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The FE Week Podcast: The Tory Party Conference, Lords ‘Peer Review’ the Skills Bill and the future of assessment

In our second episode, Shane is joined by exams board guru Kirstie Donnelly, from City & Guilds Group, and policy director Simon Ashworth, from the Association of Employment and Learning Providers.

So – what did the Conservatives have to say on skills? What are the Lords planning to do to the Skills Bill? And have exams had their day?

Listen to episode two below and hit the subscribe button to get the latest updates on the podcast.

Give us coherence, not competition, please chancellor

Employers are growing disillusioned as Kickstart, traineeships and apprenticeships all compete, writes Sharron Robbie

The announcement on Monday by the chancellor of the exchequer at the Conservative Party conference of a £500 million jobs support package has had a mixed response from training providers across the West Country.

In the main, the extension to the employer apprenticeship incentives until January 2022 is seen as a positive move, and will hopefully encourage more employers to offer apprenticeship opportunities.

Any support for employers in closing the skills gap is welcomed. The extension of the incentives and Kickstart will inevitably help thousands of employers and employees alike.

But many providers are concerned at the impact the Kickstart programme is having on apprenticeship and traineeship starts.

One local provider commented, “We are seeing more young people choosing an option that could be seen as a short-term solution, Kickstart, rather than a long-term, career pathway option, an apprenticeship.

“We are struggling to fill vacancies, and employers are becoming very upset that they cannot attract a young person into taking up an apprenticeship with them.

“Are we missing a golden opportunity to wed these two programmes together for the benefit of all?”

One aspect of the current slew of initiatives, which has caused animated discussion across the many video calls I attend, is the fact that Kickstart provides a salary to the participant, whilst traineeships are unpaid. This is seen as giving the Kickstart option an unfair advantage.

Training providers are wondering whether to engage in the recent 16 to 18 traineeship procurement at all. That’s because they see Kickstart as directly affecting their likelihood of achieving the numbers they’d need.

Providers are considering whether to engage in the traineeship procurement at all

This is a real shame, as traineeships are an excellent way for young people to experience a sector or job role, or to gain much-needed confidence within the world of work.

It is difficult to understand the government’s traineeships and apprenticeships targets, given this insistence on offering competing programmes and pathways. It is directly impacting our national flagship programmes.

There are currently hundreds of unfilled apprenticeship vacancies on the Find an Apprenticeship website and there is high employment across the south west.

Competing government programmes are creating real challenges in the apprenticeships space, leading to more and more disillusion and disappointed employers.

Employers are desperate to fill skills gaps and this is particularly pertinent to the health and social care sector, one of the key priority sectors across our region.

Kickstart could have been used as a vehicle to encourage interest in the sector, and of course progress on to apprenticeships and employment – but this doesn’t seem to have been the case.

The Devon & Cornwall Training Providers Network has been working closely with a large gateway organisation to support individuals on the Kickstart programme with wraparound support and training.

To date we have supported more than 150 employers across a range of sectors, but have yet to see any from the health and social care sector engaging with the Kickstart programme.

In an area where the lack of people entering health and social care is of real concern, we would have thought that employers would have been coming forward in their droves.

If we are to support employers in filling skills gaps, while also giving young people access to industry-standard training, then there must be coherence and parity of funding across these competing programmes.

It is also vital that the learner is not forgotten in all this. Are skills being gained? Is there progression?

One worry is that once the scheme ends, there will be young people without a recognised qualification and no job offer. This can’t be right.

We need a huge push from the DWP, colleges, independent providers and employers to convert as many young people on these different programmes into apprenticeships. Win win!

Baker to take on government over ‘inadequate’ careers guidance laws

Just days after ministers announced they are to “strengthen” Lord Baker’s landmark clause on careers education in schools, the man himself is set to hit back with his own stronger law.

The Department for Education announced on Tuesday that it would use the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill, currently working its way through the House of Lords, to “give equality to technical education in career advice in schools, so all pupils understand the wide range of career routes and training available to them, such as apprenticeships, T Levels or traineeships”.

The skills white paper promised a three-point plan to enforce the Baker clause back in January 2021. Point one of the plan was to introduce specific minimum requirements, which it believes it achieved through the announcement made this week.

The government has messed up the Baker clause. It’s not being forcibly administered
Lord Baker

The government’s amendments state that pupils should expect two mandatory visits from providers of technical education and apprenticeships over the course of their secondary education. However, the government has reserved the right to specify further details in secondary legislation.

This, according to Lord Baker, makes the government’s attempt “inadequate”.

Speaking to FE Week, Lord Baker said determining the detail around career advice rules through secondary legislation would weaken its intent because the detail “can’t be debated or amended”.

“The government has messed up the Baker clause,” he adds. “It’s not being forcibly administered.”

Peers can expect to see a new Baker clause next week when they come to debate the Skills Bill. Baker’s new amendment will “oblige” schools to organise three mandatory encounters with technical education and training providers over the course of their secondary education.

“It will be the duty of schools to do it,” he adds, “and that means that if they do not do that activity, they could be legally obliged to do so”.

Red tape forces small firms to turn their backs on apprenticeship cash incentives

Small employers are walking away from cash incentives for hiring apprentices due to “bureaucracy”, colleges have warned as the scheme receives its second extension from the chancellor.  

Rishi Sunak announced at the Conservative Party conference on Monday that businesses will now have until the end of January 2022 to apply for a £3,000 bonus every time they hire an apprentice.  

He also announced that his flagship Kickstart scheme – which subsidises job placements for young people on Universal Credit and was due to end in December – will be extended to March.  

Businesses criticised Kickstart as overly “complex, bureaucratic and slow” in an FE Week article published last week, which revealed that less than two-fifths of jobs created by the scheme had been filled.  

It appears similar problems are being experienced with apprenticeship incentives.  

Colleges and training providers that spoke to FE Week said many small employers have found the process of creating a digital apprenticeship service account – which they need to have in order to claim the incentives – “horrendous”.  

Grant Glendinning, executive principal north and group strategic lead for apprenticeships for NCG, which incorporates seven colleges, said: “The digital apprenticeship service is administrative-heavy, from funds reservation all the way to an employer receiving an incentive, making it difficult for small employers lacking the administrative functions to manage the service for them.”  

He warned that the work entailed in claiming the incentives can “actually create a disincentive” and said his college group has “seen instances where employers have decided against claiming, when entitled to, as they deem it not to be worth their efforts”.  

His concerns were echoed by Lee Pryor, director of apprenticeships at the Luminate Education Group, which comprises three colleges. He said: “A lot of our small employers, such as butchers, hairdressers and corner shops, some of which don’t even have the internet, have really struggled with setting up apprenticeship accounts to claim the incentives.  

“We had one employer ring us up and say, ‘Look, it’s too complicated’, and walked away from the scheme. I think trying to make it as easy as possible is the only solution, but what that easy option is, I’m not quite sure.”  

Luminate’s head of employer engagement, Charlie Grayson, said the incentives are a “fantastic draw” for companies but the “only way we’re overcoming the bureaucracy is hand holding employers, which puts a massive strain on our resource”.  

The digital apprenticeship service was launched in April 2017 but was only for levy-paying employers to manage and spend their apprenticeship funding.  

Small employers, meanwhile, had to go through providers with non-levy-procured contracts until the service was opened to them in January 2020. Small firms are currently capped at ten apprenticeship starts through the service.  

The Department for Education said there are a “number of resources” available to help employers with the apprenticeship service, including “how-to videos, advice on apprenticeships.gov.uk or information available by visiting our help portal”.  

But more action is needed, according to Glendinning. He said: “Providers do not have full oversight of the incentive applications that employers make, nor their progress status.  

“In order to aide employers, greater visibility is needed so the right assistance and support can be made available. Status updates for incentive applications are vague, and as a provider we receive a lot of queries around when payment will be made that we are unable to [give] support with – employers are not paid by us, nor can we clearly see the progress of the application.”  

Glendinning added that employers “understandably assume the provider is at fault when things go wrong or are delayed, and this can strain relationships”.  

Sharron Robbie, managing director of the Devon & Cornwall Provider Network, told FE Week she has done 45 one-to-ones with providers about the incentives and “every single one, without exception, has said how horrendous it has been in terms of the digital accounts”.  

She said a common problem is obtaining PAYE reference numbers, particularly for micro-SMEs.  

Apprentice cash incentives were first introduced by Sunak in August 2020 and offered firms £2,000 to take on apprentices aged 16 to 24, while those that employ new apprentices aged 25 and over are paid £1,500. They were increased to £3,000 for all apprentices in February and extended to September 2021.  

Funding for around 100,000 new starts was set aside in the Plan for Jobs.  

New DfE figures published yesterday showed there had been 101,460 apprentice incentive claims by September 29.  

Total funding for the extension will be revealed at the spending review on October 27.

Ofsted finds safety concerns at SEND charity

A charity that teaches FE courses to learners with special educational needs has promised “improvements are under way” after Ofsted reported a number of site security concerns.  

My Life set up a post-16 specialist college three years ago at the request of Wigan Council and received a new provider monitoring visit from the inspectorate in July.  

The resulting report was published last Friday and showed ‘insufficient progress’ judgments across the board – the lowest rating possible.  

Inspectors pulled leaders up for a badly designed curriculum and criticised “poorly performing” tutors.  

But of most concern was My Life’s safeguarding arrangements.  

Learners are aged 16 to 25, with moderate to severe learning difficulties, autism, speech, language and communication needs, and emotional difficulties. Students, of whom there were 20 at the time of Ofsted’s visit, have access to a ten-acre site and farm that supports their learning.  

Inspectors reported that while learners “say they feel safe”, public footpaths run adjacent to the site and current fences “would not prevent a learner from leaving the site, or unauthorised visitors gaining access”.  

Additionally, chalets that are sometimes used for crisis accommodation for external service users are on the same site, as is an equestrian centre, veterinary practice and café. These facilities are “open to the general public with no secure demarcation between them and the provider”, the report said.    

Ofsted noted that leaders and governors introduced some measures to protect learners, such as security gates at the front entrance and closed-circuit television cameras across the site. Leaders also showed inspectors their plans to further improve site security but had not yet started to implement them.  

Every possible measure is being taken to ensure the safety of everyone

A spokesperson for My Life said this week the provider has “begun work to implement a detailed and peer-reviewed improvement plan” to address the concerns.  

They said: “It is vital that everyone is safe when they come to My Life Learning. While Ofsted’s safeguarding recommendations are largely based on securing areas of the My Life site – where there could be a potential and general concern in the future, rather than as a response to a specific event or issue – every possible measure is being taken to ensure the safety of everyone.  

“My Life as an organisation has since strengthened further its safeguarding team and governance.”  

The spokesperson added that a new curriculum is being introduced this term, as is a more robust system of self-assessment, targets and actions for improvement. There will also be additions to the governance of My Life Learning to bring FE specialisms to the team.  

When specialist post-16 institutions are issued with a poor Ofsted report, the Department for Education takes a “discretionary approach to determining the appropriate action” which could include “action to suspend or limit new learner places where deemed appropriate”, according to DfE rules.  

As well as considering Ofsted’s findings and other information the department has about the performance of the provider, officials also take into account the views of the local authorities that are the commissioners and joint funders of specialist post-16 institutions.  

My Life Learning has had no sanctions imposed on it by the DfE.  

My Life executive Caroline Tomlinson said her charity has “given people and families hope for the future” after setting up My Life Learning. “The recommendations that Ofsted have made are all sensible and achievable and with the full support of our parents and carers, our improvement plan is already under way,” she added.  

“We look forward to welcoming Ofsted back for the full inspection in the new year.”

DfE earmarks £3.3m for team of insolvency and fraud lawyers

The Department for Education has hired seven law firms to provide legal advice on insolvency, audit and fraud cases – at a cost of up to £3.3 million.

Tender documents show the companies will be put on a rota over the next two years to advise on legal matters. Cases will likely involve “financially distressed” colleges, academy trusts, independent and higher education providers for the DfE’s provider market oversight (PMO) division.

The DfE anticipates there will be around 40 of these “projects” each year, although there is “no guarantee of work and no retainers”.

A spokesperson for the department said the tender had caps on what the winners can charge to “ensure greater value for money” to the taxpayer.

Hourly and day rates for each of the seven firms have been redacted in the tender documents.

But they do show the contracts commenced on September 3 for an initial one-year period – valued around £2,067,000, with an option to extend for a further 12-months – which would cost an additional £1,275,000.

Julian Gravatt, deputy chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said the DfE has spent “quite a lot” in recent years on lawyers and accountants to provide advice on restructuring and on funding rules.  

Part of the problem, he told FE Week, is “under-funding, over-regulation and an environment in which mistakes result in lengthy investigations”.  

The DfE launched its PMO team, currently led by director Matthew Atkinson, in late 2017.  

The move came partly in response to the considerable number of untried and untested training providers that have hit the market in recent years, for example, through the register of apprenticeship training providers.  

FE Week reported last month that a training provider called ABIS Resources Limited is suing the education secretary in the High Court after the firm’s FE loans and apprenticeship contracts were terminated. This is believed to be the first time a training provider has taken the DfE all the way to court over terminated skills funding contracts.  

There have also been a number of high-profile cases of alleged fraud in recent years, while many other FE providers have fallen foul of complex data rules, which has led to contested clawback challenges following audits.  

A college insolvency regime was also introduced in 2019. Hadlow College became the first to fall under the education administration process in May of that year, followed closely by its sister college, West Kent and Ashford College. Investigations into financial irregularities at the colleges are ongoing.  

Multiple FE Commissioner reports have since warned that other colleges have been close to going insolvent.  

According to the tender documents, the lawyers will provide legal services and advice for “restructuring and insolvency, such as in the run-up to and during an education administration” or independent business reviews.  

Advice will also be required for “counter fraud and investigations”, including in the event of “legal challenge, assessment of relevant potential contractual action and strategic options depending on individual case factors”.  

Elsewhere, the lawyers could be called on for “ongoing audits and provision of advice on funding error recovery action”, which will include a legal assessment on likelihood of legal challenge and possible “debt recovery”.  

“This could include advice on freedom of information and GDPR provision,” the tender documents add.

[This article has been updated from its original version as the correct total for the legal advice could reach £3.3 million, rather than the £23.4 million originally reported.]

DfE does ‘too much procurement’, top civil servant admits

A top skills civil servant has signalled that the Department for Education is looking to move away from tendering for independent training providers. 

Keith Smith, the DfE’s director for post-16 strategy, chaired a webcast on proposed reforms to FE funding and accountability last week and admitted his department “does do too much procurement”. 

He said: “We have a huge amount of complexity in the system for people for competing and bidding for funds. 

“We are very keen, if we can introduce a simpler system that can get us much clearer on the outcomes and success we’re trying to achieve, that actually we should have confidence in using that funding mechanism with the institutions we are funding. 

“There are some really important questions here on the funding of independent training providers as commercial organisations. It is really important we think about those two questions together.” 

Currently, independent training providers receive their adult skills funding through a mixture of direct procurement by the DfE and subcontracting from colleges or other providers. 

Colleges meanwhile receive grant funding from the DfE annually without the need to tender. 

The DfE’s FE funding and accountability consultation, which closed yesterday, proposes reforms to administering national adult streams.

It puts forward a single “skills fund”, which will bring together the adult education budget and national skills fund. 

This new system is aimed to give providers “autonomy over their budget, reduce burdens and enable them to plan strategically for the long term”, according to last week’s webcast. 

Allocated funding through the skills fund will be non-ringfenced and a lagged system will fund “real delivery – meaning there will be no reconciliation, funding on plans or clawback for under-delivery”. 

The DfE also proposes moving to multi-year funding with “simple and consistent allocations”. 

The consultation document says the department would like to consider how procurement for private providers “works and could be improved”. 

Multiple tenders have plagued the department and private providers in recent years. The AEB tender of 2017 was beset with delays and had to be completely redone after officials realised it was botched. And when the final outcomes were released most providers had their funding slashed – including one case of a 97 per cent cut. 

Providers teamed up to threaten the DfE with legal action before the agency found additional funding to top up contracts. 

Later in 2017 the DfE had more issues with its tender for non-levy apprenticeship funding. For example, the agency awarded a contract to a defunct provider but an ‘outstanding’ college was rejected. 

In 2019, the DfE delayed its European Social Fund tender three times following technical errors as well as claims the agency broke procurement rules, which led to more threats of legal action. 

And this year another AEB tender was controversially run with multiple delays. 

Other funding streams the DfE currently procures include skills bootcamps and traineeships. 

The outcome of the funding and accountability consultation is due to be published in spring 2022.

NCFE scoops £38m prize in battle for T Level contracts

NCFE has triumphed in the battle between awarding bodies for T Levels.

The new flagship technical qualifications hit a milestone this week with the awarding of contracts to develop six new courses for 2023 – the final year of the T Level rollout.

NCFE is set to earn by far the most from T Levels of any awarding body, having won contracts to design and award nine T Levels for rollout between 2020 and 2023, netting the charity £38 million.

City & Guilds has earned the second most, winning contracts to develop seven T Levels, worth £26.7 million; while Pearson has won four contracts, worth £11.3 million.

Since the Department for Education controversially decided to have just one awarding body for each T Level, awarding organisations have been competing for ownership of the 16-to-18 programme. Each successful awarding organisation wins a license to design and award the T Level qualification, but the copyright is owned by the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education.

Consequently, 20 of the 21 T Levels being rolled out are being awarded by NCFE, City & Guilds and Pearson.

The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education, which awards the contracts with the DfE, announced on Monday that Highfield Qualifications will be developing its first T Level, in catering, for 2023 after winning a contract worth £2.6 million. NCFE will design another three and City & Guilds will design a further two for that year.

NCFE ‘fully committed’ to T Levels

NCFE said they were “delighted” to have won the 2023 contracts and they have been “really pleased” with the progress of the qualifications.

Asked for the secret of its success in winning the contracts, the awarding body argued it was “fully committed” to T Levels from their inception and “clearly demonstrated” the focus and resource it would put into developing them.

Subject experts have also been used on their bids to show “the T Level qualifications we develop will equip students with the relevant skills those sectors are looking for, while providing a practical and engaging approach to learning that supports students into their future careers”.

The income from T Levels has been a boon to NCFE, as the £38 million exceeds the charity’s total income for 2019/20 of £36.1 million.

NCFE’s latest financial statements report its “success” with T Levels “brings certainty of direction and stability” to their work.

The decision to have one awarding body per T Level came about after the 2016 Sainsbury Review of post-16 technical education.

The review recommended new technical qualifications “should be offered and awarded by a single body or consortium” to combat a “race to the bottom”, with qualifications becoming easier to pass.

Sector leaders, including Rod Bristow, Pearson’s then-president for the UK, raised concerns about this approach in 2018 when the DfE tendered for bodies to design the first wave of T Levels, for rollout in 2020.

Bristow warned of “inherent risks” and “adverse consequences” such as a “lack of resilience with the significant reliance on the ‘bid winner’, the loss of innovation and expertise, and a lack of choice for providers”.

A 2017 report by Frontier Economics, commissioned by the DfE, even warned that having just one awarding body created a “risk of system failure” in the programme.

The full table of T Level contract values

Young people hit hardest again in full-year apprenticeship figures

Apprenticeship starts for the whole of 2020/21 grew marginally on the previous year, new figures show.

Provisional data published this morning by the Department for Education has revealed there were a total of 319,400 starts last year compared to 319,000 at the same point for 2019/20 – an increase of 0.1 per cent.

Starts for 2020/21 were, however, still 18 per cent down on the 389,000 recorded in 2018/19 – the year before Covid-19 struck.

FE Week analysis shows apprenticeship starts for young people and the lower levels continue to fall while those for adults and the higher levels shoot up.

Starts for 16- to 18-year-olds (64,400) and level 2 (83,700) both dropped by 15 per cent on the previous year. Meanwhile starts for people aged 25 or above (160,900) and level 4 or above (98,100) increased by 8 per cent and 21 per cent respectively.

Final data will not be available until later this year.