Are there more questions than answers?
Despite the King's Speech and and a sector address from the Secretary of State for Education in the last 36 hours,
do we have any more clarity on the Labour government's plans for the skills sector? 🤔
I thoroughly enjoyed hosting the IoD Education Group's webinar this morning on "UK skills policy and delivery: opportunities for the new government"
Over an insight-packed hour we covered three main areas mentioned in yesterday's King's Speech:
1. Skills England
- how will post-16 skills policy integrate with a new National Industrial Strategy? And immigration policy?
- how will Skills England impact the shape and size of other bodies such as IfATE, the Office for Students and ESFA?
- how quickly can Skills England get up to full operating capacity at a time of acute and urgent challenges in the skills sector?
2. The Growth and Skills Levy
- what do 'flexibilities' in using the levy mean?
- will these flexibilities have a negative effect on overall apprenticeship numbers, especially for non-levy paying employers?
- should levy contributions be increased, either through raising the 0.5% paid or by reducing the £3m annual payroll threshold?
- should a larger proportion of levy funds raised be actually allocated to the Apprenticeship Budget, and would that allow much-needed increases in individual funding bands?
3. Devolution of adult skills
- what elements of adult skills funding will be devolved?
- will devolution create a tension with pursuing a national skills strategy, and the work of Skills England?
- how can inconsistencies between combined authorities that might affect larger employers be smoothed out?
Thanks to my brilliant panel of speakers for their help in starting to decipher what we still need clarity on from the government and the DfE
I am very much looking forward to the maiden speech by Skills, FE and HE Minister Jacqui Smith tomorrow in the House of Lords
This morning, we had a full line-up of senior policy experts from the B5, the UK's top five business groups:
Alex Hall-Chen Institute of Directors (IoD) 👏
Jane Gratton British Chambers of Commerce 👏
Robert West CBI (Confederation of British Industry) 👏
Faye Skelton Make UK 👏
Paul Wilson FSB Westminster (Federation of Small Businesses) 👏
and representing independent training providers and colleges:
Simon Ashworth AELP 👏
Plus a fab and really engaged audience 🙌
Lots of questions and opinions through the chat function
DM me if you would like a link to the recording, well worth watching!
#skills #iod #education #apprenticeships #teamfi