ union with its own democratic structures, budget and elected leadership.

Without properly supported unions, students can struggle to “have a say or get involved”, leaving them “feeling disconnected, unheard, and unsure if anyone is fighting for their needs”.

Her own college is unusual. Dudley employs a full-time students’ union president, and its 2026-27 budget included £180,668 for the union, covering staffing, campaigns, trips, clubs and societies.

Most other college unions operate on a fraction of that amount.

Ahmad says some receive as little as £10,000, which she considers “not enough”. She estimates that only 10 to 15 colleges still pay their students’ union presidents, with most relying on volunteers.

The Association of Colleges (AoC) acknowledges the problem.

Eddie Playfair, its senior policy manager, believes most colleges have some form of student council or students’ union, supported by the association’s student engagement charter.

But, he says, “very few colleges have the benefit of sabbatical officers and it may be time to reconsider how college students’ unions are supported”.

There are exceptions. Student representation is flourishing at Leeds City College, where 2,595 learners voted in this year’s students’ union elections, representing 12 per cent of its student population.

Elsewhere, the infrastructure is being dismantled.

In April, SGS College’s deputy principal told governors that its students’ union arrangements were “ineffective due to low levels of student engagement”, describing the problem as common across FE.

Governors subsequently voted to withdraw recognition of the union, rescind its constitution and close its bank account.

For Ahmad, such developments raise a fundamental question: who speaks independently for students when the structures designed to represent them disappear?

Former NUS vice-president for FE, Qasim Hussain

A promise still waiting to be delivered

Greater FE representation is not a new ambition for the NUS.

When Ahmad’s predecessor, Qasim Hussain, took office in 2024, he wanted every FE provider to have an independent, funded students’ union, with dedicated staff and paid student leaders.

He also proposed a stronger national system for representing FE learners.

At the NUS national conference that April, proposals were approved that included a commitment to encourage and support a vibrant national voice for college and vocational learners.

Two years later, FE Week can see no evidence of a substantial expansion in independent college unions, or of the specific FE engagement plan promised through the reforms.

Ahmad has inherited the same problem.

As a student, she observed a “clear gap” between NUS and FE, with college learners missing information about national campaigns, events and opportunities.

“Too often, NUS has felt disconnected and inaccessible to FE members, and we need to change that,” she says.

She is now contacting college unions with limited resources, offering help with campaigning and representation, and planning visits to colleges including Calderdale and Leeds City College.

“The issue with most student leaders is they don’t know how to lead a campaign, and that’s where we can collaborate with them.”

Her ambition is to rebuild regional and national relationships, so that college students see NUS as more than a distant organisation dominated by universities.

But rebuilding trust will take more than an enthusiastic vice president.

An organisation under pressure

NUS has weathered financial crises before. In 2018, a £3 million deficit brought it close to bankruptcy, triggering major restructuring.

Although the immediate crisis passed, financial sustainability remains a concern.

The NUS’s 2024-25 accounts show turnover falling 16 per cent on the previous year and a pension liability of £9.1 million.

Its national operation is also much leaner than in previous decades.

Around 60 staff now work across the organisation, but none is a dedicated FE specialist.

Meanwhile, university students’ unions are questioning whether national membership represents value for money.

At least ten have voted to disaffiliate over the past year, including HE unions at Cambridge, Manchester, University College London and the London School of Economics.

Campaigners have cited membership costs, democratic accountability and disagreements over the union’s response to the war in Gaza. Oxford’s students’ union is also considering its future relationship with the NUS, with its annual membership fee of £17,500 featuring in the debate.

The NUS says over half its members are from the FE sector, making up 216 out of its 377 member institutions in the UK.

But a college’s affiliation does not mean it has an active, independent students’ union or participates meaningfully in national democracy.

Indeed, the NUS cannot provide a definitive figure for how many colleges have genuinely independent unions rather than college-managed student consultation arrangements.

And while FE institutions may make up most of its membership, their voices can be overwhelmed by better-resourced university representatives at national conferences.

The cost of getting to college

Ahmad has chosen a practical issue for her flagship campaign.

This month, she launched an NUS petition calling for free bus travel for students and apprentices. More than 2,000 people have so far signed it.

“We love buses, but when 20 per cent of students and apprentices have missed class because they could not afford the cost of public transport, something has to change,” she says.

It is an issue she knows from Dudley. Many students travelled for more than an hour from Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Halesowen to attend college, with transport costs placing another burden on already stretched households.

Weeks into the job, she was involved in the NUS campaign for the 16-17 Saver railcard to stay valid after holders turn 18, a change the Department for Transport announced in August 2026.

She sees transport as inseparable from the government’s ambitions to reduce the number of young people not in education, employment or training.

At the end of 2024, the Dudley council area had England’s highest combined proportion of 16- and 17-year-olds recorded as NEET or whose activity was not known.

“If transport is not accessible, how can education be accessible and affordable?” she asks.

Ahmad’s wider NUS manifesto also includes expanded bursaries, travel funds and hardship support, subsidised meals for low-income learners, better access to equipment and learning resources and improved mental health provision.

She wants “free, prompt, and culturally competent mental health support in every college”, alongside trauma-informed safeguarding.

Learning to challenge authority

Ahmad’s experience as a student governor at Dudley helped shape her understanding of college finances, strategy and decision-making.

It also taught her that students could challenge decisions affecting their daily lives. She raised concerns about women’s rights and helped intervene when a student faced expulsion, persuading leaders to give them another chance.

She believes students’ unions can help colleges recruit student governors, positions that can otherwise be difficult to fill.

But she warns against colleges treating their unions simply as an extension of their own enrichment department.

“There should be a separate enrichment team for that purpose, fully led by staff, whereas the union is a democratic body led by students,” she says.

And she encourages governors to be “bold” and highlight issues that might not otherwise appear on a board’s agenda: unreliable timetables, cafeteria prices, staffing quality and the practical barriers facing learners.

She is similarly concerned about the availability and quality of apprenticeships.

At Dudley, she witnessed a sharp decline in opportunities. The college reported that apprenticeship vacancies had fallen from 700 in 2024 to 200 by December 2025.

Ahmad wants apprentices to have guaranteed access to off-the-job training, as well as stronger protections against discrimination, harassment and unsafe working conditions. Apprentices, she argues, must acquire meaningful skills rather than being treated as “cheap labour”.

Dudley College Campus photography 2024 .Picture by Shaun Fellows / Shine Pix Ltd

Democracy without a union?

The government’s plans to lower the voting age to 16 could give colleges a new role in political education, presenting an opportunity for NUS.

Students’ unions can organise debates, hustings and campaigns, introducing young people to democratic participation before they enter the polling booth.

“Students’ unions can be really good places to share views and have those tricky conversations,” Ahmad says.

The NUS is campaigning to simplify voter registration, including through arrangements that would allow colleges and universities to register students automatically.

Ahmad sees an opportunity for colleges to become centres of democratic participation. But political engagement is becoming increasingly contentious.

The NUS has launched a campaign called ‘Fighting far-right hate with love’, providing students with a six-week course of actions to “erode the power of the divisive far-right rhetoric that is currently so loud”.

The organisation has also faced criticism over its own handling of political disputes, particularly allegations of antisemitism in 2022, with former NUS president, now defence secretary, Wes Streeting a prominent critic of the union at the time.

Ahmad is currently involved in a DfE and University of Salford initiative to develop a national community cohesion framework for colleges, universities and students’ unions.

The framework is intended to help institutions strengthen belonging, inclusion, student relationships and civic participation amid concerns about antisemitism and other forms of hatred.

A movement searching for its future

Three days a week, Ahmad stays in a London hotel while working from the NUS’s co-working office in Hoxton.

For the rest of the week, she returns to Dudley’s students’ union, maintaining contact with the learners whose experiences brought her into politics.

In December, the NUS is holding a strategy exchange for students’ union CEOs to consider the next decade of post-16 education and the student movement.

Ahmad hopes to leave office in two years having achieved at least some of her manifesto commitments, and for more people to understand what FE is without her having to explain it.

If she succeeds, the shy teenager who once spoke only to her teacher could help give a generation of college learners a voice.

She feels “very lucky” to be where she is. But luck will not be enough to revive a once-proud movement.

Budget 2026: Apprentice minimum wage to rise to £8.31 an hour

Apprentices will receive a 31p-an-hour minimum wage increase next April – the smallest percentage rise in the rate since 2021, the chancellor announced in today’s budget.

John Healey has accepted the Low Pay Commission’s recommendations to raise the apprentice rate by 3.9 per cent, from £8 to £8.31 an hour, from 1 April 2027.

The increase is smaller than the 6 per cent rise introduced this April and the 18 per cent uplift in 2025. The rate was increased by 21 per cent in 2024.

The rate is the minimum that must be paid to all apprentices aged under 19 and to those aged 19 or over during the first year of their apprenticeship. Older apprentices who have completed their first year must be paid at least the minimum wage for their age.

The same £8.31 rate will apply to non-apprentice 16 and 17 year old workers. The minimum wage for 18 to 20 year olds will increase from £10.85 to £11.27, while the national living wage for workers aged 21 and above will rise from £12.71 to £13.21.

All four rates will increase by 3.9 per cent. In recent years, younger workers have seen their minimum wage rates rise faster than adults. The Treasury estimated the increase across the workforce will benefit around 2.3 million workers.

Higher apprentice wages have prompted debate over whether young people are being priced out of apprenticeships, particularly in small businesses.

It also comes ahead of Alan Milburn’s long-awaited final inquiry report on tackling youth unemployment, which is expected in November.

During his budget speech in the House of Commons, Healey said the government will respond to Milburn’s report by the end of the year and introduce a white paper “early in 2027” with legislation to follow.

‘Savings’ to fund extra apprenticeship brokerage pilots

The chancellor also confirmed today the government is providing an extra £100 million across 2027-28 and 2028-29 to expand mayoral apprenticeship brokerage pilots to 14 mayoral strategic authorities across England.

Ministers last year allocated an initial £140 million, to be funded from the Department for Work and Pensions’ annual apprenticeship budget, to fund the pilot in seven areas. This appears to be the first time growth and skills levy funds will be used to fund initiatives beyond training and incentives.

But Healey, who first revealed more cash was on its way to extend the “football scouts for apprenticeships” scheme at Labour’s party conference last month, said today that the additional £100 million would be funded from “savings from welfare fraud and error”.

This suggests that only part of the £240 million total pot for local apprenticeship brokerage services will come from England’s annual apprenticeship budget.

The Treasury press office later confirmed to FE Week that the additional £100 million will not be funded from the apprenticeships budget.

Union Learning Funding returns

The budget also confirmed £15 million a year from financial year 2027-28 to restore the union learning fund, which will provide grants to union-led projects that support workers retrain and develop skills.

FE Week reported in September that Healey intended to revive the scheme, which the Conservatives scrapped in 2021.

Before its abolition, it funded union learning representatives to help workers access education and training, often through existing providers.

The Treasury’s costings put the fund’s fiscal cost at £20 million in both 2027-28 and 2028-29, £5 million a year higher than the programme budget. The document does not explain the difference.

Youth employment schemes

The government’s existing youth employment and skills programmes were costed at £665 million over the next two years, with £290 million allocated in 2027-28 and £375 million in 2028-29.

The previously announced measures include £3,000 grants for employers hiring unemployed 18 to 24-year-olds, £2,000 payments for smaller businesses recruiting young apprentices, and an expansion of the jobs guarantee to 22 to 24-year-olds.

Separate Treasury policy costings reveal ministers expect the jobs guarantee expansion to save £60 million in universal credit payments over two years, including £25 million in 2027-28 and £35 million in 2028-29.

The savings are based on lower benefit payments to young people entering subsidised employment. The Treasury’s calculations also assume some participants will leave their jobs before completing the full six months.

The national jobs guarantee rollout is due to begin in November, offering eligible 18 to 24-year-olds who have spent 18 months on Universal Credit a fully funded six-month job.

Last week the government announced 12 organisations, including Leeds College of Building, have been selected to run the scheme across 25 areas.

HE franchise crackdown savings

The Treasury expects to save almost £1 billion over six years through its crackdown on higher education franchising.

Budget costings forecast savings of £200 million in 2028-29, rising to £225 million by 2031-32, with £100 million in savings expected before the new rules take effect.

Providers teaching 300 or more students on behalf of universities will have to register with the Office for Students from September 2028 for their courses to remain eligible for student finance.

The reforms follow concerns about fraud and poor-quality provision amid a rapid expansion of franchised higher education.

FE colleges and sixth-form colleges are exempt from the additional registration requirement.

Devolution must not treat London as the place that copes

Maybe it’s because I grew up in London, but devolution looks different when viewed through the eyes of the young people in the capital.

Devolution has the potential to transform skills systems across England. Giving regions greater control over skills, economic development and workforce planning should create more responsive local systems and bring decision-making closer to employers and communities.

But as powers, influence and resources move away from Whitehall and towards regions, there is a risk that London is viewed as a place that can cope without additional attention or investment. That assumption would be a mistake.

London’s FE colleges sit at the centre of one of the country’s most complex and economically significant skills ecosystems. They serve learners from every background, support employers across some of the UK’s most productive sectors and play a critical role in promoting social mobility.

Yet despite being one of the wealthiest cities in the world, London combines extraordinary wealth with deep pockets of poverty and inequality. Around 27 per cent of Londoners live in poverty, while child poverty remains particularly acute in boroughs such as Hackney, where I was born. In some communities, more than half of children are growing up in poverty.

That matters because devolution can create growing differences between regions in how support is delivered. As powers diverge, young people may increasingly encounter different skills entitlements, apprenticeship opportunities and support services depending on where they live.

Capital costs

For London colleges, there is another challenge: cost.

Colleges in the capital face operating pressures that are often more acute than elsewhere. They compete with higher-paying industries for specialist teaching staff. They operate within a labour market shaped by exceptionally high housing costs. Many work from ageing estates where maintenance, refurbishment and development costs are substantial.

Yet national funding rates do not always reflect these realities.

A London college principal recently told me that the challenges facing colleges are broadly the same wherever you go in the country. In some respects that is true. Every college is grappling with recruitment pressures, constrained budgets and rising expectations.

But the cost of delivery in London is different.

The government’s ambitions for construction, digital skills, green industries and economic growth depend on colleges being able to recruit and retain staff with industry experience. That challenge is particularly acute in London, where qualified professionals can often command significantly higher salaries outside education.

As devolution gathers pace, London colleges cannot simply absorb policy change. They must help shape it.

A stronger collective voice

London’s FE sector needs a stronger collective voice. Colleges should be positioning themselves as anchor institutions within London’s growth sectors and more central to workforce planning, economic development and community opportunity.

The capital needs a skills system that reflects the whole learner journey, from 16-19 education through to adult retraining. Bringing planning for both together would create a more coherent approach to workforce development and strengthen the link between education and employment.

The success of devolution will ultimately be judged by whether it creates a more coherent skills system, delivers the ambitions of Skills England and gives local areas a meaningful role in workforce planning.

The real danger is not devolution itself, but a fragmented skills system that weakens national coordination.

Devolution should be welcomed. But it must not be built on the assumption that all London communities are affluent or that the capital’s educational and social challenges have already been solved.

London is more than the City, Canary Wharf and Westminster. It is also Hackney, Newham, Southwark and countless other communities where colleges play a vital role in creating opportunity.

If power is being redistributed across England, we must ensure opportunity follows it.

The young people who need support most can be found in Hackney as well as Hull, Newham as well as Newcastle. A successful devolved skills system should expand opportunity everywhere, not simply move it from one place to another.

Fewer classes, fewer teachers, more time behind cell doors

Changes to prison education contracts made in October 2025 resulted in a 25 per cent cut to planned education hours across the prison estate in England. One year on, we look at what this has meant for learners in prison and the staff who support them.

Since the new Prisoner Education Services (PES) contracts came into effect – covering literacy and numeracy courses up to level 2, as well as ICT, English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) and vocational training – there are fewer classes available in the vast majority of prisons.

Education at 84 of the 94 establishments covered by these contracts was cut, with an average decrease in education hours of 28 per cent. Six prisons lost more than half of their planned hours.

By last December, at least 300 prison education staff had been made redundant, with the University and College Union (UCU) reporting “course closures, reduced purposeful activity and increased strain on staff.”

In some prisons, the cuts have contributed to people spending more time in their cells.

At one of the establishments which faced cuts of more than 50 per cent, HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP) found over 4 in 10 men there spent less than three hours a day out of their cells. They highlighted that this inactivity was contributing to “high rates of self-harm”.

Ofsted inspections reflect the impact of the cuts. There have been inspection reports published on 25 prisons covered by the new PES contracts since they were introduced. Of these, just four (16 per cent) were rated “good”. This has reversed the progress made in recent years; The proportion of prisons rated “good” had increased to 31 per cent in 2024-25, the last full year before the new contracts were introduced.

The contracts have also not increased classroom attendance, a key argument for making the cuts. Average attendance has been 65 per cent. Under the previous contracts it was 73 per cent.

Curricula are now narrower. Independent Monitoring Boards (IMBs) reported that vocational training has been hit particularly hard, with popular courses “stripped back or removed completely.” At one category C prison, HMIP found much of the vocational training had ended. They described another establishment as “utterly failing to fulfil its remit as a training prison.”

IMBs have also highlighted concerns about cuts to creative learning and arts provision, as well as reporting that ESOL has been “removed entirely or curtailed across many prisons” including at specialist foreign national establishments. This is particularly concerning given Sole’s status as part of core provision in contracts.

People with learning difficulties have been disproportionately affected, with support cut back across multiple establishments. Despite 2026 being the national year of reading in prisons (and now a key focus of the new Ofsted inspection framework), specialist reading teachers have either been cut or are under threat because of insufficient funding. HMIP have said this “risked the progress of the prisoners most at need.”

There has inevitably been a knock-on impact for the distance learning that Prisoners’ Education Trust provides access to, essential for learners to progress to higher academic levels.

Our team is aware of least one prison that has stopped offering distance learning altogether, while others have reduced the staff capacity available to support provision. Some establishments have introduced waiting lists or caps on application numbers.

Yet at the same time we have seen a significant increase in demand, as people in prison look for opportunities to learn. Over the past twelve months we have received over 3,300 applications for distance learning courses, an increase of 12 per cent.

Our commitment to learners in prison is unwavering, reaffirmed in our new five-year strategy published this month, with its continuing focus on excellence in distance learning provision, alongside innovation in digital learning.

The devastating cuts to prison education provision have added to the stresses already seen across the system. Prison educators already felt isolated and undervalued, and their morale has now taken a further significant hit.

Education in prison is proven to reduce reoffending and get more people into work. The cuts should be reversed and the government should properly fund education so that all prisons can focus on rehabilitation.

Misogyny is changing our classrooms – and colleges need help

Colleges across the UK are overlooking a cultural shift that is as swift as it is unsettling.

Misogyny, incel ideology and far-right influence – packaged through manosphere narratives – have migrated from digital echo chambers into classrooms, corridors, and campus social spaces.

What once seemed like an online problem is now a lived reality for educators and students, especially female staff who face rising hostility in their daily professional lives.

The FE sector, already stretched by funding constraints and safeguarding demands, is being asked to manage a cultural crisis without the tools, training, or national guidance required to do so.

Media, Music, and the Confusion of Early Masculinity

This crisis is not confined to extremist corners of the internet. It has seeped into mainstream media, particularly the music and promotional videos shaping young men’s early sexual awareness. At the moment FE learners begin to understand desire, relationships, and gender, they are confronted with a landscape saturated with sexualised imagery and contradictory messages.

Sexualised performance – from rock to rap to contemporary pop – is acted out to lyrics that oscillate between empowerment and misogynistic tropes.

Young men are often left to interpret these messages alone, without structured guidance or critical literacy. Their first encounters with female sexuality are filtered through commercialised eroticism and gendered power play.

And FE offers no consistent curriculum space to help them make sense of this.

The silence leaves a vacuum easily filled by manosphere narratives that promise clarity through hostility.

Looksmaxxing, softmaxxing, hardmaxxing

Alongside sexualised media, new pressures emerge from online communities centred on “looksmaxxing,” “softmaxxing,” and “hardmaxxing.”

Once obscure, these terms now circulate widely among students navigating appearance-based anxieties, algorithmic radicalisation, and rigid expectations of masculinity.

Looksmaxxing culture promotes obsessive self-improvement, cosmetic enhancement and the belief that male worth is measured through dominance, aesthetics and sexual success.

Yet educators have received no training on how to discuss these issues, no guidance on identifying harmful behaviours, and no framework for supporting students caught in these digital currents.

FE staff are expected to manage a cultural shift they were never prepared for.

AI–enabled misogyny

AI-enabled misogyny adds another layer of urgency.

Deepfake pornography targets female students and staff. AI-generated harassment, and doctored images circulated in group chats have become an uncontrolled tool with few safeguards from technology companies.

In colleges, more male students challenge the authority of female staff while deferring to male colleagues.

These incidents are no longer hypothetical – they are present and recurring.

Yet most FE institutions have minimal guidance on AI abuse, and few have policies robust enough to address the scale of the threat.

The gap between updated Department for Education guidance (KCSIE, 1 September 2026) and the practical skills required to manage these situations leaves staff vulnerable and safeguarding teams overwhelmed.

The manosphere moves offline

The manosphere – promoting male grievance, anti-feminist rhetoric, and gendered hostility – has become a cultural force shaping attitudes and behaviours in FE settings. Students reference misogynistic influencers, including those currently incarcerated, as authoritative voices on gender and identity.

Research from the University of York shows that over three quarters of secondary school teachers have raised concerns about rising misogyny, while over a quarter of students openly discuss influencers such as the Tate brothers.

Fourteen percent of teachers report male students disrespecting female staff more than male staff, signalling a gendered power dynamic that undermines classroom safety. This shift is ideological, reinforced by algorithmic radicalisation that educators cannot compete with.

The impact on staff – Especially Black and global majority women

The consequences for staff, particularly Black and global majority women, are profound.

Anecdotal feedback suggests rising disrespect, accusations of feminist bias, and emotional exhaustion from managing misogynistic behaviour daily.

Many describe subtle, persistent hostility; others describe fear of retaliation or being undermined by male colleagues.

FE leaders must confront an unavoidable question: how are we protecting female staff from growing verbal and digital violence?

Here are my recommendations for FE Leaders:

1 Establish robust AI abuse policies for reporting and sanctioning AI-enabled harassment.

2 Embed digital and gender literacy across GCSE, A-Level, HE, PSHE, and vocational programmes.

3 Provide specialist staff training on misogynistic influencers, digital masculinity, and AI-enabled harm.

4 Create protected spaces for female staff with confidential reporting routes and leadership-backed protections.

5 Build structured discussion spaces for guided conversations on sexuality, media, masculinity, and online pressures.

6 Invest in intersectional safeguarding recognising that misogyny and racism intersect, disproportionately affecting Black and global majority women.

FE colleges are now frontline spaces where misogynistic, racialised, and digitally accelerated ideologies are contested daily.

The question is whether the sector will be empowered – politically, financially, and structurally – to meet this moment.

The cost of inaction will be borne by female staff, female students, and the integrity of the learning environment itself.

No plumbers, no homes: The skills crisis threatening Britain’s building ambitions

Plumbers are as essential to this country’s housebuilding, data centre and clean energy ambitions as any other trade in construction, but the pipeline replacing them is nowhere near wide enough.

England has lost 25,700 plumbers from its workforce since 2018, a 16 per cent fall in under a decade. On current trends, a further 30 per cent will go by 2039.

That is the finding of JTL’s new workforce modelling, the first analysis to draw together data from across the sector’s main skills card schemes to map the true scale of the workforce.

Built with data and insight from the Office for National Statistics, the Department for Education, the Joint Industry Board for Plumbing and Mechanical Engineering Services and the Building Engineering Services Association, together with other industry partners, it gives the sector the clearest picture of its own workforce it has ever had.

Apprentices make up just 5.2 per cent of the plumbing workforce today, less than half the 14.2 per cent apprentice share in electrical. Skills England’s own growth modelling implies the plumbing sector needs more than 8,500 new entrants a year to meet demand. However, the latest full-year figures show just 2,150 started a plumbing apprenticeship in the sector.

Completion rates have also stalled at around 45 per cent, so the number of people finishing a plumbing apprenticeship each year is now roughly half what it was a decade ago.

We don’t think this happened by accident.

The incentive for small and medium-sized employers (SMEs) to take on an apprentice has not kept pace with the real cost of training someone over three or four years. An employer taking on an apprentice on minimum wage over a four-year programme invests between £70,000 and £90,000 in wages and on-boarding costs, and typically only breaks even in year three. Over 95 per cent of employers in this sector are SMEs, most of them micro-businesses, for whom that upfront cost is a much harder barrier to overcome.

New level 2 and 3 plumbing standards designed to simplify entry routes into the trade have also been delayed, leaving training providers and employers working to standards that no longer reflect the job as it is done.

Together, these pressures mean fewer people are entering the trade than are leaving it.

This falls within the context of Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s government setting out some of the most ambitious housebuilding plans in a generation, including his pledge for the biggest council housebuilding programme since the post-war period, alongside tens of billions of pounds of data centre development and the rollout of heat pumps and other low-carbon heating technology central to the clean energy transition.

Every one of those ambitions depends on people who can install and maintain this infrastructure safely. On current trends, the plumbing workforce will not be large enough to deliver them.

We do not think this decline is irreversible, but it will not correct itself without the government taking urgent action.

Raising the SME apprenticeship hiring incentive from £2,000 to £3,000 for under-25 recruits, with a further £3,000 for apprentices on priority construction standards including plumbing, would make taking on an apprentice viable again for more employers.

Designating plumbing a priority occupation in national workforce planning would mean funding and attention follow the sharpest shortfalls, rather than being spread evenly across every trade regardless of need.

Finally, removing the delay to the new level 2 and 3 plumbing standards would increase employer demand, creating more opportunities for young people and let training keep pace with the job as it is now done.

Whilst it is positive to see the government’s focus on technical education, without further support, there will not be the opportunities available for young people to take up trades like plumbing.

Full apprenticeships remain the gold standard route into this trade for good reason, but the pipeline into this trade is too narrow, and every year it goes unfixed, the shortfall gets harder to close. Government, employers and training providers each have a part to play in widening it, because the houses, data centres and heat pumps this country needs will not get built without the people to install them.

Getting young people into jobs is only half the battle

The government’s response to the NEETs (not in education, employment or training) crisis is now beginning to take shape, with more apprenticeships, stronger local routes into work and renewed efforts to help those currently NEET take their first steps into the labour market.

That is welcome. But there is another question we should be asking: what happens once someone gets through the door?

The new local apprenticeship service is designed to create thousands more apprenticeship opportunities, with local teams matching potential recruits with employers and encouraging smaller firms that have never taken on a trainee to do so. It is an important response to the challenge that Alan Milburn identified in his interim report.

But getting someone into a first job is only half the challenge. The job also needs to be “sticky”: a place where a new starter receives the support, management and opportunity they need to stay, learn, earn and progress.

That matters because the barriers to employment do not disappear when someone receives a job offer. Milburn’s interim report highlights the growing prevalence of health conditions among those who are NEET, with anxiety, depression and neuro-developmental conditions among the defining features of the problem. It also found that employers are increasingly concerned about the pastoral support some recruits require, particularly smaller businesses that may not have the resources to provide it.

For employers, this can create a difficult balancing act. A recruit may have the potential and qualifications to do a job, but can need time to build confidence, understand workplace expectations or manage a health condition alongside work. That means that successful workplace integration may require more support than it once did.

Our ‘Bridging the Gap’ research suggests managers see significant gaps in some of the workplace skills new recruits need to develop, including resilience, professionalism, communication and the ability to receive and act on feedback. Almost half of managers have encountered recruits who lack an understanding of workplace-appropriate behaviour, while four in ten have seen a mismatch between academic knowledge and the practical requirements of the job.

These are all skills that can be developed through experience, coaching, feedback and opportunities to practise. The question is therefore not simply whether someone is “work ready”, but whether the workplace is ready to help them become work ready.

For someone entering employment for the first time, the workplace can be full of questions they have never had to ask before. How do I speak up in a meeting? How do I respond when someone tells me I have got something wrong? When is it appropriate to ask for help?

A good manager can turn those moments into opportunities to learn. In a hybrid workplace, where many of those lessons no longer happen naturally through sitting alongside experienced colleagues, that role matters even more.

And the quality of that first management experience can have consequences. Our research found that almost one in three people have left a job because of a negative relationship with their manager, while workers with ineffective managers are more than twice as likely to say they plan to leave their organisation within 12 months.

For those who may already face barriers to employment, a poor early workplace experience can make staying in work harder still. If we want to move people from inactivity into sustainable employment, the first few months demand forethought and investment, not an afterthought.

Managers need time and training to onboard inexperienced recruits, provide regular feedback, create opportunities to learn from colleagues and help new starters navigate the workplace. Our research found that 66 percent of managers see regular check-ins and feedback as one of the most effective ways to integrate new starters, while 89 per cent of managers who have received formal leadership training say it has improved their ability to develop younger employees.

There is a wider economic argument too. When organisations fail to retain and develop early-career employees, they lose the investment made in recruitment and onboarding, while weakening their future talent pipeline. Good management is not a soft add-on to employment policy; it is part of the infrastructure that makes employment sustainable.

The answer is not to tell those who are NEET that they are not “work ready”. Nor is it to assume that a health condition or lack of experience means someone cannot contribute. It is to recognise that readiness for work is developed, and that successful participation depends on the conditions around the individual as well as their own skills and ambition.

Those ambitions are clear. Sixty-four per cent of young people told CMI they want to become leaders at work. We should be asking how we help them realise that potential, rather than allowing a lack of experience to become a permanent barrier. We need to prepare people for work, but we also need to prepare workplaces for them. Management is the bridge between the two.

V Levels must earn trust A Levels built over generations

The level 3 landscape is entering a period of significant change. Alongside A Levels, T Levels are becoming more established, while proposed new V Levels are intended to create clearer pathways for young people after 16.

The ambition behind these reforms is understandable. For decades, governments have sought to address the challenge of achieving genuine parity of esteem between academic and technical education. As ASCL has argued, the deeply ingrained perception that academic routes carry greater status than technical and vocational routes must shift if we are to achieve that goal. Without this change, efforts to build the skills base the country needs are undermined and the talents of many young people risk not being fully recognised or developed.

However, parity of esteem cannot simply be created through qualification reform. It must be earned over time through confidence, credibility and sustained support from employers, universities, schools, colleges, learners and families. If policymakers are serious about creating qualifications with lasting value, there is much they can learn from the enduring success of A Levels.

As principal of St Dominic’s Sixth Form College, a high-performing specialist A Level provider, I see first-hand the continuing demand for academic study. My commitment to A Levels is unwavering. They remain one of the most respected qualifications in the world and continue to be the gold standard of academic study before higher education.

A key reason for their enduring popularity is the flexibility they offer. A Levels allow young people to pursue subjects they find intellectually stimulating while delaying specialisation until they are more certain about their future direction.

It is a rare opportunity for a student to combine physics, classics and mathematics, or music, geography and sociology, simply because those subjects interest them. One of the great strengths of sixth form education is the ability to accommodate ambitious and sometimes unconventional subject combinations. In an education system increasingly focused on specialisation, that freedom retains enormous value.

A Levels are also respected because they are rigorous. The sustained application of knowledge and skills over two years develops intellectual depth, independent learning and critical thinking. Their reputation has been built over decades through consistent standards and a clear purpose. Any qualification seeking similar levels of public confidence will also need to establish a reputation for rigour, reliability and quality.

Perhaps most importantly, A Levels help young people develop attributes that will serve them throughout their lives. Success requires resilience, determination, self-discipline and commitment. These qualities matter enormously in a labour market being reshaped by technological change, artificial intelligence and economic uncertainty.

None of this diminishes the importance of technical and vocational education. High-quality technical pathways are essential if we are to meet future workforce needs and provide opportunities for young people with different talents, interests and ambitions.

However, there should be caution about the pace at which new qualifications are introduced. If V Levels are to succeed, they will need more than a place within funding systems, performance measures or UCAS tariff tables. They will need genuine brand recognition.

A Levels are recognised and understood by virtually every parent, employer and university. Young people know what they represent and the opportunities they can unlock. That recognition was not created overnight. It has been built over generations and is a major reason why the qualification continues to command such confidence and esteem.

The experience of T Levels illustrates how challenging this process can be. Although they offer considerable strengths, it has taken years to build awareness and understanding among learners, employers and the wider public. Establishing a trusted qualification brand takes time.

For that reason, there is a risk that the introduction of V Levels is being rushed. A longer lead-in period could have helped schools, colleges, employers and universities develop a clearer understanding of their purpose and value. If parity of esteem is the goal, policymakers must recognise that esteem is built gradually through consistency, quality and trust.

The future level 3 landscape should see A Levels, T Levels and high-quality vocational qualifications sitting alongside one another. But if V Levels are to enjoy the same confidence that A Levels command today, they must be given the time needed to establish their identity, earn trust and build a reputation that endures. That is perhaps the most important lesson that the success of A Levels can teach us.

Innovate Awarding fined £185k after centre certificated learners in 24 hours

An awarding body that failed to investigate suspected malpractice at a training provider until it registered and certified more than 100 learners in less than 24 hours has been fined £185,000 by Ofqual.

Innovate Awarding has now revoked almost all of the 851 level 3 business administration certificates issued to learners at one of its centres between 2023 and 2024, following a probe by the qualifications regulator.

Ofqual said Innovate failed to carry out adequate approval checks, monitoring or investigations, and did not review certificates already issued despite evidence the centre had been registering and certificating learners improperly for “many months”.

FE Week understands the centre, which Ofqual names only as ‘centre A’ in its notice of fine today, is EPIC Graduate School Ltd, based in east London. The company has not responded to requests for comment.

Innovate first raised concerns about the centre on 18 January 2024, after 130 learners were registered and certificated within a day, and removed its direct claim status. The qualification has 580 hours of total qualification time.

Innovate later sanctioned the centre, ended its relationship with it and closed its investigation, after the centre said on 31 July 2024 that 108 learners awaiting certification had been withdrawn.

But that investigation looked only at the 108 learners and did not consider the 851 already certificated through the centre, Ofqual said.

Innovate only widened its inquiry to those learners after discussions with Ofqual in February 2025. It completed the revocation of 847 of the 851 certificates, which Ofqual said were “wrongly awarded”, in August 2026, more than two years after concerns first emerged.

Innovate will also pay £15,000 of Ofqual’s costs on top of the £185,000 fine.

EPIC Graduate School, based in Forest Gate, east London, is a training provider set up in 2021. According to the company’s website, it offers privately funded courses in business administration and emergency first aid at work, alongside testing for door supervision and CCTV operatives.

‘Reckless rather than merely negligent’

According to the penalty notice, issued today following a final decision by Ofqual’s enforcement panel on 2 October, Innovate Awarding missed “numerous opportunities” to prevent the centre’s malpractice and showed a “reckless” disregard of its own controls for preventing potential qualification fraud.

But by the time a wider inquiry was launched in March 2025, after Ofqual flagged concerns about the initial investigation, learner records and contact information were “unavailable” and the opportunity to gather evidence “had largely been lost”.

In its comments on aggravating features of the case, the exam regulator said Innovate Awarding could “easily” have avoided the breaches by taking basic steps before approving the centre, when monitoring it, and after indications of malpractice came to light.

It added: “There were widespread system and controls issues, and a disregard of established processes and policies which appeared reckless rather than merely negligent.

“Although there were flaws with [Innovate Awarding’s] policies at the time, it appears likely that adverse effects would have been avoided had it followed those polices.”

‘Large scale’ impact

Innovate Awarding’s failures to identify malpractice also had a “large scale” impact due to more than 800 certificates which can be used as evidence of English language competence remaining valid for a “prolonged period” before being revoked.

Ofqual said the awarding business breached several of its own policies, including awarding the centre direct claims status, which allowed the centre to claim certificates without external quality assurance approval, after only 30 working days and samples of four learner portfolios.

Innovate’s own policies required at least 12 months of monitoring before awarding this status, and a review of ten learner portfolios.

The centre’s approval was also given “without adequate independent verification” of evidence, which included external quality assurance reports that contained “clear anomalies”, and limited assessment of risk indicators such as “links to sanctioned centres, phoenix organisations or connected businesses.

Innovate Awarding failed to recognise or escalate “significant warning signs” including an April 2024 external quality assurance report that identified learner evidence that appeared to be “several years old”, was “lacking authenticity”, used incorrect names, and “redacted” documents, Ofqual said.

The centre exceeded its annual learner registration forecast of at most 250 within about four months and “frequently” registered and certificated within one or two days, despite the business administration qualification requiring 580 hours.

Ofqual said Innovate Awarding did not routinely monitor its registration data and only escalated concerns about the centre when “exceptionally high” learner volumes appeared in January 2024.

‘No concerns’

During the investigation, Innovate said it had “no concerns” about the centre because it “responded promptly to requests and made payments on time”, according to the notice.

Ofqual also found “weak data management, record keeping and oversight”, including a lack of accurate and auditable records.

Amanda Swann, Executive Director for Delivery at Ofqual, said: “The value of qualifications depends on public confidence that they are awarded fairly and earned legitimately.

“Innovate Awarding failed to respond effectively to serious concerns raised about qualifications delivered through one of its centres. Weak controls increased the risk of qualification fraud and allowed certificates to remain in place despite doubts about whether some learners had genuinely met the qualification’s requirements.

“These are significant failings that undermine trust in qualifications and warrant a substantial financial penalty.”

Rob May, managing director of Innovate Awarding, said the company acknowledges Ofqual’s notice about “historical compliance matters from 2024”.

He added: “When concerns were raised, Innovate took action to investigate the matter, reported it to Ofqual and cooperated fully throughout the regulatory process. We are no longer working with the training provider concerned.

“Since the issues were identified, we have implemented a range of enhancements to our compliance, governance and quality assurance processes to strengthen oversight across the organisation.

“Our priority remains delivering high-quality services and maintaining the confidence of our learners, customers and stakeholders. We are committed to continuous improvement and meeting the standards expected by the regulator.”