Manifesto promise: Scrap fees and loans in further education by doubling the Adult Education Budget

Emily Chapman argues FOR

When I ran to be Vice President for Further Education at the National Union of Students’ National Conference this year, I ran on a manifesto of ensuring funding for Adult Education and ESOL was ring-fenced and that the concept of lifelong learning became central to any government’s FE agenda. Having myself returned to education at the age of 25, I know just how important lifelong learning is, so I’m pleased to see that Labour’s manifesto includes a commitment to scrap fees and loans in further education, by doubling the Adult Education Budget.

Everyone should have the right to access further education, at any stage in their life. For many people, adult education and lifelong learning provides a much-needed second, third or even fourth chance. It supports the most disadvantaged to enter and return to work, gives people agency over their lives and allows them the opportunity to change their career path and learn new skills.  

Time and time again, research has shown the incredible contribution adult education and lifelong learning makes; to the individual, to the economy and to society. Yet these benefits have been consistently overlooked by a government who, until very recently, was committed to pursuing a higher education agenda, rather than a skills-based one.

Over the past ten years adult education has been consistently side-lined and its budget subjected to unprecedented cuts. As a result, colleges have been forced to severely narrow the curriculum they provide to adult learners and there are now around 1.5 million fewer adults participating in further education than there were 10 years ago – a fall of 38%.

This dramatic drop in adult learners is unsurprising. Whilst Advanced Learner Loans are ostensibly about supporting adults to gain Level 3 qualifications and above, they are not accompanied by adequate maintenance support. Learners are expected to take on debt to cover both their course and living costs. In an economy where wages are stagnating and the cost of living is rising, it is inevitable that older learners would turn away from adult education, fearful of the debts they would have to take on in order to better their lives.

Labour’s commitment to scrapping advanced learner loans and reintroducing grants has the opportunity to reverse some of the damage done to lifelong learning over the past ten years. Not only will it provide support to older workers and learners from more deprived backgrounds to actually access further education throughout their lives, it also has the potential to completely alter the way lifelong learning is conceived in society.

Everyone should have the right to access further education

Rather than being seen by the majority as just language classes and pottery courses, adequate investment would signal a move towards recognising the incredibly important role adult learning plays in social mobility; in creating communities; in improving the mental and physical wellbeing of its participants and in re-skilling workers throughout their lives.

But whilst this funding and investment would be an important step forward, it’s not enough on its own. There needs to be a cohesive and coherent lifelong learning strategy that recognises the need for quality, impartial careers information, advice and guidance. The Learning and Work Institute’s surveys consistently show that we are more likely to see adults in learning who already have qualifications, than those who don’t, and so adequate IAG will be critical.

The vote to leave the European Union last June has realigned the focus in education policy and I’m pleased that both Labour and the Conservatives have recognised that there needs to be a much greater focus on, and investment in, further education. I’m hopeful that the commitment to adult education will extend beyond June 8.

Emily Chapman is Vice president for further education at the National Union of Students

Labour manifesto pledge: Reintroduce the 16-19 Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA)

Shakira Martin argues FOR

Scrapping the education maintenance allowance scheme in England was a mistake. Plain and simple. The coalition government did a U-turn on their education policy centred on ‘fairness and equality of opportunity for all’. Against all their rhetoric it took away from those who needed the help most. Labour’s commitment to reinstating the scheme if elected next month are a step in the right direction on the road to recovery for FE.

EMA made a significant difference to those from low-income backgrounds, covering essentials such as food, books and transport. It wasn’t perfect but it eased educational disadvantage and scrapping it has had major repercussions on students from lower-income families. At the time of implementation in 2004, financial constraints were seen as a barrier to involvement in post-16 education, it aimed to directly reduce the cost of education as a means for raising their participation (including influencing retention and attainment).

Many students were struggling then, and they’re still struggling now.

We know from our own research that many find it difficult to cover their course costs with half stating that they had considered dropping out due to financial worries. This manifesto finally says to post-16 learners that our politicians are ready to invest in young people again and provide a real ladder to opportunities, skills and jobs.

The introduction of a 16-19 bursary fund to ‘replace’ it didn’t even come close to filling the dark hole that cutting EMA left behind, at just a third of the previous budget dedicated to young learners it barely scratches the surface when tackling the needs of students in hardship. Many are faced with a postcode lottery, depending on the area in which they live means they could be awarded strikingly different amounts. And that’s only if they’ve been told about the fund to begin with, with many being told to only apply for funding ‘if they need it’ – firmly placing the burden on the student.

The introduction of a 16-19 bursary fund didn’t even come close to filling the dark hole that cutting EMA left behind

It’s clear that the overall budget of the post 16 bursary and its discretionary nature are inadequate to meet the needs of FE students. For several years NUS has been calling for a new and improved EMA, which is why we’re particularly pleased to see that Labour has pledged to re-introduce the payments awarded to 16-19 year olds if elected on 8 June.

It isn’t the first time Labour has declared its promise to poorer students, back in October 2016 at Labour Party conference, shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner spoke about restoring EMA. An unknown on both occasions is exactly how much Labour would commit to the reintroduction of payments, going back to the old scheme would result in means-tested weekly payments of £10 – £30 for those from households earning less that £31,000.

It has been close to 7 years since the government announced it was removing the allowance for those studying in England. Inflation is real. To adequately keep up we’d need to see weekly payments of around £40 and increase the family income threshold and maintain a small discretionary fund for emergencies.

Currently young learners are not receiving the crucial financial backup they need to get to their place of learning and thrive within it. We need to be supporting those who rely on further education institutions, not shutting them out.

Shakira Martin is President-elect of the National Union of Students

Conservative manifesto pledge: Allow employers to use their levy to pay apprentices’ wages

Martin Doel argues AGAINST

The apprenticeship levy is a bold policy that surprised many when it was announced, but it is of a piece with much of the last government’s thinking in terms of what is now being called Red-Toryism; it involves a more interventionist and less purely market-driven approach. In its application of what is effectively a hypothecated tax, it could be a game changer in ensuring employers commit to developing the skills of their workforce to increase productivity, national prosperity and promote individual careers.

To be this game changer, however, levy policy needs to be stable and subject to only incremental, well-considered change, rather than spasmodic development based on self-interested lobbying.

The most oft-stated concern of both employers and further education providers is the frequency of change in our technical and professional education system. It was therefore surprising to see in the Conservative manifesto, under a section headed ‘Career Learning,’ a proposal that companies be able to access the apprenticeship levy to support wage costs during a period of career training (the nature of this training is not specified).  This, when the levy has barely been introduced and its impact has certainly not been assessed, either in output terms, or in terms of the amount of income generated.

A separate, but related, concern is in relation to the potential for ‘gaming’ – a phenomenon that has sadly afflicted a series of skills initiatives, including but not limited to individual learning accounts, train to gain and the early stages of the apprenticeship ‘renaissance’. If the levy is related to a specific and clearly defined apprenticeship product, its application and impact will more easily be ensured and assessed. The wider the product book, the wider the potential for its abuse or misuse; to prevent such abuse or misuse, would be an overweening bureaucracy, again following a pattern that has become wearingly familiar in skills reform. Already we have seen the potential for gaming around the Register of Apprenticeship Training Providers.

If the uses of the levy are to be expanded, it would be best for this to be in relation to training costs in a family of apprenticeship products that can be more easily monitored at the outset.  Work placements and/or traineeships in the college-based route might be candidates for this broadening, providing a useful incentive for employers to become fully involved and committed to the development of young people and prospective apprentice/employees. Tracking and accounting for subsidised wage costs would be much more difficult to achieve, particularly with a new and untested apprenticeship levy IT system.

No one can know how much might be available until the levy has operated for at least a year

A further additional candidate for liberalisation of the levy, which is mentioned in the manifesto, is for large employers to pass on their levy vouchers to smaller employers in the supply chain. Sensibly, at the launch of the levy this has not been allowed, but it has been well signposted as a future development. 

Involving smaller employers in this way also avoids one of the other pitfalls of the proposal to cover wage costs in other training programmes. Namely, losing the prospect of using underspent levy funds to underwrite apprenticeship training costs for smaller employers who do not pay the levy. 

Though there are estimates of how much underspend may be generated, no one can know how much might be available until the levy has operated for at least a year. This uncertainty provides a clue as to why a (small c) conservative line has been taken in the allocation of apprenticeship funding for non-levy payers. Without the apprenticeship levy underspend by large employers, government will need to fund this directly, or accept that apprenticeship growth will slow and be concentrated in large employers.

We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to develop a world class technical and professional education system, with high-quality apprenticeships at its heart. Realising this potential will depend on implementing policy in a considered, evidence-based and focused way, not veering one way and another even before we understand the consequences of policy changes already underway.                    

Martin Doel is FETL Professor of Leadership in Further Education and Skills at UCL