JTL’s response to the IfATE’s second consultation on apprenticeship funding bands

  Posted by: electime      12th November 2020

Jon Graham, Chief Executive at JTL, the leading training provider to the building services engineering sector, discusses his thoughts regarding the latest Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education’s (IfATE) consultation on apprenticeship funding bands.

“Coronavirus has had a major impact on the apprenticeship industry as a whole. Tens of thousands of apprentices have been affected, particularly in relation to the practical, on-the-job training element of this form of education. This practical training proved to be difficult to achieve during the first lockdown of the pandemic, and even now it continues to be challenging despite safety measures being in place. The second lockdown will bring further challenges.

“The impact of Covid-19 on the UK’s education system continues, yet a crucial part of the ecosystem, apprentices, is being further damaged by the possible future government’s funding decisions. JTL, FE colleges and other training providers are delivering vital training to the next generation of workers, which is crucial in ensuring that the current skills shortage is tackled. However, despite the promising outlook presented as part of the Chancellor’s ‘Plan for Jobs’ in the summer, in which funding incentives and schemes aimed at helping young people were announced, it seems that the latest IfATE consultation on apprenticeship funding bands may have a disastrous knock-on affect. This is the second IfATE consultation, yet it has ignored many comments from the first consultation.

“Over the last few months, the Prime Minister and the Government has put particular emphasis on young people and the future of apprenticeships. The Chancellor’s recent support package outlined a range of support for young people, including incentives for employers to take on apprentices, funding for traineeships, Kick Start placements and funding options for people to stay on at colleges. This was a promising move from the government as we know that there is a real threat that some young people, who would usually have entered the labour market this year, might find themselves at risk of becoming neither in employment, in education, or in training.

“In a similar vein, The Lifetime Skills Guarantee announced by Boris Johnson was focused on providing opportunity over the long term, and to help support more adults to progress and get the skills that are valued by employers, which will in turn help  our economy to build back better from the pandemic.

“Yet despite all these recent government pledges to support apprentices and to encourage employers to recruit more apprentices, it seems inconceivable that IfATE is looking at reducing funding. Simply put, reducing funding will mean that fewer training organisations will be able to support young leaners and in turn, will be less able to develop vitally needed skills. Therefore, it is hard not to believe that IfATE is under instruction to find an overall 20 per cent reduction in funding and that the Institute is therefore looking for ways of ‘working backwards’ to achieve this.

“True or not, certainly the proposed exclusion of ‘ineligible costs’ from the calculation of the prescribed 9 per cent margin, when these costs account for an estimated 22 per cent of apprenticeship delivery, is causing enormous angst across the apprenticeship training sector. As a result, we are now hearing that some key skills training may become simply unviable – putting training the next generation of some professionals at risk, further increasing the current skills shortage.

“Looking back to the Commons Education Committee report on apprenticeships in October 2018, it clearly acknowledged that high quality training cannot be delivered on the cheap. It was from this report that the Education Committee recommended that the “Government increases the top funding band to better match the full cost of delivery for some apprenticeships. But this is precisely what lies at the heart of the problem with the new funding model that IfATE is proposing. How ridiculous is that when freedom of movement is about to end?”