Our commission will use engagement as lead indicator for FE outcomes  

Across the FE sector, colleges routinely confront twin pressures: sustaining high learner attendance and retention, and maintaining a motivated, stable workforce. Yet most interventions act reactively, rather than identifying early warning signs. We focus on attendance rates after students stop turning up. We track retention after learners have already disengaged. We address staff wellbeing once burnout has taken hold. This approach, which is baked into the way the system currently operates, could be holding back performance and progress. 

This is why ImpactEd Group is launching the Further Education and Sixth Form Commission on Engagement: the first national study exploring how engagement can serve as a lead indicator of outcomes across our sector. This is not an arm’s length, observational research project. It’s about supporting a fundamental shift in how we understand and respond to the dual challenges of learner and staff engagement facing every college. 

The evidence base on engagement in education has been growing significantly in recent years, with ImpactEd Group publishing our own research from over 100,000 school-aged pupils in May 2024. This study revealed that more than one in four students disengage during their first year of secondary school, with engagement levels never fully recovering thereafter. Measures of enjoyment, trust, agency, and safety decline sharply in early secondary school too, particularly for girls and disadvantaged pupils.

And perhaps the most significant insight for colleges to pay attention to was the finding that learners in the top quartile of engagement are ten percentage points less likely to be persistently absent than those in the bottom quartile. So not only is engagement data affording schools a much richer picture of the dynamics of their cohorts, but it is also supporting them to focus precious time and resources in the right places, before a lack of engagement turns into poorer outcomes.  

The same kind of engagement insights can be valuable for staff too. In ImpactEd’s school research project, analysis of staff surveys showed the predictive ability of engagement in relation to staff retention. Those who showed poorer levels of buy in to organisational strategy and leadership were less likely to still be at the school later in the academic year.  

The FE sector will see a lot of parallels in this research, but in post-16 settings, where learners arrive already carrying years of positive and negative educational experience, understanding these engagement patterns could be even more vital. This is reflected in the growing evidence base from FE itself, where attendance data is signalling a rising engagement challenge across colleges, one that mirrors, and in some cases exceeds, the trends seen in schools.  This is where the commission comes in.  

Commission’s mission

By bringing together experienced FE leaders alongside researchers, practitioners and policy experts, we’re creating space to translate these learnings from schools into tools shaped specifically for colleges and sixth forms.

The commission will shape research design, bring together front-line practitioners and analyse national findings to consider how proactive approaches to engagement can move us from reactive management to front foot improvement strategies. Colleges participating in the research will take part in a learner and workforce census, which will enable us to build a national picture of college engagement and produce local and national benchmarks.

With attendance and retention challenges compounded by funding constraints and workforce instability, the time to do this work together is now. Every learner who disengages and leaves represents not just lost potential, but lost funding and a failure of our fundamental mission. Every member of staff who burns out and departs represents institutional knowledge lost and recruitment costs incurred. 

The FE sector has always been pragmatic and focused on what works. This commission embodies that spirit – building evidence, testing assumptions and translating findings into tools that leaders need.

By participating, colleges won’t just contribute to national understanding, they’ll gain insights that help them act earlier, target support more effectively and create environments where learners and staff can thrive. 

ImpactEd Group are providing a subsidy for participating FE and Sixth Form Colleges and we encourage you to reach out to take part: rajbir.hazelwood@impactedgroup.uk  

Budget 2025: Free training extended to under 25 apprentices in SMEs

The government is set to scrap co-investment payments that small and medium-sized employers have to pay for apprentices under the age of 25.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves has also set aside £820 million to fund her promised “youth guarantee” for young people aged 18 to 21 over the next three years.

Reeves made the announcements during today’s budget speech before the Treasury revealed further tweaks to the apprenticeship system in the chancellor’s red book, including removing the 10 per cent top up for levy payers and halving the time big businesses have to use their funds.

Reeves told the House of Commons: “Today I am announcing funding for training for under 25 apprenticeships completely free for small and medium-sized enterprises.

“And funding for our new youth guarantee, providing £820 million pounds over the next three years to give young people who are let down by the Conservatives the support and the opportunity that they deserve, guaranteeing every young person a place in college, an apprenticeship or personalized job support, and after 18 months, 18 to 21 year olds will be offered paid work, not benefits.”

Co-investment ends for under 25s

Since the apprenticeship levy was introduced in 2017, only large employers with a payroll in excess of £3 million pay into the levy at a rate of 0.5 per cent of salary costs.

The contributions go towards funding all parts of the apprenticeship system, including 95 per cent of training of apprentices in non-levy paying businesses. SMEs then make a co-investment payment of 5 per cent.

In 2024, the Conservatives scrapped the 5 per cent co-investment payment for SMEs when they hire an apprentice under the age of 22.

Reeves today announced she will extend this co-investment relief to those aged 22 to 24.

It is unclear whether this change will kick in immediately or from the new financial year in April 2026.

The move will be funded from an extra £725 million set aside over this Parliament “to help support apprenticeships for young people” under 25, according to Budget documents.

Other big levy changes for big businesses

The documents added that alongside this funding, the government will introduce new reforms to “simplify the apprenticeship system and make it more efficient” as short courses are introduced from April 2026 when the apprenticeship levy is reformed into a “growth and skills levy”.

This will include:

  • Removing the additional [10 per cent] uplift to levy accounts;
  • Changing the expiry window to 12 months [from the current 24 months];
  • Changing the government’s co-investment rate to 75 per cent [from currently 95 per cent] for levy-paying employers once they have exhausted all their fund

The Treasury also said government will continue “working with employers to streamline the suite of apprenticeship standards available”.

More details on these policy changes “will be announced shortly”.

Minimum wage rates for all workers, including apprentices, will also rise from April. Apprentices aged under 19, and 19 and over in their first year, will be paid at least £8 per hour, up from the current £7.55 minimum. This also applies to working 16- and 17-year-olds not doing apprenticeships.

The mininimum wage for 18-20 year olds will rise to £10.85 per hour and the national living wage for workers aged 21 and over rises to £12.71 per hour.

Levy receipts to hit £5bn by 2030

Meanwhile, the government’s spending watchdog has today updated its forecasts of how much money the apprenticeship levy is expected to raise.

The Office for Budget Responsibilities now estimate the levy will raise £4.4 billion in 2025-26 – £200 million more than they forecast in March.

The Treasury has this year set an apprenticeship budget for England of £3.075 billion while the devolved nations receive just over £500 million. It means the top-slice the Treasury takes between how much the levy generates and how much is dished out for apprenticeship spending hits around £820 million.

Forecasts for 2026-27 show the levy intake will rise to £4.6 billion in 2026-27. If the Treasury fails to increase apprenticeship spending budgets then the Treasury margin will hit £1 billion.

And the OBR now expects the levy to raise £5 billion for the first time by 2029-30.

England’s apprenticeship budget is at breaking point and went overspent for the first time last year.

Ben Rowland, CEO of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, said: “There’s a bitter irony in Rachel Reeves’ ‘Bingo Budget’.

“Government is wrestling with how to create the growth the country needs, while urging employers to do more on productivity, investment and for wider society. Yet an obvious and pre-funded solution is sitting right under its nose, and one that employers will back: investing in apprenticeships.

“And as a bonus, with levy receipts set to burst the £5 billion mark, releasing a substantial portion of the Treasury’s apprenticeship levy topslice is the one tax rise the chancellor doesn’t even need to announce, because it happens automatically.”

Charlotte Bosworth, CEO of apprenticeship training giant Lifetime Training, added: “While the increased funding for apprentices under the age of 25 is a positive step, the continued withholding of unspent apprenticeship levy funds is also a missed opportunity to address the urgent challenge of young people not in employment, education, or training (NEETs). 

“With nearly a million young people in this position, greater funding is essential to ensure fair access to career opportunities and to support the government’s ambitions for growth and reduced unemployment.”

Youth guarantee spending revealed

The £820 million youth guarantee will offer a six-month paid work placement for every eligible 18 to 21-year-old who has been on Universal Credit and looking for work for over 18 months.

The government said this will help young people across the UK take the first “crucial step” into sustained employment.

An estimated 12.7 per cent, or 946,000, of 16 to 24-year-olds were not in education, employment or training (NEET) in July to September this year, down 0.3 per centage points on the year.

It follows eight youth guarantee “trailblazers” overseen by regional mayors that have been testing a range of initiatives aimed at reducing youth inactivity and unemployment.

Each area has been allocated £5 million for 2025-26 and a further £5 million for their programmes to run until April 2027.

A budget that backs FE, delivered by a government that can’t stop undermining itself

Endless hints and speculation on tax has left the UK in limbo of late, hasn’t it?

In fact, for one reason or another, it has been that way for a quite a while now. Pockets and purses are being squeezed tighter, balance sheets are not so easy to balance, and yet the demands and need for growth haven’t gone anywhere, in fact, growth of our economy is needed more than ever.

In the build up to today’s Budget, it has been so encouraging to see the profile of FE and the vital role it plays in delivering growth, raised on a national stage:

  • Our prime minister referenced further education as being a ‘defining focus’ of this government
  • During the recent Association of Colleges conference, CEO David Hughes  referenced this being a decade of opportunity for colleges and how our sector is so central to the five missions of this government
  • The much-anticipated FE skills white paper was a welcome read and the sector looks forward to more clarity on the content and how we can support the achievement of its aims
  • The reformation of the apprenticeship levy into the skills and growth levy is welcomed by the FE sector as a way to break down the barriers to CPD (career professional development) and employer-led training, making it more affordable to businesses
  • The introduction of construction technical excellence colleges (CTECs) and V Levels will support more young people accessing meaningful careers

Additionally, today’s announcement of the completely free apprenticeship training for those aged under 25 and employed by SMEs (small and medium sized companies), and the confirmed £820 million investment into the new youth guarantee for our young people is good news to be celebrated.

All of this – as a collective package – will support the journey to economic growth.

I fully welcome today’s Budget, not least because it signals a commitment to a plan of action to ensure better lives for the UK and all who occupy her. But – and there is always a but – no matter how difficult this Budget has been for the government to pull together, if they are to ensure the UK understands the task at hand and supports that task, going forward all of this flip-flopping, leaking and so-called ‘financial fandango’ has to stop. Especially if the aim is to reverse opinions of the 0 per cent of polled UK residents who feel the economy is in ‘very good shape.’

What lies ahead will be challenging if we are to solve the problems together and each “do our bit”.

UK residents must be able to have confidence that when the government makes a decision, that decision must be written out in indelible ink and communicated appropriately.

Our colleges are attended and staffed by people who are feeling the financial pinch. They are supported by employers who are trying to maintain efficient operations, on top of whatever other personal and professional pressures they each may be experiencing – the constant need to reforecast finances is an unnecessary additional strain.

All of this confusion and constant leaking – right up to today’s OBR leak – has led to a hesitancy for employers to invest in skills, business confidence has been reduced, and economic confidence is at an all-time low. To get on with it and indeed ‘do our bit’, we need consistency in plan and message, and direction must be maintained.

We must be able to focus on teaching, studying and working so that when the growth of our economy comes – and it will – we are ready to take advantage of what that means and truly be a part of it.

Are assessment reforms a safety risk we can’t afford?

The government’s proposed reforms to apprenticeship assessment have sparked serious concern from employers. This is particularly the case for employers represented by sector skills bodies Cogent Skills and Enginuity across safety-critical industries including engineering and manufacturing, life sciences and nuclear.

While the intention may be to streamline processes and reduce duplication, the unintended consequences could undermine apprenticeship credibility and compromise safety. For apprenticeship assessment, a one size fits all approach won’t work.

Ignoring employer expertise

Historically, industry-led trailblazer groups have ensured apprenticeships meet real-world standards. The current approach is ‘pro-employer’ rather than ‘employer-led’ which is a subtle but significant difference. Moving away from employers leading development of assessment plans with support from sector skills bodies risks diverging from the people with deep technical knowledge and expertise. Whilst there was room for streamlining of processes and reducing bureaucracy, this can’t come at a risk to quality. Within a manufacturing setting, continuous improvement never undermines the quality of the output.

Why consistency matters

Occupational competence underpins apprenticeships. Employers need to feel confident that an individual completing their programme is competent and ready for the job. Whilst some assessment plans were probably overly long and prescriptive, moving to very short plans means that different assessments could be delivered, which risks consistency and the reliability of the apprenticeship brand as a kitemark for competence. Moreover, employers are concerned that a sampling approach is not appropriate in all circumstances.

Safety and compliance risks

The employers we represent tell us that sampling-based assessment models prioritise speed and cost over rigour. In safety-critical environments, this approach is unacceptable and could have catastrophic consequences. They worry that if there are no standardised assessments, there is no basis for a recruiting employer to understand what work that individual can competently carry out. At best this could mean that the employer retests the individual, at worst, that they are not recruited.

The sectors looked after by Cogent Skills operate under strict regulatory frameworks, from nuclear safety standards to chemical process regulations. A sampling approach to assessments risks compromising competence and increasing operational risk. Employers are concerned that in environments where safety is non-negotiable, these reforms feel like a race to the bottom.

In the engineering sector, employers hold apprenticeships in high regard and trust the robustness and reliability of the assessment of competence. These employers are also concerned that the mandatory qualification can replace the end point assessment. In real terms, this risks competence being judged on a multiple choice test and off the job assessment rather than the assessment of practical ability in the workplace.  All this will reduce employer confidence in apprenticeships over time and could lead to some smaller employers walking away from apprenticeships completely.

Potential erosion of a safety critical culture

Equally troubling for employers across our sectors is the decision to remove formal assessment of behaviours. Safety culture, teamwork, and adherence to protocols are not optional extras, they are essential for maintaining site safety and team integrity. Without rigorous assessment of behaviours, we risk diluting the safety culture that underpins these industries.

A better way forward

Employers want apprenticeships to work. They are not averse to continuous improvement, particularly where this reduces unneeded processes. However, maintaining quality is essential to maintaining employer confidence. In safety critical industries in particular, the risks of moving too fast, and without listening to employers, could have serious implications. Comprising on competence could lead to compromising on public safety.

We understand that government wants to strengthen apprenticeships, and would recommend starting with a sector-by-sector rather than a one size fits all approach. As sector skills bodies working together as members of Skills Federation, we are well placed to understand employer needs. We are keen to support government to ensure that apprenticeships work for employers large and small, and individuals across our industries. We believe that not compromising on rigorous assessment and keeping the focus on occupational competency can maintain the credibility and quality of apprenticeships, ensuring they remain a trusted benchmark of skill and safety.

Ofsted’s one-word grades were a ‘good’ way of explaining quality

I think I’m having an identity crisis. For years, whenever I’ve stood on stage at conferences and talked to staff at partner colleges, local authorities or training providers, one of the first questions I’ve been asked is simple: ‘What’s your Ofsted grade?’

It’s been the shorthand for quality, safety and credibility. At The Skills Network, we’ve prided ourselves on every partner achieving ‘good’ or better for their adult delivery.

Even in my personal life, Ofsted grades have guided decisions. Every time my family has moved house, the first thing I’ve checked is the local schools’ Ofsted ratings. Estate agents certainly know this – they splash “outstanding schools nearby” across property ads because parents, like me, look for a simple metric.

We all crave simplicity. I rarely watch a film with an IMDb rating under 6.5 and I hesitate to book a hotel scoring below 7 without digging into the comments. The rating comes first; the detail follows later.

End of the elevator pitch

So, what happens now that Ofsted grades are gone?

Until recently, our quality assurance could be summed up in a word – “good”. That was our elevator pitch. But now, the elevator has stopped. The new system feels more like climbing 10 flights of stairs just to explain where we stand.

We’re told that instead of a single grade, there’ll be report cards with coloured dots. Those of us steeped in the inspection framework may know what each colour signifies, but will the average parent, learner or employer? Without that simple label, communicating quality suddenly becomes a complicated conversation.

And then there’s the language. What does expected actually mean?

Having been at OCR when letters changed to numbers, we spent a lot of time with a little chart showing the mapping against the old grades; grade 4 a pass, grade 5 a good pass with a bit of a grade B etc.

Is ‘expected’ the new ‘satisfactory’ with a dash of ‘good’? Or do we now expect good, so ‘expected’ is simply average? Similarly, is ‘strong’ the top end of good with a sprinkling of ‘outstanding’?

To make matters worse, the new ‘secure fit’ approach means that if even one sub-judgement ‘needs attention’”, the overall outcome could be pulled down. In other words, you could be strong in everything but one area and still end up with a negative headline.

That doesn’t feel like “less pressure” to me – quite the opposite.

Promise of greater clarity

The justification for abolishing grades was noble enough. We were promised greater clarity, less pressure and a fairer reflection of institutions’ strengths and weaknesses. But I’m not convinced the reality matches the rhetoric.

Clarity? Not for parents, learners or employers who just want to know whether a place is good and safe. A better reflection? Perhaps, but only for those fluent in inspection-speak.
Less pressure? Tell that to a college leader watching one ‘needs attention’ comment undo years of hard work.

FE Week readers will understand the subtleties, but the public won’t. The risk is that the new framework makes quality less transparent to those outside our world.

Keep the playing field level

There is, however, one major positive. The renewed focus on inclusion and disadvantage is welcome and should play to FE’s strengths. FE is the most inclusive arm of the education system, offering life-changing opportunities for those who need them most. If inspection frameworks now highlight this contribution, that’s something to celebrate.

But this advantage only holds if definitions and expectations are consistent across all sectors and there is consistency in the inspection teams. If “inclusion” is judged differently for FE than for schools, we’ll have a problem. The playing field must remain level.

We’ll need to see whether the promised benefits – greater fairness, less stress, more nuance – materialise. Feedback from the first colleges and providers through the process will be crucial.

But the immediate issue is communication. How do we, as providers, describe ourselves now? How do we reassure stakeholders, parents, funders and partners about our quality without that simple, universally understood grade?

I’ll keep my metaphorical step-counter handy – because explaining quality in the post-grade world is going to be one serious workout.

The quiet power of FE, where second chances spark social change

When I first walked into a college classroom nearly a decade ago, I wasn’t a lecturer but a woman in recovery, trying to rebuild a life that addiction had torn apart. 

I had just had my first son, some 20 years after leaving school with no FE qualifications. My Access to HE course, which I completed with a distinction, became a ladder out of an earlier chaos. It gave me a language for understanding people, systems and, eventually, myself. 

Today as a lecturer and programme co-ordinator, I’m helping to shape a new foundation degree in social and community practice.

It feels like the natural continuation of my own journey: learning, recovery and community all stitched together. 

The degree is being developed from need. In South Devon like in many coastal regions, social issues overlap – mental health, homelessness, addiction and low-level crime. 

Here, like most areas, support services are stretched and staff turnover is high. Too many people fall through the cracks. The new programme is designed to develop practitioners who can stop that happening. 

It equips them with the knowledge and critical skills needed to intervene early, carry out informed and ethical assessments, and work collaboratively across agencies. The aim is to ensure children, families and vulnerable adults receive timely, coordinated support.

The first year gives students the fundamentals – ethics, legislation, human development, wellbeing and research. The second year focuses on specific social challenges such as addiction and recovery, homelessness and deprivation, disability, mental health and working with victims and offenders. 

That last group of modules excites me the most. Real lives don’t fit neatly into categories. 

Someone can be a survivor, a parent, a carer, an offender and a neighbour all at once. Our students learn to see the whole person rather than just the label. 

Our social science classroom discussions, sometimes fuelled by lived experience, remind me daily that empathy is a form of intelligence. Some have faced the issues they now study. 

National data underlines why programmes like this matter. The Office for National Statistics reported this year that rates of symptoms of depression in England remain nearly double pre-pandemic levels. 

Alcohol-related deaths in the south west are among the highest in the country. 

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation described 2025 as a “turning point for poverty policy” as people struggle with housing and cost-of-living pressures. 

Every one of those statistics translates into the kind of cases our graduates will face. 

A collaborative project with Devon and Cornwall Police asked our students to present ideas on tackling antisocial behaviour and crime in Torquay. Their message was direct: punishment without understanding changes nothing. They proposed prevention through support and education – ideas that are now being implemented. 

Seeing that level of maturity in their analysis and proposals was a highlight of my career. 

What strikes me most about working with my students is their sense of service. Whether they go on to become social workers, advocates, counsellors or police officers, they share one common purpose – to make people’s lives better. 

Yes, it’s cheesy, but it’s also evidence-based. Research from the University of York shows that trauma-informed practice reduces repeat crisis interventions and improves community outcomes. 

The data confirms what lived experience has already taught many of us. For me, recovery and teaching are different sides of the same coin. 

Writing a module on addiction and recovery allowed me to bring that perspective into academia in a way that feels responsible and useful. It tells students – and maybe the sector – that vulnerability can coexist with professionalism. 

Real change in social care begins when education helps people turn understanding into action that strengthens the communities around them.

When I look around my classroom, I see a few learners who might reshape the very services that once supported them. That’s the quiet power of further and higher education working together. 

And if my story proves anything, it’s that learning doesn’t just change lives. It can save them too. 

It’s mayday for the skills sector under DWP

If you’ve seen the film Das Boot, about a German U-boat, you’ll remember what happens when they did an emergency dive. Alarms going off, crew scrambling everywhere and sheer panic.

Why does this spring to mind when I think of skills moving into the Department for Work and Pensions? Well, if skills didn’t have enough challenges, inserting it into the DWP risks sinking the market quickly.

Historically, employability and skills funding has been like oil and water; the two don’t mix. That doesn’t help employers, jobseekers or learners.

Research shows most employers hire for attitude and train for skill. Putting responsibility under one roof may seem like the best way to achieve this – but let me provide a reality check.

The DWP has a huge budget, skills will be a fraction of that, and there are flashing red lights from what has happened to employability, especially for SMEs.

The arrival in 2021 of DPS2 (Dynamic Purchasing System), which Jobcentres can use to fill unmet needs, has been a disaster. That’s because if a Jobcentre manages to find a programme that works really well, they can’t repeat it. They have to buy on price.

Contract awards are updated quarterly on Contract Finder so competitors can see what the winning price was. So they bid below that, often significantly lowballing. The Jobcentre ends up with poor-quality provision which they know won’t deliver, but it’s that or nothing. 

The DWP’s inability to course correct on this cannot be allowed to happen with skills.

When I met Debbie Abrahams MP, chair of the Work and Pensions Select Committee, and gave her evidence of how the DWP has failed to learn from, replicate and scale Jobcentre programmes, she agreed it undermines ministers’ priorities.

Problems are compounded by the DWP’s lack of transparency about the performance of its employment support programmes, as requested by her predecessor, Sir Stephen Timms and the National Audit Office.

Mel Stride’s response when he was secretary of state to a transparency campaign led by the then MP John Penrose, was the DWP didn’t need to measure performance and he didn’t see why they should. He also said using past performance as part of the criteria to evaluate bids from suppliers would “not be legally compliant with current procurement regulations”.

Alarmingly, Labour haven’t changed that, even though I suggested they should request full transparency during their access talks with civil servants prior to the election. 

The lack of training for Jobcentre staff to write specifications means they guess at what is needed, often unintentionally precluding proven solutions. They get conflicting guidance about whether they can speak to other regions about best practice, or speak to providers about their challenges. 

The DWP’s insistence that knowing a provider’s performance would compromise fair and open competition is an interpretation of procurement law unique to them.

They have predictably created a race to the bottom where a provider can write a great bid, low ball on price and win the work, even when they don’t have the expertise or capability to deliver it. This is inevitable if performance isn’t taken into account.

Whilst some DWP regions may like to address that, they are powerless.

Does quality matter?

Quality matters and has to be measurable, but the current modus operandi means it isn’t. Ofsted and the sector have worked hard to raise standards but the DWP’s current approach will reverse that. Skills England will say what? 

I’ve spoken to work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden about the need for public sector reform to achieve growth, and how DWP employment support is the place to start.

The way through this, as I discussed with Darren Jones (now chief secretary to the prime minister) earlier in the year, is a facilitated amnesty. Rather than allow civil servants to issue eloquent brush offs, McFadden and colleagues need to go looking for problems, call some of this poor practice out, and shift the intent of the organisation.

McFadden has already said the DWP is there to help get people into work, which means getting the best from skills, not ruining the sector. Hopefully we can say ‘all aboard’, rather than ‘abandon ship’. 

Our jobs market is changing faster than anyone expected – our skills system isn’t

Technological, demographic and environmental changes – so-called mega trends – are just some of the shifts reshaping the labour market at unprecedent speed, far faster than previously expected.

It is imperative that skills are now put front and centre of the growth agenda. A system of lifelong learning is needed to fuel labour market resilience and economic growth.

Jobs total is increasing, but not all occupations are growing

For the last five years, the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) has been leading The Skills Imperative 2035 research programme to quantify the implications of these mega-trends. We published employment projections in 2022 which showed the total number of jobs was expected to grow, but that almost all this growth would be in higher skilled professional and technical jobs such as engineering, teaching and health practitioners. We identified that 12 million people in England work in mid-to-low skill occupations such as administrators, sales, and warehouse operatives, which are in decline. Our projections suggested that one million of these jobs could disappear by 2035.

A quarter of jobs in high-risk occupations could be lost

However, new analysis which has examined how the labour market has changed since 2022 shows that the pace of change has been more rapid than expected – as much as three times faster for some groups. If these trends continue, up to three million jobs in high-risk occupations could disappear before 2035.

Why these lost jobs matter

In previous periods of change in the labour market, displaced workers have found similar new jobs without creating large-scale unemployment. However, if there are far fewer low skilled jobs opportunities in future, these workers risk being permanently excluded from the workforce at a time when we need more workers because of the growing labour market. These workers tend to be lower-skilled/qualified compared to those in growing occupations. They will need support to upgrade their skills to enable them to transition to growing parts of the labour market.

These changes also pose a threat to young people

Changes also pose a major threat to young people who leave education without the skills and qualifications to access growing higher-skilled jobs. With fewer low skilled jobs opportunities in the future and increased competition from lower skilled workers already in the labour market, they run the risk of being not in education, employment or training (NEET).

We need to build a system of lifelong learning

The impact of these mega-trends on the labour market is very compelling. An urgent response is required. A system of lifelong learning is needed, with a cradle-to-grave approach to skills development at its core. In our report we set out the collective response required from across government, educators and employers.

Central to this response is the need to ensure all young people leave education with a strong base of the ‘essential employment skills’ (EES) – such as collaboration, communication and problem solving. Our research has shown that these skills are already important but will be even more vital in future, especially in growth occupations which utilise them intensively. These skills must be explicitly recognised and developed alongside the teaching of knowledge, supported by a common skills framework that schools and colleges can use.

Also central is the need to reinvigorate the adult skills system. As the rate of change accelerates, so too does the need to help existing workers reskill and upskill, given that over 70 per cent of the future workforce in 2035 are already in work. An injection of funding can rejuvenate the adult skills system after a decade of neglect, decline and fragmentation.

A joined-up, lifelong learning system – focused on both technical skills and EES – is now more essential than ever for delivering economic growth that benefits everyone.

Apprentice minimum wage to rise to £8

The minimum hourly wage for apprentices will be boosted to £8 next April, the chancellor has announced.

Ahead of tomorrow’s budget, Rachel Reeves tonight revealed the minimum rate on offer to apprentices will rise by 45p, or 6 per cent, from the current £7.55 per hour. 

While the wage boost is lower than last year’s 18 per cent hike, it is higher than the current rate of inflation that sits at 3.6 per cent in the year to October. 

Reeves will also increase the national minimum wage for 18 to 20-year-olds by 8.5 per cent to £10.85 per hour.

And the national living wage will also rise by 4.1 per cent from £12.21 to £12.71 per hour for workers aged 21 and over.

The rate rises will kick in from April 1, 2026.

Employers have to pay at least the apprentice minimum wage for apprentices aged 16 to 18, and for apprentices aged 19 or over in the first year of their apprenticeship. After their first year, apprentices aged over 19 should receive at least the national minimum wage, or the national living wage, depending on their age.

Reeves is also expected to use her budget tomorrow to confirm freezes on rail fares and NHS prescription charges to ease the cost of living. However, she is also rumoured to be extending a freeze on income tax thresholds once more and capping pension contributions through salary sacrifices to raise government revenue.

Reeves said the changes will benefit “many” young people across the country.

“I know that the cost of living is still the number one issue for working people and that the economy isn’t working well enough for those on the lowest incomes,” she added.

“Too many people are still struggling to make ends meet and that has to change.”