Supreme Court holiday pay ruling could ‘open the floodgates’ for claims

Education employers will have to review holiday pay arrangements of term-time-only workers and may face legal claims for back-pay following a landmark court ruling.

An employment appeal tribunal ruled in 2018 that Bedford Girls School music teacher Lesley Brazel was underpaid because of the way her holiday pay was calculated.

Today, the Supreme Court quashed an appeal by the school’s parent charity, the Harpur Trust.

It means employers with permanent staff on term-time-only contracts must from now on calculate their holiday pay based on the hours they work in a normal week, rather than paying them pro-rata based on the number of weeks they work each year.

Legal experts and professional bodies today warned the case would have huge ramifications for schools, colleges and other employers, with those paid incorrectly potentially entitled to back pay.

The Incorporated Society of Musicians, which supported Brazel in her legal action, said the case “could improve holiday pay for thousands of workers in the education sector and beyond”.

Chief executive Deborah Annetts said music teachers “often go above and beyond for their students but all too often they are not treated in the way they deserve”.

A spokesperson for the Harpur Trust said the ruling “will have significant cost implications for a number of sectors, including state and independent schools, the care sector and higher education”. 

Ruling will create ‘significant financial burden’

Joanne Moseley, an employment lawyer at Irwin Mitchell, said the “significant decision” would be a “blow to many thousands of employers across the UK who, up until now, have pro-rated holiday entitlement to reflect the number of weeks employees work each year”.

“Many employers have adopted a ‘wait and see’ approach but we’re now at the end of the road. We’ve seen that organisations have been caught out by previous holiday pay rulings and this one is sure to place a significant financial burden, which could run into millions of pounds, for many.”

Nick Hurley, partner at law firm Charles Russell Speechlys, said the ruling would make “holiday pay much more expensive for employers who have this type of arrangement and is most likely to affect those in the education sector”.

“This could open the floodgates for other part-year permanent workers who have had their holiday calculated incorrectly to bring claims for unlawful deductions from wages for any difference in what they have been paid and what they should have received, although there is a two-year backstop on these claims.”

Trust was wrong to ‘pro-rate’ holiday pay

Brazel, who has taught the saxophone and clarinet at Bedford since 2002, took her case to employment tribunal following a change to her pay in 2011. She worked variable hours each week during term time and is only paid for what she teaches.

The trust had previously calculated her holiday pay based on what she would earn in an average week and multiplied it by 5.6, the statutory number of weeks of leave in England, ignoring any weeks in which she did not receive any pay.

But from 2011, the Trust changed its method and calculated the total number of hours Brazel worked each term, took 12.07 per cent of that figure and paid her for that number of hours.

This was based on guidance from the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, which has since been rewritten.

Although the first employment tribunal dismissed her claim, she successfully appealed, with the employment appeal tribunal ruling that her holiday pay should be based on a normal working week.

The Harper Trust appealed, but the Court of Appeal rejected their appeal in 2019, again ruling that the so-called “calendar week method” was the correct implementation of the law.

Employers must ‘immediately change’ practices

The Supreme Court ruled today the Court of Appeal was “correct” to reach that view.

“In short, the amount of leave to which a part-year worker under a permanent contract is entitled is not required by EU law to be, and under domestic law is not, prorated to that of a full-time worker.”

In an example included in the judgment, the court said Brazel’s pay for the Easter holiday in 2013 would have been £687.26 under the calendar week method, compared to £452.20 under the pro-rated approach.

Lesley Rennie, principal employment solicitor at WorkNest, said many employers would need to “immediately change their holiday pay practices”.

But they will also need to “assess their historic liability and make a judgement call on whether to make a back-payment in respect of any holiday pay underpayments or to bear the risk of a claim”.

“Employers should be mindful that if this case is widely reported, employees are more likely to be aware of it and assert their rights.”

Brazel said the case had been “long and arduous”, but she was “pleased to have secured my holiday pay rights, in accordance with the law and my contract of employment, in the highest court in the country”.

“I hope that others can now benefit from this verdict.”

The Harper Trust said: “We welcome the clarity that this judgement brings and will now focus on determining our next steps in ensuring that holiday pay is adjusted for those affected.”

Our T Level success depends on big improvements in literacy and numeracy

Improving English and maths attainment is not exactly a new priority for government and it will be tough to do, writes David Robinson

I was pleased to read in FE Week that the vast majority of the first cohort of students taking T Levels, and their FE providers, found the new courses to be a genuinely positive experience.

Given the scale of this ambitious reform, it could easily have been otherwise.  Looking ahead, it will be fascinating to see what these students progress onto, and what their eventual employment outcomes will be.

There have been concerns about the experience of T Level students, with the availability of work placements being amongst the most common.

However, whilst T Levels so far look like a rewarding qualification for students, the more pressing issue relates to which students will pursue them in the future, and what the options are for those that don’t.

The option for alternative programmes of study became clearer in May, when the Department for Education (DfE) published a provisional list of 160 qualifications that overlap with the initial T Levels.

Upon the completion of an appeals process, qualifications still on the list will be defunded from 2024.

Their removal is certainly a live issue, and was debated in parliament this week. This follows a petition urging the reversal of plans to remove funding for BTECs gaining 108,000 signatures.

Those against the proposals argue that reducing choice will harm progression for many young people.

On the other hand, the government point toward a need to streamline post-16 education, noting that some BTECs will continue to be funded.

To improve understanding of what the removal of these qualifications may mean for young people, the Education Policy Institute undertook an analysis.

We wanted to see how many students in previous cohorts took overlapping qualifications, and whether they would have been able to take T Levels instead.

Our analysis showed one-third of students taking level 3 technical or applied general qualifications were taking qualifications that may be defunded.

The issue is particularly acute amongst education students, where as many as nine in ten would be affected. Once the overlapping qualifications have been defunded, these students may be expected to take T Levels.

However, around a third of these students may not be ready for the more demanding nature of T Levels.

The challenge may be greater for construction students, with almost half potentially not ready for T Levels. 

The demanding nature of T Levels may present barriers to significant take-up

Specifically, over a quarter of students (27 per cent) don’t achieve at least a grade 4 in GCSE English and maths.

Previously, it was necessary to achieve this threshold to secure a full T Level pass. This requirement has since been removed, but it nevertheless remains a common requirement, from providers in order to access T Levels.

Concerningly, almost a third (32 per cent) of health students haven’t achieved these grades. This is followed by 27, 26 and 22 per cent of education, construction and digital students respectively.

In addition, almost one in six students (16 per cent) were taking smaller study programmes than T Levels, suggesting they may not have the appetite or capacity for a larger qualification.

These figures are derived from cohorts without access to T Levels, and as the new qualifications are fully rolled out, many factors will influence their take-up.

Indeed, DfE has introduced a transition year to support students to progress onto T Levels, and this analysis does not take account of that.

Nevertheless, it’s clear the demanding nature of T Levels may present barriers to significant take-up.

This may particularly be the case for students interested in education qualifications, given so many alternatives may be removed, and for those interested in construction, given the step up in qualification size and how few students appear to have the necessary GCSE grades.

More broadly, policymakers will need to consider how to enable more young people to achieve the GCSE grades to access T Levels.

This will be tough. Improving English and maths attainment at age 16 would not exactly be a new priority for the government.

And, despite several years of the resit policy being in place, it’s still the case that (prior to the centre/teacher assessed grades of the pandemic) less than half of students improve their grade upon resit.

Without the government doubling down on existing efforts, many of these students may take one of the remaining non-T Level qualifications.

But the fear is that more students will instead opt for lower-level qualifications or drop-out of education altogether.

This is concerning, not least as almost two in five young people don’t achieve a full level 3 by the age of 19.

T Levels appear to be a good option for many students. But DfE must tread carefully to ensure the success of their new qualifications, without creating a new fault line in the progression of young people.

DfE updates incorrect level 3 review impact assessment

The government has updated a report that outlines the impact its controversial reforms to level 3 qualifications will have, after the original was based on incorrect data.

Officials have stressed that the revisions do not change the direction of policy travel, which includes defunding applied general qualifications such as BTECs that overlap with T Levels, but the changes do affect the potential scale of the impact.

The revisions show a marginal decrease in the proportion of government-funded qualifications currently available at level 3 that may be axed. But level 3 qualifications for adults face a slightly bigger impact than first estimated, while more awarding organisations will also be damaged.

But the Sixth Form Colleges Association warned that this updated impact assessment “still shows that a significant proportion of level 3 qualifications are unlikely to feature in the future landscape”, which doesn’t square with ministerial promises that only a “small proportion” of will be removed.

What went wrong?

The DfE published the original ‘review of post-16 qualifications at level 3 in England: impact assessment’ in July 2021.

But this was based on an “incorrect cohort of 16- to 19-year-olds”, rather than the latest available data.

A new baseline list now covers qualifications approved for government funding in scope of the review in the 2019/20 funding year, as of May 2020.

And the enrolment, and associated characteristics, data has been updated from 2018/19 to 2019/20.

Slightly better outlook for 16- to 19-year-olds…

The previous impact assessment concluded that around 60 per cent of qualifications currently available at level 3 “may not fit into the future landscape for young people”. These qualifications represented 16 per cent of all 16 to 19 enrolments at level 3, and 62 per cent of non-A level enrolments at level 3.

Based on the revised mapping, the DfE now estimates that a slightly smaller proportion – around 54 per cent – of qualifications for young people at level 3 may now be defunded. These qualifications represent around 12 per cent of all 16 to 19 enrolments at level 3, and 40 per cent of non-A level enrolments at level 3.

…but a slightly worse outlook for adults

The original impact assessment concluded that of technical qualifications at level 3 that are available through adult funding streams, around 31 per cent may not fit into the future landscape. These qualifications represent 19 per cent of adult enrolments on technical qualifications at level 3.

But the revised estimate shows that 33 per cent of qualifications currently available to adults at level 3 may no longer be available.

No change to proportion of students unable to access level 3

The impact assessment previously estimated that around 4 per cent of 16- to 19-year-olds currently studying at level 3 may not be able to progress directly to level 3 following the reforms.

Repeating the same methodology using the revised mapping of current qualifications to the updated 2019/20 data, this leads to a “reduction in this estimate”. However, this reduction is “relatively small, and is lost within the rounding”.

A few more awarding bodies will be hit

Based on the first indicative mapping exercise, the reforms could have reduced up to seven awarding organisations’ publicly funded 16 to 19 year old enrolments by 80 per cent or more.

Using the same methodology, but with the updated data, the DfE now finds that up to 10 awarding bodies, out of more than 130, could see their publicly funded 16- to 19-year-old enrolments at level 3 and below fall by 80 per cent or more. Four of these AOs have over 500 government-funded 16 to 19 enrolments at these levels.

Black students no longer expected to be highly affected by reforms

The previous impact assessment concluded that 16- to 19-year-olds from SEND (special educational needs and disability) backgrounds, black and Asian ethnic groups, and males could be particularly impacted by the proposals. Students from disadvantaged backgrounds could also be particularly affected.

Based on the revised mapping, this assessment “remains broadly the same”, with those from SEND backgrounds, Asian ethnic groups, disadvantaged backgrounds, and males disproportionately likely to be affected.

But following the “additional flexibility on the future academic landscape, and the accompanying updated mapping and data”, students from black ethnic groups are “no longer anticipated to be disproportionately highly affected.

However, those from white ethnic groups are “now slightly more likely to be impacted”.

Revised impact assessment still concerns colleges

James Kewin, deputy chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association, said: “This updated impact assessment still shows that a significant proportion of level 3 qualifications are still unlikely to feature in the future landscape. This is hard to square with the government’s assurance that only a ‘small proportion’ of qualifications will be defunded.

“As applied general qualifications have only recently been reformed, and many will be scrutinised through the T Level overlap process, they should not have to go through a further approval process.

“The uncertainty created by this interminable review process is very unhelpful, and the sooner it is brought to a conclusion, the better.”

Ofsted denounces continued use of online teaching in latest education recovery research

Ofsted has raised concerns over some further education providers reverting back to online learning over the spring without a clear reason for doing so.

The inspectorate published its latest findings today into the recovery of education from the Covid-19 pandemic, with three reports covering early years, schools, and further education and skills.

It follows previous reports in the spring and autumn and assesses what the key issues are and how the sector has been recovering.

The report was informed by discussions among Ofsted staff and inspections carried out between April 25 and May 27 of independent specialist colleges, seven further education colleges, two sixth-form colleges and one local authority and adult education provider. Inspection findings from seven independent training providers with high-needs provision and adult education courses were also reviewed.

Here are the key findings…

Switch back to remote learning rings alarm bells

Ofsted reported that “in a small number of cases” some providers had switched back to, or retained, remote learning and off-the-job training in apprenticeships where there was no clear benefit for doing so.

It said that while remote learning can be useful in some courses, it can also narrow the opportunities for developing skills and limit social engagement with peers and staff.

That was especially problematic in instances where practical skills are needed, such as brick laying or car mechanics, and is especially important for younger learners in their social development.

Chief inspector Amanda Spielman said: “Across all phases of education, we’re seeing creative and resilient responses to the ongoing challenges of Covid-19. But I am concerned that some learners in a small minority of further education and skills providers are still not receiving sufficient classroom teaching or off-the-job training.

“This is narrowing their opportunities to gain practical skills and limiting their social engagement, which could have serious consequences on their readiness for the workplace.

“No matter how good online teaching is, it’s just not possible to change brake pads, cut hair or lay bricks remotely. And having just a few hours on site each week doing practical activity isn’t enough for younger learners to gain the skills and experience they’ll need in the workplace.”

Spielman continued: “It may be better from a business or financial perspective for providers to use online or remote learning, but this should only be done where there is a clear benefit for learners.

“We’ve seen how the youngest children, who spent most of their lives in lockdown, have struggled with starting school. But the transition from education or training to the workplace is just as dramatic. Learners need to have the confidence and social skills to work alongside their colleagues – not only other young people, but also adults who might be decades older than them.”

Release for off-the-job training stymied

Staff shortages and pressures on businesses resulted in some employers failing to release their apprentices for the mandatory off-the-job training element of their learning.

Ofsted said that firms were struggling to balance training with the day-to-day demands of running their businesses. Areas like hospitality, travel and tourism, and health and social care were particular areas this was happening.

Staff shortages had also amounted to high workloads on some apprentices who were having to fill the gaps.

Functional skills snubbed

Learners that missed functional skills during the pandemic often don’t understand the importance of the subjects, and opted to duck the learning coming back, according to Ofsted.

In some cases, timetables for maths and English had been compressed in an attempt to help learners catch up in practical and vocational skills, resulting in not enough time being allowed to make good progress in those two areas.

Changes for work placements in health and social care

Challenges in securing work placements are easing, the watchdog says, but industries which were hit hard by the pandemic, such as health and social care, still struggled.

It said some health and social care settings were too busy to train staff or were reticent about new people on their premises.

In addition, tasks they were doing were not always appropriate for their course, citing examples of some nursing associate apprentices having to carry out porter duties or work in pharmacies rather than in patient-facing care.

Ofsted praised the hard work of providers to secure new placements with either new contacts or re-establishing partnerships halted during the pandemic.

Paused learning continues for some apprentices

Elsewhere, some apprentices were still on an agreed pause in their learning or still on their programmes beyond their finish date because of delays in training and assessments, or they just were not ready.

Business closures had contributed to that, but in some cases apprentices had found better paid jobs elsewhere and abandoned their courses altogether, the report said.

Finding end-point assessment organisations had proved a struggle, the documents reported, either because there were not enough organisations to carry out the tests or because of sector pressures in areas such as driving tests.

Adult learners are staying away

Many providers have reported declining numbers of adult learners, with some courses closing entirely as a result. That was most prevalent in community learning settings.

However, in some employability courses, interest is higher because adult learners are looking to retrain in a new career.

Anxiety high in the run-up to exams

Ofsted has reported “high levels of anxiety” among learners who sat exams this summer, with many further education learners taking a “high stakes” exam for the first time.

The combination of usual exam pressures with the lack of familiarity of exam procedures had contributed to that, and prompted providers to put in place extra measures such as more mock exams, increased pastoral support or more revision time factored into courses.

Concerns around curriculum re-sequencing

The watchdog said that the curriculum had been “re-sequenced for many learners”, such as front-loading courses with the theory elements and focusing on practical skills later.

“As a result, we have some concerns that apprentices were not given enough time to learn curriculum content securely,” its report said.

Some providers added catch-up elements to the curriculum, while some learners reported feeling “overwhelmed” with the amount of content they were having to learn.

T Level colleges awarded slice of £74m to refurbish buildings for 2023 delivery

Over £74 million has been awarded to colleges to develop 86 T Level projects set to launch in September 2023, the Department for Education announced today.

The funding will be used to refurbish or upgrade buildings as colleges prepare to deliver new T Levels in courses such as agriculture, animal care and catering.

Additional funding will be dished out to colleges in early 2023 so that they can invest in industry standard specialist equipment – which will take the total pot for capital funding to over £150 million for wave four of the T Level rollout.

The DfE said this brings the total invested through the T Level Capital Fund to over £400 million.

The DfE has, however, refused to disclose how much each college has been allocated as this information about public funding is “commercially sensitive”.

Media, broadcast and production is one new T Level course set to launch for the first time in 2023, yet none of the winning building projects announced today were for this route.

Asked why this was, the DfE told FE Week that all applications that “meet minimum criteria are ranked according to the quality of their applications and funding allocated based on that ranking”.

A DfE spokesperson also said that all T Level providers receive payments for specialist equipment before their courses come online, and the amount allocated is determined using a formula. In waves one, two and three the allocation was based on the number of students a provider expected to have in the fourth year of T Level delivery (steady state).

The spokesperson said the DfE will confirm how the department will allocate specialist equipment allocations in wave four “later in the year”.

The 86 winning T Level projects announced today:

It’s disappointing to hear Andrea Jenkyns trot out the same old lines on BTECs

Are ministers clear on the difference between technical and applied general qualifications? asks James Kewin

It was fantastic to see so many MPs at last night’s parliamentary debate on the future of BTEC qualifications.

The debate was triggered after the #ProtectStudentChoice petition secured 108,349 signatures earlier this year.

Despite the intense heat and political drama elsewhere in Westminster, MPs from all parties made a compelling case for the government to rethink its plan to scrap the majority of applied general qualifications such as BTECs.

This cross-party support for the campaign from politicians (which we’ve previously seen reflected in the letter from 118 parliamentarians to former education secretary Nadhim Zahawi) has been matched by cross-sector support from the education world and beyond.

Organisations representing staff, students and leaders from schools, colleges, and universities are among the 30 partners backing the campaign, alongside employer groups, and of course, FE Week.  

One reason that #ProtectStudentChoice has secured such widespread support, is that it has adopted an evidence-based and reasonable position on the government’s plan to reform Level 3 qualifications.

Fundamentally, we believe that many young people will be better served studying an applied general qualification rather than an A level or T level-only study programme.

T levels are a welcome development and will strengthen the current suite of technical qualifications, but they should sit alongside, rather than replace, BTECs.

Sadly, the new minister’s response to the excellent points put forward by MPs last night was neither evidence-based, nor reasonable.

Although Andrea Jenkyns has only been in the job for a week, she does have the advantage of being a former BTEC student and has talked in the past about the transformative effect this qualification has had on her career.

So it was particularly disappointing to hear her trot out the usual tired and discredited ‘lines to take’ last night.

MPs are often bemused to find that when they ask questions about applied general qualifications, ministers invariably provide answers about technical qualifications.

MPs are often bemused to find that when they ask questions about applied general qualifications, ministers invariably provide answers about technical qualifications

It is hard to say whether ministers do not know the difference, or are simply wishing away BTECs because they are not one of the two qualifications of choice that the government wants to see dominate the future qualification landscape.

Last night’s debate was triggered by concerns about the government plans to scrap the majority of BTECs.

Responding to these concerns by simply restating the same plans and talking up T Levels is a bizarre approach, but one that has been adopted by a succession of skills ministers.  

With a new prime minister in place by 5 September, and new set of ministers to follow shortly after, the government has a chance to reset its damaging plans for level 3 qualifications. 

Former Conservative ministers used last night’s debate to urge a rethink, in part because the government’s plans are so curiously un-Conservative.

They reduce ‘consumer’ choice, scrap a successful ‘product’, and replacing it with a state-backed alternative with no track record.

You can imagine the response if this sort of plan was put forward by one of the opposition parties in any other sphere of public life.

So what needs to change?

First, a new government must get the basics right.

Three routes are better than two.

Students need genuine choice, not A levels, T levels and a small group of applied general qualifications that are approved by exception.

And understand that a T level is not simply an upgraded BTEC – in most cases, they are a different type of qualification that provide a different type of educational experience.

Acknowledging this would help to address the misplaced focus on ‘overlapping’ qualifications.

Second, end the obsession with boosting T level numbers.

The Department for Education has become so focused on this output that it has lost sight of the much more important outcome (ensuring all students are pursuing relevant, high quality qualifications that lead to further study and/or skilled employment).

Unless there are radical changes to the make-up of T levels, they will remain a minority product.

Scrapping most BTECs to make T levels a mass-market product is a desperate move and one that is unlikely to succeed – we are much more likely to see an increase in A level or NEET numbers instead.

Third, listen to, and engage with, the sector.

Last night, the minister claimed to be “consulting vigorously” on next steps.

But there is little point in consulting if you ignore what people – particularly those responsible for delivery – actually tell you.

That has certainly been the sector’s experience to date – it is hard to recall a more top-down, ‘government knows best’ approach to policymaking in the past ten years.

The 12-month delay to defunding is welcome, but delaying a bad idea does not stop it from being a bad idea.

Education policymaking should start with the student and work backwards.

A new administration has the opportunity to do that, and recalibrate the current approach to reforming qualifications at Level 3 and below.

The 30 members of the #ProtectStudentChoice coalition stand ready to help, as is the broad, cross-party group of MPs that made such a valuable contribution to last night’s debate. 

Teachers at 39 colleges will strike this autumn

Strike action has been confirmed at 29 more colleges across England, bringing the total that will be picketing this autumn to 39.

The University and College Union this week confirmed 29 of the 33 colleges balloting on strikes have agreed to industrial action, held after refusing to accept a 2.5 per cent pay offer recommended by the Association of Colleges.

The UCU wants a 10 per cent rise with a minimum uplift of £2,000.

It reported that the ballot was 89.9 per cent of members voting in favour of strike action, from an overall turnout of 57.9 per cent.

The four colleges that did not vote for strike action were Bournemouth and Poole College, Exeter College, and Sussex Downs and Hastings colleges which are both part of the East Sussex College Group. Those colleges did not meet the 50 per cent turnout threshold.

The 29 colleges will join four in the north west – Burnley College, The Manchester College, City of Liverpool College and Oldham College – which balloted separately and will walk out on September 6 and 7 during college induction week.

Hackney, Havering, Redbridge, Tower Hamlets, and Epping Forest colleges from New City College Group, as well as Barnet and Southgate College, also plan strike action after a separate ballot.

UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: “College staff have shown that they are sick and tired of falling pay and have voted overwhelmingly for strike action after employers offered an insulting 2.5 per cent uplift in pay.

“College workers have had their pay held down so long that the vast majority now face financial insecurity. Yet as the cost of living crisis bites employers want their staff to take a further hit with more below inflation pay rises. This is completely unacceptable and shows exactly why many staff are voting with their feet and choosing to leave the sector altogether.”

Inflation hit 9.1 per cent in May, while cost of living pressures from increased energy bills, food shops, fuel and council tax among others have hit people’s bank balances.

The UCU said staff pay at colleges is now 35 per cent below inflation since 2009, and referenced its report which said that seven in 10 would leave the industry unless pay and conditions improve.

Capital City College Group averted strike action after last week agreeing to a 9 per cent rise for those on £30,000 or less from August.

The AoC upped its pay offer from 2.25 per cent to 2.5 per cent in June, rejected by the UCU as being “totally unacceptable”.

David Hughes, AoC chief executive said it is “disappointing” that unions are intent on strike action in the autumn, particularly because of the impact it might have on students keen to start their studies.

“I would urge the unions and their members to avoid disruption during the important recruitment period at the start of term. This would be counterproductive as anything which decreases the number of enrolled students would impact on colleges ability to increase staff pay,” he said.

“Having said that, the cost of living crisis is biting hard for college staff, as it is for their students, the colleges themselves and many others in society. That’s why we continue to work hard to persuade the new ministerial team at the Department for Education of the urgency in winning more funding and giving flexibilities with existing budgets to boost college staff pay.

“We will continue to make the case for improving staff pay as it is vital for colleges to be able to retain and recruit their teaching talent.”

Fred Sirieix’s prisoner-run restaurants to expand to boost hospitality skills

A charity formed by First Dates star Fred Sirieix to train prisoners in the hospitality industry is set to expand its work to its third prison before the end of the year.

The Right Course was formed by the TV star back in 2017 and sees staff kitchens in prisons turned into high street style training restaurants, run by inmates to teach them industry-level skills and help secure them jobs on release.

The project launched at the category C HMP Isis at Thamesmead with the DM Thomas Foundation, with a second refurbished staff canteen launched at HMP Wormwood Scrubs in 2021.

At Monday’s Novus Moving On conference around the future of prison education, Sirieix and The Right Course chief executive Simon Sheehan told FE Week that a third kitchen is due to open at HMP Berwyn in the next two or three months.

The pair have plans to continue rolling out the project further.

Sheehan said: “It has been growing and we are just keen to get more and more sites that want to have a high street restaurant within the prison, and it’s a great training environment too.

“We are going around visiting various prisons and seeing if they have got suitable facilities. Some need much more investment than others just to get a restaurant that can produce the quality of food we want, and also to become an environment where people want to eat, otherwise it will fall apart. You need customers like any business who want to come in and spend their money.”

The team has not set annual targets for new restaurants, but confirmed it is looking at having the third restaurant up and running in the next few months at HMP Berwyn.

Sirieix added: “The Right Course is working but it will only work and make a real difference when it is rolled out at scale across the prison estate.

“Not all prisons are suitable, but maybe 50 or 60 per cent will be suitable. Everybody needs to be fed, there are restaurants in every single prison. So instead of just feeding them, feed them by creating a workshop that is training people and giving them skills.

“We are ready to roll it out, we have got the team – Simon is doing an incredible job meeting governors, meeting prisons and meeting education providers, and it is a case of people embracing and understanding there is a real need.”

The journey started when one of the teachers for Sirieix’s daughter was mugged outside of school and visiting a prison Sirieix recognised that staff messes were the perfect place to teach offenders new skills.

According to the charity, 61 prisoners commenced the programme in the first two years, with 95 per cent of them gaining at least one level 2 NVQ in areas such as front of house, catering and food production or barista.

It said that 50 per cent of its 2019 candidates eligible for release gained employment in the industry.

There are also hopes it can address the recruitment shortfalls in the hospitality industry.

Sirieix said: “When you think about the staff shortage in hospitality where there are hundreds of thousands of vacancies now, they are not going to be filled because these vacancies were filled by EU workers and now we are out of the EU. So the people who were coming for those jobs are not going to come.

“The solution for hospitality businesses is either you employ the very few people who are trained and have experience, or you get people walking in from the street. So the people we are training they have already got the experience, they have already got the skills and they have got a minimum of knowledge with what the job is about.

“People say they are ex-prisoners, can we trust them? We have to believe in redemption and forgiveness, and also we have to give people chances and opportunities.”

For prisoners, Sirieix said they love the work because it gives them a sense of satisfaction and achievement, as well as transferable skills regardless of whether they later get a job in the industry.

Sheehan added: “You see the learners through their journey on the course, that confidence really does build. Prison strips a lot of it out of them, but this is a good stepping stone back to when they are coming up to release.”

5 actions we will be pressing our 6th education secretary on

There are some big decisions which would have been made this summer if the previous DfE incumbents had stayed in post, writes David Hughes

James Cleverley’s appointment to education secretary makes him the sixth person in that post in the six years I have been at AoC.

Not a great recipe for continuity, certainty and stability, but it’s not an unprecedented turnover rate.

Between 1964 and 1970 we also had six, across three and culminating with Margaret Thatcher in the post.

And there were five between 2001 and 2007, finishing in the split of responsibilities between Ed Balls and John Denham.

Historians will no doubt give views on what it all means and what we can read into it. My job is to make sense of it for the college sector.

In some ways the new education secretary and his team of ministers are in a caretaker role, with no mandate to – or perhaps much need – to make big decisions. That it’s happening over the summer helps to reinforce that view.

But there are some big decisions which would have been made this summer if the previous incumbents had stayed in post.

That makes it vital that the new ministerial team makes positive decisions and takes action on some things because delays could be damaging.

Equally there are some areas where an overt and transparent decision to delay would be extremely helpful.

On the positive side there are five sets of actions and decisions we will be pressing for:

1. ONS reclassification

Preparing the ground over the summer for the possible reclassification of colleges as public sector institutions.

The ONS is carrying out a review this summer and a decision is due in early September.

Reclassification will mean more work for colleges, at the very least to stitch their accounts into the Department for Education’s but it could bring some upside too.

There is a very simple case to be made for a VAT exemption for colleges which would result in an investment of over £200m into colleges and could easily be a promoted as a tax cut for productivity (something the candidates for PM might want to consider?).

2. Staff pay

Our calls to the previous ministerial team on help for colleges on staff pay, recruitment and retention received an encouraging response, and we continue to work with officials on ways DfE could help.

Given that it is likely that school pay will be resolved this month, it would be remiss if ministers left those proposals hanging until the autumn.

Among the proposals were more flexibilities on the additional 40-hours of learning and on the Adult Education Budget which could be decided this month.

3. Capital project funding

This summer will see many colleges commencing capital projects, with funding support from DfE which was bid for last year. In the time between bids and project start, construction costs have rocketed, and all those increases need to be met by college reserves and borrowing, with the DfE grant being fixed.

Help with this is an easy one, with a simple inflation adjustment to grants.

4. Local skills improvement plans

We are at a crucial time for the roll-out of LSIPs, so we want to see work continued, taking on board the lessons learned in the pilots and reflecting this week’s NAO report which questioned the DfE reliance on employers driving the skills agenda.

Ministers could put these together and set new expectations of the partnership approach they want to see, between employers and colleges, identifying skills priorities and working together to help deliver on them.

LSIPs provide a good vehicle for a quick response to the NAO report and I hope that ministers pick that up quickly.

There is also one area where I hope to see a decision to delay:

5. Level 3 qualifications review

I’m on record as calling the approach to this review “reckless” and I stand by that.

Our analysis, published last week, of the proposed defunding of 160 qualifications deemed as overlapping with T Levels showed that this could result in thousands of young people without a qualification to work towards.

A decision to delay this for at least an additional three-years would be a blessing for all and would reduce risks enormously. Behind this approach is a fear that colleges will not grow their T Level delivery.

I don’t think that will happen, but a simple 10 per cent premium on the funding rates for T Levels would be the best way to solve that, using underspends in the wider 16 to 19 budget which I am sure will emerge over the coming months.

There will be pressure for ministers to do as little as possible until the new PM and Cabinet are in place, but that would be a mistake.

Urgent issues need urgent action now.