Qualifications Reform Review
Debate between Lord Johnson of Marylebone and Baroness Smith of Malvern(5 days, 16 hours ago)
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
I thank my noble friend. He is right that there is something very arresting for a new Member of the House of Lords and a returned Education Minister to attend a meeting with my noble friends Lord Blunkett, Lady Morris, Lady Blower and Lord Knight, all of whom are very expert in this area. I am glad that he thinks I at least listened and understood what they said to me.
My noble friend is right that of the qualifications that we started looking at, of which about 460 were due for defunding by 2026, about 200 had very low enrolments: 100 or fewer students. We have largely managed to remove those from the qualifications landscape. It is probably still the case that that landscape is overly complex for students to be able to work their way through, but we kept 157 of the qualifications that were previously proposed to be defunded.
On the point about the curriculum and assessment review, as I touched on earlier, that review has within its remit the consideration of the assessment routes for 16 to 19 year-olds, and—responding to a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Willetts, which perhaps I did not address previously—a particular emphasis on ensuring that our curriculum and assessment routes enable everybody to succeed, including those who are disadvantaged and those with special educational needs and disabilities. For that reason, it will focus carefully on bringing forward recommendations about what the assessment route should look like for students post 16, and we will reflect on those and use them as the basis for further decisions about how to ensure that our qualifications for 16 to 19 year-olds are suitably rigorous, suitably accessible and provide appropriate choice for students.
Lord Johnson of Marylebone (Con)
My Lords, like others on all sides of the House, I very much welcome the Government’s rapid work to lift much of the uncertainty over the defunding of applied general qualifications. It would be hugely beneficial if the Government went a little further and were absolutely explicit that this is not just a stay of execution until 2027 but that there is a long-term place for these qualifications in our education system. That is my first point. The second point is: can the Minister show similar rapid work in lifting the uncertainty over how the growth and skills levy will interact with the lifelong learning entitlement, and if not now, say when the Government will do so?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
I do not think it is appropriate for anybody—I do not think the noble Lord would have done it—to say that there would never be any development or new qualifications introduced into the 16 to 19 landscape or that there should ever be any ending of any qualification. So the qualifications landscape should not be set in stone. However, I can repeat, as I said to his noble friend, that the Government do not envisage a qualifications landscape in which there is only a choice of T-levels or A-levels. That is one of the reasons why the work of the curriculum and assessment review in setting out its views on what should remain in order to provide appropriate routes for young people will be the basis for any future decisions made there. It is my view that there will always need to be qualifications that are neither A-levels or T-levels, but they need to be of sufficiently high quality to ensure that we are not selling short the young people who take that route.
No sooner have we solved one problem than the noble Lord quite rightly pushes us to get on to the next one. Skills England is currently consulting on some of the current flexibilities that we will be introducing to develop the growth and skills levy, and of course we are also working hard on the implementation of the lifelong learning entitlement. I hope it will not be too long before we will be able to say more about both of those and, as the noble Lord also suggested, how they will link together. But I will just have a little break over Christmas before we come back to do that, and I hope all noble Lords also have a very restful break when it comes.
Higher Education Sector
Debate between Lord Johnson of Marylebone and Baroness Smith of Malvern(2 weeks, 5 days ago)
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Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
The noble Lord is right that it is important that the graduate route visa has been protected. It allows international students, in the case of PhD graduates, to stay for an additional three years to contribute and look for work. I think that that is appropriate, given the contribution that they make, as the noble Lord says.
Lord Johnson of Marylebone (Con)
My Lords, I draw attention to my interests on the register. I share the shock of my noble friend Lady Barran at the OfS’s decision to suspend applications to the register. This sends a terrible message to investors around the world and will deter institutions that want to follow trailblazers such as Dyson, NMIT, LIS and TEDI in bringing innovation and choice to our higher education system. If the Office for Students cannot handle the duties that Parliament has given it, should it not delegate back to the Quality Assurance Agency the quality assurance function that it has taken from it?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
Well, I simply reiterate the point that it is important that this Government have gripped the issue of financial sustainability and have asked the OfS to focus on it. The OfS has made its decisions about where to focus its capacity to enable it to do that. I take seriously the point that the noble Lord made, but it is the role of the OfS as the regulator of the sector to regulate, to ensure that we have the sort of quality that—I disagree with the noble Lord—will continue to attract students, researchers and others into the UK.