Detail of apprenticeship levy audit regime revealed

Apprenticeships funded from May will be included in the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s 2016-17 audit programme, FE Week can reveal.

Annual ESFA financial assurance audits take place shortly after the end of the academic year, typically between mid-August and the end of October, and for the first time will include a separate section for apprentices recruited from May.

Click here to see the detail within the relevant ESFA audit working papers. 

For the first time, ESFA-appointed auditors will be seeking evidence of payments from employers to providers. In section eight, the auditor must answer the following question: “Where the employer or training provider are required to make payments, does evidence exist that the payments have been made?”

An employer payment must be “evidenced by a transfer of funding visible in the provider’s (or subcontractor’s) financial systems; this will typically be in the form of a provider invoice and corresponding employer payment for a provider. For employer-providers, they must evidence how the costs are calculated.”

At the present time these audit working papers can only be accessed when producing a sample report from the Provider Data Self-Assessment Toolkit (PDSAT).

The PDSAT software is used by the ESFA-appointed auditors to check the credibility of provider data, but providers are also expected to use it regularly.

Five new reports have been added to PDSAT (see below), with a particular focus on the negotiated price, additional payments and co-investment.

Local authority sets up rival apprenticeship provider register – but will charge

A local authority is planning to make hundreds of thousands in management fees by offering access to its own apprenticeship provider list, FE Week can reveal.

Nottingham City Council is currently tendering for apprenticeship providers to join its “directory” – a list that it intends to share with other public sector employers across England.

The list, it says, will include other local authorities, the emergency services and the NHS.

All business “transacted” through the directory, which claims to have stricter quality criteria than the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s free register of apprenticeship training providers, will be subject to a one-per-cent management fee.

The council estimates a “potential value of spend” of £31.5 million per year, which would net the council a cool £315,000 a year.

But these figures are based on just 10 per cent of apprenticeships “in relevant employers across England” – so by the council’s own admission, management fee income could exceed £3 million per year.

A spokesperson for the council defended the charge, insisting that it had “an obligation to recover costs incurred in the management” of the directory “in line with well-established methods in the public sector”.

“This fee is intended to solely meet management costs, with any income generated covering the cost of setting up and maintaining the service,” he said.

FE Week reported in March on a similar set-up run by the NHS, prompting questions about whether such fees met strict ESFA rules.

The London Procurement Partnership manages apprenticeships for NHS organisations in the capital, and charges a one-per-cent management fee based on the value of the work it wins on behalf of providers.

And, in a separate case, NHS Shared Business Services, a national joint venture between the Department of Health and the information technology consultancy Sopra Steria, is charging providers 0.95 per cent on a quarterly basis for all apprenticeship business it secures.

A spokesperson for what was the SFA said at the time that, from May 1, “no government money can be used to pay brokers’ fees”.

The Nottingham council spokesperson insisted the charge was fully compliant with the rules.

“Our standard contract states that this management fee must only be paid from a legitimate source and never from government payments for apprenticeships funding,” he said.

FE Week has asked the ESFA to confirm that the charge complies with its rules, but has not yet had a response.

But Simon Ashworth, the chief policy officer at the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, expressed concerns about whether the charges – and the directory – were necessary.

“Employers and providers will decide for themselves whether they want to use this service, but we have serious doubts about whether taking funding away from frontline provision in the form of a management fee is justified given the approved provider and quality assurance systems which have already been introduced by the government under the reforms,” he told FE Week.

According to the tender, which runs until August 21, the directory will “consist of sufficiently experienced and qualified training providers who can deliver education services to apprentices employed by public body organisations in England”.

To be eligible to apply, providers must also be on RoATP – but must also meet higher quality standards.

These include the stipulation that providers have at least a grade two overall from a recent Ofsted inspection, and are not subject to intervention by the ESFA.

Successful training providers will be offered a two-year contract, during which time they must “maintain relevant registration with RoATP”.

The directory will “be available to local authorities and their maintained schools, police services, fire and rescue services and NHS services across England,” according to the tender.

The council spokesperson said the directory is designed to “save other public bodies facing budget pressures time and money by offering access to approved training providers which have already been procured through a rigorous process”.

He said the council recognised that providers had already been through a “rigorous process” to get onto RoATP, but insisted that its higher standards had been “aligned” with “strategic council plans”.

 

AEB tender results pushed back AGAIN, now into August

Training providers are being are being told they will learn the results of their long delayed adult education budget bids in August, even though the Education and Skills Funding Agency claimed the announcement would be made “at the end of July”.

This is far from the first time this news has been held back – the tender took place between January and February of this year, with the results promised on May 19. 

After missing that deadline, the ESFA told the relevant providers in June that they would have to wait until the end of July.

And now, providers have been let down again.

They were told today that their results would be published on August 4, in a message sent via the ESFA’s e-tendering portal.

“Following the earlier message issued on June 28, the ESFA can now confirm that the award notification as a result of the invitation to tender for education and training services – adult education budget 2017 to 2018, will be made on the August 4,” it said.

“Contract awards resulting from the tender exercise will be for a nine-month period running from November 1 2017 to July 31 2018.”

The delay was a hot topic at the Association of Employment and Learning Providers’ conference in June, where Keith Smith, director of funding and programmes at the ESFA, told delegates that an announcement was expected “very, very shortly”.

“We’re looking at how we manage the transitions from the current allocations to the new allocations,” he explained.

“I can’t say anything more on it yet but it’s imminent; I think it’ll be good news for the sector.”

Independent learning providers were first told as long as as last October that they would need to re-tender for around £110 million of the Adult Education Budget for 2017/18.

On hearing of the August date, chief policy officer at the AELP, Simon Ashworth, said: “All the indications are that the tender has been heavily oversubscribed.  Given the reports that the AEB has been underspent, we retain the view that the whole budget should have been procured to secure better outcomes and improved value for money.”

The tendered AEB contracts were originally meant to have started on August 1 – three days before the tender results will finally – we hope – be revealed

Assessment organisation claims ESFA approval for subcontracting model

An end-point assessment organisation claims that the Education and Skills Funding Agency will allow it to subcontract apprenticeship exams – even though the agency is in the middle of a significant crackdown on similar arrangements.

SSL Assessment Services Partnerships is currently approved to deliver EPA for the level three team leader standard, and is listed on the register of apprentice assessment organisations.

The arrangement involves two separate entities – SSL working as a consultancy, responsible for quality and process, and a training provider looking after occupational competence.

And while the bulk of any fee is to go to the training provider for carrying out the actual assessment, SSL intends to retain a portion of it for its services.

Nigel Sweeney, the firm’s managing director, accepted that “perhaps this is subcontracting in its broadest sense”, but said he preferred the term “partnership”.

“We are a partnership in which the lead partner [SSL] has the ability to pick the very best occupational lead partner for each specific standard,” he insisted.

He added that the “occupational lead partner is a partner in their own right”.

The ESFA, which manages the AAO register, has been hammering subcontracting arrangements like this amid widespread concerns over abuses of the system.

Providers can no longer subcontract whole apprenticeship frameworks or standards, after numerous lead organisations were caught charging massive “topslice” fees.

And, as of August 1, subcontracting of advanced learner loan provision will also be banned, with only lead providers allowed to deliver these courses in the future.

Despite this, Mr Sweeney told FE Week what he was doing was “fair” – and claimed it had been approved by the ESFA.

But FE Week has been unable to get confirmation on this fact.

A spokesperson for the Institute for Apprenticeships said it “abides by the register of apprentice assessment organisations, administered by the ESFA” and that it was up to each employer to decide “which of the registered organisations they contract to deliver the end-point assessment”.

But when we asked the ESFA if such a model was allowed, we were directed back to the IfA’s comment – even though it clearly indicates that responsibility for enforcing the rules lies with the ESFA.

However, during a webinar in January for the Future Apprenticeships programme, run by the Association of Employment and Learning Providers and funded by the Education and Training Foundation, representatives from what was then the SFA hinted that there would be a new models for EPA coming through – including partnerships.

Janet Ryland, of the funding and programmes division, said the agency was not “prescribing the type of models or consortia”, while her colleague Richard Mole said they needed to be “clear about who’s responsible, where the conflicts of interest lie and how those will be managed”.

Mr Sweeney said that he and the training provider partner were working together to develop the assessment materials, with the training provider bringing the “occupational competence” and his own company providing “policy and process” and quality assurance.

The training provider will carry out the assessment, but the final decision on whether an apprentice passes will rest with SSL.

The “lion’s share” of the fee is to go to the provider, but a portion would be retained by SSL for “admin, engaging with the employer” and handling “quality issues”, Mr Sweeney said.

Currently SSL is partnered with White Rose Training to deliver final exams for the team leader standard, but Mr Sweeney said he wants to engage other providers to deliver assessments for other standards, and would be applying for recognition by Ofqual.

An Ofqual spokesperson confirmed that SSLASP was not yet recognised by the qualifications regulator.

Yorkshire colleges first to publish targets in £56m AEB pre-devolution deal

Colleges in West Yorkshire have agreed a “landmark” partnership with the combined authority to align their annual £56 million adult education budget provision while it waits for an official devolution deal to happen.

The authority – made up of Bradford, Calderdale, Kirklees, Leeds, Wakefield and York councils, and Leeds city region enterprise partnership – has the region’s seven colleges on board with the scheme, which aims to address “acute skills shortages” faced by the area.

Each college has its own targets it needs to reach as part of the partnership, including increasing starts on higher-level apprenticeship courses, improving the proportion of full-time courses with a work experience element, and increasing its income from apprenticeships.

It is hoped that by reaching these targets, the colleges will help to narrow the skills gap in Leeds’ major sectors of manufacturing and engineering, health and care, infrastructure and digital.

The partnership has been created while the combined authority progresses with plans for a full devolution deal, which FE Week understands is in its very early stages.

Councillor Susan Hinchcliffe, skills lead for the West Yorkshire’s combined authority and leader of Bradford council, said she was “immensely pleased” with the new partnership.

“It is paramount that our young people, particularly those hardest to reach, have access to training and qualifications that will lead them to rewarding employment,” she said.

“By realigning this £56 million annual spend, we can ensure that young people have the right skills to gain access to well paid jobs that meet the demands of our businesses.”

The seven colleges in the partnership are Bradford College Group, Calderdale College, Kirklees College, Leeds City College, Leeds College of Building, Shipley College and Wakefield College.

Ian Billyard, principal of Leeds College of Building said that by working with the combined authority, his college had “identified how we will improve our links with employers, grow our apprenticeship offer and develop our pathways to higher-level learning to address the skills shortages in our sector and bring affordable, high-quality education to the young people of the north.”

Andy Welsh, chief executive of Bradford College Group said he was “keen to develop” his college’s “career-focused provision further and in alignment with the needs of the Leeds City Region economy”.

“In partnership with the combined authority and with a renewed focus, we will continue to work to support the needs of Bradford residents and beyond, from the most disadvantaged to those accessing degree level training. Bradford College Group fully endorses this partnership.”

DfE quick to rebuff ‘evidence’ of employers calling for changes to off-the-job rule

A plea for flexibility in apprenticeship off-the-job training requirements has been swiftly rebutted by the Department for Education.

In a paper sent to the DfE on Monday, the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, backed by leading employers, asked that employers developing apprenticeship standards be allowed to set their own rules for how much time apprentices spend in off-the-job training.

The submission included “substantial evidence” from employers, including several NHS Trusts, sandwich chain Pret a Manger and business services group Rentokil Initial, on the impact the DfE’s “arbitrary” 20 per cent off-the-job training requirement would have, and came after AELP boss Mark Dawe (pictured above) met with skills minister Anne Milton earlier this month to discuss the issue. 

The paper warned of the policy’s “unintended consequences”, while employers claimed that it “limits their participation, engagement and appetite to fully embrace apprenticeships”.

“Ramifications are wide-ranging, from limiting social mobility and hampering the achievement of the three million apprenticeship starts to which the current government is committed,” the AELP said.

In place of this one-size-fits-all approach, the organisation asked that the employer groups developing the be allowed to “decide what the percentage of off-the-job should be for required for each of their standards”.

They should “have the authority to recommend to the Institute for Apprenticeships and the Education and Skills Funding Agency the percentage which should be delivered as part of an apprentice’s working hours”, it added.

A DfE spokesperson was quick to rebut any possibility that the rule would be reviewed.

They insisted that the 20 per cent rule is “a core principle that underpins a quality apprenticeship” and “a key aspect that makes an apprenticeship distinct from other work-based learning”.

Under current ESFA rules, introduced in May, all apprentices must spend at least one fifth of their time in off-the-job training.

This is defined as “learning which is undertaken outside of the normal day-to-day working environment and leads towards the achievement of an apprenticeship”.

It can include training “delivered at the apprentice’s normal place of work” but it “must not be delivered as part of their normal working duties”.

The rule has proved extremely divisive throughout the sector.

In a recent FE Week feature, Sue Pittock, the chief executive of Remit Training, argued that homework – done outside the apprentices’ normal working hours – should count towards the 20 per cent.

This view was backed by Mr Dawe, who, as part of the same feature, described the “mandatory 20 per cent” as a “throwback” that “doesn’t offer any correlation with the quality of the provision actually being delivered”.

And Paul Joyce, Ofsted’s deputy director for FE and skills, told the AELP conference in June that the inspectorate would not be auditing providers’ compliance with the rule during inspections.

It’s not a universally unpopular policy, however: many others in the sector want the 20 per cent rule to stay, in order to protect apprentices from exploitation.

Exclusive: IfA turns to headhunters after failing to recruit a permanent CEO

The Institute for Apprenticeships has failed to appoint a permanent chief executive, FE Week can reveal.

A job advert for the top position at the new institute was first launched in April, with a submissions deadline date of May 22.

A person for the role should have been appointed by now, but having failed to do so the IfA has turned to Odgers Berndtson, a major recruitment firm, for help.

In an email sent last week to a sector leader and seen by FE Week, a recruiter from the company says: “I wanted to make contact about a chief executive opportunity I am working on for the Institute for Apprentices.

“Whilst I appreciate you have just moved into a new role, I would be keen to have a word to seek your thoughts and expert opinion on this assignment and see if anyone within your network you may think is suited towards this role.”

A spokesperson for the IfA then confirmed to FE Week today that the institute is still actively  looking for chief executive applicants.

“We received a good response to the advert and have a strong field for the post,” he said. “At present the competition remains ongoing and as part of the process we have used headhunters. The institute remains committed to filling the post as soon as possible.”

The spokesperson added that in the meantime, Peter Lauener will remain as interim chief executive for the institute and he has “made it clear that he is happy to remain in post until the next chief executive is appointed to ensure continuity of leadership”.

The IfA launched in April and is expected to have an annual budget of around £8 million and up to 80 staff.

The chief executive position is only a fixed term contract, of up to five years, with a salary of up to £142,500.

According to the email sent by Odgers Berndtson, the boss of the IfA will have a role in “developing and managing effective relationships with senior stakeholders, seeking to bring them on board and win their commitment to the functions of the Institute, including how those might evolve over time”.

It adds: “The chief executive will be expected to be a visible and authoritative presence on the public stage and in engaging with senior figures in the private and public sector, and will be a credible figure with employers.”

In April, the government appointed Antony Jenkins as permanent chair of the IfA, as well as the chairs for 15 route panels, and a panel of apprentices to advise the board.

Lords launch inquiry into the state of technical education

The House of Lords has called for an inquiry into whether or not FE and vocational training is funded fairly.

Lord Forsyth (pictured above), the chair of the economic affairs committee, is asking for written submissions to be sent in by September 14.

There are a number of FE areas he is hoping to receive submissions for, including the sector’s thoughts on the apprenticeships levy and the government’s target of three million new apprenticeships by 2020.

The post-16 skills plan, based on the recommendations from Lord Sainsbury’s review of technical education, is also on the agenda, as are the much anticipated T-levels, which will give 16- to 19 year-olds the option to study for technical qualifications in 15 sectors.

The inquiry will also look at higher education.

“Successive governments have committed to increasing participation in higher education,” he said. “More recently the government has pledged to increase the number of apprenticeships offered.”

“For those who do not go to university, is the system of further education and vocational training funded fairly? Should there be a greater focus on technical qualifications in STEM subjects to fill shortages in the labour market?”

The committee is keen to gather evidence from those with “direct knowledge” of the issues, including students, recent graduates and apprentices, but it also wants to hear from businesses and enterprise on whether the current system “equips workers with the necessary skills for the modern economy”.

“For our inquiry to be effective we need to hear as many views and experiences as possible,” he said. “Written evidence will play an important role in informing our work and I would encourage anyone with knowledge, or an interest in this area, to return a submission by September 14, 2017.”

Anyone wanting to give written evidence should submit their views online here.

London college merger called off at last minute

A planned merger between two London colleges has been called off at the last minute, FE Week can reveal.

Barking and Dagenham College and Havering College will no longer link up on August 1, Barking’s acting chair of governors has admitted.

Mark Bass told FE Week that merger discussions between the two colleges “have for the present time been discontinued”.

“This was a decision taken by Havering board following a response from the Barking and Dagenham College board, in light of a review of the merger conditions set by the Barking and Dagenham College board,” he said.

A spokesperson for Havering College has also confirmed that “following careful consideration and detailed discussions by the board” it had decided “not to pursue its merger with Barking and Dagenham College”.

“This is because the board considers that a merger with Barking and Dagenham College is no longer the best option to achieve the college’s aspirations for its students, staff and local communities,” he added.

The merger was one of the recommendations to emerge from the east and south-east London area review, which ended in November 2016.

It is now the fifteenth area review recommendation to fall through.

As previously reported by FE Week, these include all three of the Tees Valley review mergers, after the collapse of a partnership between Middlesbrough College and Redcar and Cleveland College was announced earlier this month.

It happened two weeks after the merger between Darlington College and Stockton Riverside College was called off, while a partnership between Hartlepool Sixth Form College and Hartlepool College also fell by the wayside earlier this year, after the SFC announced plans to join forces with Sunderland College.

Other failed mergers include Bury College, which dropped out of a three-way link-up with the University of Bolton and Bolton College in April.

And FE Week reported in February that another Manchester merger involving Stockport, Oldham and Tameside Colleges had been called off following intervention by the FE commissioner Richard Atkins.