Q
420Mr.
Hayes: With respect, it will be the Skills Funding Agency
that releases specifications for apprenticeships. I am very happy for
sector skills councils to be at the pivot of that process. However, as
I said earlier, the Bill does not mention sector skills councils,
except in a cursory fashion. I acknowledge that the explanatory notes
refer to them. The real point is that the National Apprenticeship
Service will be responsible specifically and explicitly for modelling
the developing
apprenticeships and the apprenticeship frameworks specified by the SFA.
It would be entirely possible to have a National Apprenticeship Service
with that competence working with sector skills councils, would it
not? Mr.
Simon: It would have been possible. However, my point
remains that under the structure in the Bill, it will be statutory for
the specification of standards to be set by the chief executive of the
Skills Funding Agency. That will give the broadest definition of what
an apprenticeship is and should be. That will be done through wide
consultation with everybody in the sector from businesses to
users. It
is absolutely right that the frameworks should continue to be set by
the business employers who use them. There are currently 180 frameworks
among the sectors. It would be wrong to bring that function into the
NAS. It is much better for the NAS to focus on delivering
apprenticeships and driving up the number and quality of them. It
should be involved in the high-level business of setting the overall
standards and in saying what an apprenticeship is. Determining who
needs to do what should be left to employers in the sector skills
councils. As I have said repeatedly, although the councils may not be
writ large in the Bill, they are writ large at the centre of the skills
system.
Q
421Mr.
Hayes: But there is no definition of apprenticeships or
advanced apprenticeships in clauses 1 to 38. Clauses 20 to
25 provide an outline of content specification for apprenticeships, but
there is no example and no draft
specification. As
the Minister knows, clause 15 allows existing vocational standards to
be upgraded to apprenticeships. As we have heard from witnesses and
from elsewhere, that is a worry because the standard of apprenticeships
and the quality of the brand are critical. If we call anything an
apprenticeship to meet the targets and fulfil the entitlement, it will
be extremely damaging to the real apprenticeships that he and I admire
and wish to
grow. Why
is there no specification? Can we expect to see it at least in draft
form in Committee so that we can have a real debate about the quality
and content of
apprenticeships? Mr.
Simon: I am very surprised that the hon. Gentleman
says that there is no definition or specification of an apprenticeship
in the Bill. If you were to summarise clauses 1 to 34, one of the
fundamental things that they do is to define and explain exactly what
an apprenticeship is, how it is to be delivered, who is to deliver it
and in what circumstances it is to be delivered. Obviously, it would be
wrong to put in the Bill the line-by-line detail and substantive
content of what that
means. The
Bill sets up the processes by which employers will work under the three
structures of the specification. At the highest level, they will work
under the chief executive of the Skills Funding Agency. The frameworks
will be made by the sector skills councils and the agreements will be
made between learners and employers. The Bills sets out
clearly how those different parts of the apprenticeship system work. An
apprenticeship is a relationship between an employer, a learner and a
provider. The Bill sets out how those parts feed in to the process and
at what levels. The process will be different in hundreds if not
thousands of cases.
Q
422Mr.
Hayes: To grow the number of apprenticeships, we need
good, independent advice and we need more young people to hear about
them. So was the Minister surprised when the CBI complained that the
Bill
“did not go far
enough”, in
terms of the advice that could be offered and that it specifically
complained that providers were not going to be obliged to let people
know about apprenticeships? The CBI said that it was very much left to
their discretion. The suitability of the advice that they gave was very
much in their advisers’ hands, rather than there being the open,
free and independent advice that might come from an independent careers
service, of the kind advocated by Conservatives and others.
I asked
careers advisers about that specifically. You will remember that I
asked Kieran Gordon, the expert witness:
“Has
the Bill gone far enough on strengthening the mechanism by which
quality independent advice can be offered to young
people?” He
replied: “I
do not think it has.”——[Official Report,
Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Public Bill
Committee, 3 March 2009; c. 57,
Q155.] He
went on to say that the Bill did not have sufficient
“teeth” in that regard. Why are the Government so
resistant to independent, free, quality advice being given to young
people so that they can consider
apprenticeships? Mr.
Simon: I was going to answer that, but I was slightly
worried that I might say the wrong thing. You might want to recap the
beginning of that question for Jim.
Jim
Knight: Sorry, a call of nature intervened. In
respect of clause 35, the important thing for the Committee to
consider—obviously, we will debate it at more length later in
our proceedings—is how this sits alongside the statutory
guidance that will be issued in respect of the duty to give impartial
advice, which was in the Education and Skills Act 2008. We will be
consulting on that statutory guidance fairly soon. It will ensure that
every young person in school is given advice about what an
apprenticeship is and about the merits of an apprenticeship. In respect
of delivering what we have set out in clause 35, that
ensures that those for whom an apprenticeship is suitable receive more
detailed advice about that apprenticeship, beyond the advice that is
set out in the statutory guidance as regards the 2008
Act.
Q
423Mr.
Hayes: May I ask just one final question? It is a very
straightforward one, and the Ministers will have the answer to hand.
They will remember—indeed, it will be writ large on their
memory—Andrew Foster’s advice about freeing up further
education colleges from what he described as the “galaxy of
oversight” bodies that regulate, monitor and advise them. We
heard scepticism from the Association of Colleges and particularly from
Graham Moore of the 157 Group about the Bill’s effect in respect
of local education authorities. As a result of the Bill, will that
“galaxy of oversight” be bigger or smaller? Will the 17
bodies that are currently involved, which Andrew Foster mentioned in
his report, be fewer or greater in number as a result of the
legislation? Mr.
Simon: I was surprised that they were not more
enthusiastic. Jim
Knight: There has been a misunderstanding.
Mr.
Simon: I can only assume that there was some kind of
a misunderstanding. Privately, they have been very enthusiastic and
supportive. I am perfectly confident that, under the new arrangements,
life in a FE college will be simpler, more straightforward and less
complex than now. On the 16-to-19 side, colleges will have one funding
relationship with the lead local authority. On the adult side, they
will have a single account relationship with the SFA, which is novel;
they now have multiple funding conversations with many different parts
of the Learning and Skills Council. Another novel aspect is that they
will have a single accreditation facility with the SFA; currently,
there is a cumbersome, 100-page bureaucratic process that they are
compelled to repeat with the LSC every time a new tranche of funding
becomes available. They will have a single performance framework in the
framework for excellence arrangements. They will have a single data
relationship with all the various agencies that require data from them;
there will be just one relationship. I am in no doubt that, under our
plans, life in an FE college will
be—
Q
424Mr.
Hayes: And will the number of bodies involved in
oversight, as identified by the Foster model, be fewer? What is the
number to be: four, three, two, one?
Mr.
Simon: There will be fewer relationships for them to
deal with,
yes.
Q
425Mr.
Hayes: We argue that all this new structure will be
convoluted and complex—we agree with the witnesses; the
Ministers do not—but how much will the change cost or save? I
guess that the ambition is that it will save a lot of
money. Jim
Knight: The costs are set out in the impact
assessment in the normal way. If I had a copy to hand, I would read out
the relevant
bit.
Q
426Mr.
Hayes: Okay, but will the new structure be cheaper? Will
it deliver a better service more
cost-effectively? Jim
Knight: Yes it will, and most importantly, it will be
responsive to the needs of both learners and employers. The other
strength for FE colleges, beyond what Siôn has set out so
clearly, is that the planned side of their business for 16 to
19-year-olds will give them a certain amount of stability, while the
demand-led side will allow them to innovate in relation to adults. That
will appeal to a sector that has been remarkably successful at
innovating and responding to the changing economic needs of its
areas.
Q
427Mr.
Hayes: I appreciate the difficulty of answering these
questions on spec, but will the Ministers set out the cost savings in
relation to the change from LSC to all the successor bodies? We would
like to be able to explore that in detail in
Committee. Mr.
Simon: The cost is already set out in the impact
assessment; we have not memorised it. It is on the
record.
Q
428Mr.
Laws: May I point out that I thought that the LSC’s
view was that the change will not save any money at all and that it
will be
cost-neutral? Mr.
Simon: This change is not a cost-saving exercise;
that is not why we are making it. In the immediate term, it will be
cost-neutral; in the long term, my expectation is that the new
structures will be more efficient and cost-effective than the
LSC.
Jim
Knight: For clarity’s sake, the administrative
cost of the new system, including staffing and on-costs, will be met,
as Siôn has said, by the LSC’s current staffing budget.
We expect that to be revenue-neutral, but there will be some additional
transitional costs. Savings will be made by operating from a smaller
estate of office premises. For example, by operating at national and
regional level, the SFA will require fewer premises. Furthermore, we
expect to make administrative savings through a centralisation of
functions, including shared support services, the greater use of
technology and perhaps some shared procurement. Sharing will be
facilitated by the fact that the SFA and YPLA head offices will be
located together in Coventry. We also think that there will be
efficiency savings at local authority level, by joining the
commissioning of 16-to-19 education and training with the commissioning
of wider youth services, such as learner
support.
Q
429Mr.
Hayes: What is the transitional
cost? Jim
Knight: That is certainly set out in full in the
impact assessment. We can obviously return to that during our
debate.
Q
430Mr.
Laws: I am sorry to butt in on John Hayes again, but is it
not the case, Minister, that some of the cost savings that you mention
are already embedded in the LSC’s plans for estate
reorganisation, so we are not really comparing the reorganisation per
se with the old
situation? Mr.
Simon: No. The LSC is not forecast to exist then, so
it does not have plans for that
period.
Q
431Mr.
Laws: That is not what it
said. Mr.
Simon: How can the LSC have estate plans for 2015
when it is scheduled to be wound up next
year? Jim
Knight: Even if the whole thing is cost-neutral, it
is still right to move the break from 16 to 19, to have a dedicated
adult skills agency, to return 16-to-19 commissioning to local
authorities and to have an agency that will ensure that everything is
coherent for FE colleges, which is what the YPLA will do.
Mr.
Simon: If you would like to give us the details of
what the LSC has told you, I will certainly look into
that.
Q
432Mrs.
Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con): There are a number of
important early years provisions in the Bill, and we have not had much
time to talk about them in the earlier evidence sessions, so perhaps I
could turn the Committee’s attention to those provisions now. I
do not think that there has been any conversation about clause 190 and
the early years budgetary framework. When that is in place, do you
expect there to be a level playing field for the cost of delivering
early years’ free entitlement for both the maintained sector and
the private, voluntary and independent sector? Do you think that that
budgetary framework should have been in place when the free entitlement
was
introduced? Sarah
McCarthy-Fry: We want to get consistency. We are not
going to specify that early years has to be delivered by one sector or
another. We are hoping that that will provide a level playing field
across all providers by giving consistency of
funding.
Q
433Mrs.
Miller: In saying that you want to get a consistency of
funding, are you acknowledging that there has not been consistency to
date? Sarah
McCarthy-Fry: The Bill aims to ensure that there is.
I would not like to say that there has or has not been consistency, but
by putting it in one setting and having it in one place, our aim is to
make sure that, even if other providers feel that they have not been as
well serviced—whether or not that is true—we will be able
to demonstrate it under these
proposals.
Q
434Mrs.
Miller: The Library’s research paper, which it very
helpfully published alongside the Bill, would tend to suggest that it
is more than just a feeling that certain sectors have not had the same
funding. The Department’s own benchmarking analysis for 2007-08
and 2008-09 clearly pointed out that maintained nurseries have been
receiving £3,800 per pupil per year, whereas the PVI sector has
been receiving around £1,800 per pupil per year. When will the
new legislation and the single funding formula, which is being
developed by local authorities, be in place so that all local
authorities will be able to even out the imbalance of funding that we
appear to have seen to
date? Sarah
McCarthy-Fry: Our intention is that our powers will
be used so that, from 2010-11, all local authorities will be required
to introduced a single funding
formula.
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