Spending Review - analysis and comment

Spending review - analysis and comment

Let's start with the levy which it seems is genuinely welcomed by most in the sector.

It will affect only larger companies with more than 100-150 employees and a payroll cost of more than £3m per year so almost all colleges and many larger training providers will face this additional cost.  But it can be drawn down by businesses of all sizes and this should stimulate the take-up of apprentices in the SME sector.

In England, It should generate £2.5bn of revenue in the sector which is a large increase on current spending levels of about £1.5bn and supports Nick Boles steering at the AoC last week that Apprenticeships is where the budget is.

Of course, not everyone is pleased, the CBI http://news.cbi.org.uk/news/response-to-autumn-_statement (that represents many large employers) says  “With the levy set at 0.5%, even those businesses most committed to training and development won't be able to recoup their outlay, and it looks like an additional payroll tax.”

"Good news" for the Adult Skills Budget. Despite lots of rumours beforehand, the core ASB will be protected at £1.5bn but £360m of savings will be made from locally-led Area Reviews, along with a possible restructure of funding systems (EFA, SFA) and other departments such as UKCES.  Something similar to the Area Reviews has already been implemented in Scotland and Northern Ireland where larger regional colleges have now been established.

Advanced Learning Loans are being extended.  _“The government will expand tuition fee loans to 19 to 23-year-olds at levels three and four, and 19+ year-olds at levels five and six”._ Will this be additional or replacement funding in the ASB though?

Sixth Form Colleges can benefit from similar treatment of VAT to schools if they become Academies.  The Government also announced they will create 5 National Colleges and will support a new network of Institutes of Technology across the country.

FEWeek carried an excellent article http://feweek.co.uk/2015/11/25/much-feared-budget-looks-positive-for-adult-skills-budget-but-what-could-the-new-19-plus-fe-loans-mean/  with the full statement also available here https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/479749/52229_Blue_Book_PU1865_Web_Accessible.pdf   

The reference areas for the sector are paragraphs 1.170 to 1.179 and 2.80 - found on pages 45 and 46.

Jonathan Wells - ForSkills and Guroo Functional Skills

Major funding changes coming

Major funding changes coming

At the AOC conference earlier this week, Nick Boles spoke about funding and apprenticeships. Whilst everyone (not just this sector), is awaiting news from next week's spending review, a few things became very clear.

Overall budgets are going down - but by how much is still speculation. 

Currently, the Government is spending £1.5bn on Apprenticeships, Colleges get around 35% of this total.  Nick Boles made it clear that this budget will increase over the next 4 years as the Government closes in on the 3m Apprenticeship starts.

The Minister made it clear to the AOC audience that he was expecting Colleges to increase their share of this budget and reduce reliance on sub-contracting. So with overall budgets going down, but Apprenticeship funding protected, budgets in other areas will come under major pressure.

The Minister also said that the way that funding is distributed will also change.  By 2020, the SFA and EFA will not be the key funding source, instead employers, the apprenticeship levy and vouchers will be the source on Apprenticeship funding - this represents a very significant change over the coming years.

Survey

Every year, we survey the thoughts of the post-16 community about English and Maths.  The survey is open now with results expected to be published in the new year.

If you are involved in supporting or teaching learners in Apprenticeships or Traineeships, please have your say, the survey is 20 questions long, and apart from the basics, you can skip the questions where you have no interest or experience.  Above all, your thoughts and opinions will influence how English and maths is delivered in the post-16 sector.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/mathsandenglish2015

Apprenticeship Mix

Changing the Apprenticeship Mix

Everyone will have heard about the Government's apprenticeships target of 3 million new starts.

FE Week are asking the question whether the Government's drive towards these numbers will have a big change in the FE sector.  It's a very fair point, there is a significant difference between the delivery and therefore funding of full time study programmes compared to mainly employer based Apprenticeships and so far, the numbers of 17 year olds on Apprenticeship programmes is low.

A little bit of digging into the recently published SFA stats https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/fe-data-library-apprenticeships reveals some interesting stats based on the 2014/15 year just completed.

• Almost 60% of Apprenticeship starts are at level 2, just 4% are at level 4 or above. 
• The most popular sectors are Business, Health and Care, Retail and Engineering making up 90% of all starts.
• 25% of starts are by those aged 16-18, 32% are 19-24 and the largest sector is the 25+ age group with 43% of starts.

Perhaps these statistics do show that the Government sees the growth in the 16-18 sector as being the biggest opportunity?