Draft Lifelong Learning (Fee Limits) Regulations 2026

Debate between Ian Sollom and Damian Hinds

Wednesday 24th June 2026 General Committees

[Ian Sollom (St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. The Lib Dems have long supported the principle of a flexible credit-based system that lets people study in smaller chunks across their working lives, rather than in one fixed block at 18 years old. We are glad to see that direction reflected here today. I am afraid we cannot endorse the instrument, however, for reasons that I will put on the record.

The first reason is substantive. The instrument, and the package that it leads, relies entirely on a loan-based model to drive take-up among exactly the cohort it claims to serve—adults who are already in work, with mortgages, dependants and a shorter working life over which to repay any loan. A loan that looks like a reasonable proposition for an 18-year-old starting a three-year degree looks very different to a 45-year-old weighing up retraining against existing financial commitments.

When that issue was raised directly in the other place during the passage of the enabling legislation in 2023, the Government’s response was essentially to defer the question to the detail. The instrument is that detail, but the question has not really been answered. The Department’s 2021 pilot of loan-funded short courses, run jointly with the Office for Students, planned for more than 100 courses and 2,000 students, but only 17 courses launched and 125 students enrolled, of whom just 41 took out a loan. That direct, real-world test of the model that this instrument now extends across the entire post-18 system did not generate demand. Will the Minister tell us what assessment has been made of whether the LLE risks repeating that outcome at scale? Has a grant-based supplement, of the kind that the Liberal Democrats have proposed, been costed and considered?

The second reason is procedural. This instrument is subject to the affirmative procedure, but the two remaining SIs in the package—the student support regulations and the repayment regulations—will be laid under the negative procedure, meaning that they will become law without a vote and without the parliamentary scrutiny warranted by a package of this complexity and long-term consequence.

The student support and repayment arrangements are not peripheral details. They are the mechanisms that will determine whether the Government have addressed that loan-aversion issue, whether maintenance support is adequate and whether repayment terms are fair. What if the fee system fails to generate the take-up that the Government are predicting or hoping for? The review is not planned until 2031-32, five years after launch. I suggest that those two instruments should be upgraded to the affirmative procedure so that we can properly scrutinise what follows.

I have a number of more specific questions for the Minister. First, the instrument carries forward the £5,760 lower fee cap for foundation years in subjects such as humanities, business, law and social sciences. That cap was set in 2023 and is unchanged since. Every other major fee category in the instrument receives an uplift in the second tranche, from August 2027. The lower fee foundation year rate does not. For many people without a traditional academic pathway, foundation years are the entry point into higher education. That route runs disproportionally through colleges and lower-tariff institutions, serving the students whom the Government say they most want to reach. Can the Minister confirm that this is simply a continuation of the 2023 cap with no independent review for the instrument, and that, unlike every other fee category mentioned, it does not rise in August 2027?

If the policy rationale for that is to keep fees down to protect access, which is reasonable, is there any compensating mechanism—direct institutional funding, for example—to ensure that providers can keep delivering that provision as costs rise around a frozen fee? The risk is that we are quietly trusting institutions to absorb an indefinite real-terms cut in exactly the provision that is most likely to serve disadvantaged learners.

Regulation 9 requires providers to notify in advance the Secretary of State of the number of credits attached to a course year, and to repeat that notification whenever activities change mid-year. Has the Department made any assessment of the cumulative administrative burden that that will place on smaller providers and FE-based higher education providers, which, again, are precisely the institutions best placed to deliver the flexible, bite-sized provision that the LLE is meant to enable?

The two-tier higher and basic fee structure in the instrument imports the existing access and participation plan mechanism from full-time undergraduate study. APPs were not designed with part-time modular or older learners in mind. Has the Office for Students been asked to assess whether APP commitments, as currently framed, are fit for purpose in a credit-based lifelong learning context?

Regulation 19 ensures that courses designated for lifelong learning purposes are not treated as designated under the pre-existing Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998 regime. Can the Minister confirm that no student currently part way through a course will risk falling between those two designation regimes and losing eligibility for support as a result?

On a minor point that is still worth highlighting, the explanatory memorandum states that the per-credit rate is £81.58, but dividing the £9,790 headline figure by 120 credits gives a recurring decimal, meaning that, at the stated rounding, 120 credits produces £9,789.60, rather than £9,790.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

We all knew that!

[Ian Sollom]

Well, I am a mathematician by trade. It is a small point, but every fee limit in the system is derived from that per-credit calculation, so will the Minister confirm the correct rounding convention, and that the providers and the Student Loans Company are working from the same figure?

We support the direction of this reform, and will not stand in its way today, but the loan-only design and the inadequate scrutiny afforded to the two follow-on instruments are real concerns. I hope that the Minister will address them.

Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Transfer of Functions etc) Bill [ Lords ] (Second sitting)

Debate between Ian Sollom and Damian Hinds

Committee stage
Thursday 13th March 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Ian Sollom (St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under you, Sir Christopher. I would like to express Liberal Democrat support for the amendments tabled by the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston. They address a critical weakness of the Bill, namely the lack of any concrete requirement for the Secretary of State to engage meaningfully with employers or industry bodies when preparing standards or apprenticeship assessment plans.

Although the current system is far from perfect, one strength of that system lies in its connection to industry needs. Employers understand better than anyone else the skills required for their sectors, and their involvement is essential to maintain the credibility and relevance of standards and assessment plans. Without those safeguards, there is a risk that over time the standards and assessment plans could become disconnected from workplace realities, and that would undermine the value of apprenticeships and technical qualifications for both employers and learners. There really should not be a problem with maintaining that link, and that is why we support the amendments.

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

It would be difficult to overstate the centrality of employer involvement in setting standards for technical and vocational qualifications. Earlier I mentioned Lord Sainsbury’s report and its finding that the then system of qualifications and courses had become “divorced” from the occupations that it was meant to serve. Several things are different about T-levels, compared with their predecessor qualifications. There is more time in college. There is English and maths and digital, alongside the core vocational discipline.

When we talk to young people, however, they talk about two real differentiating, distinguishing factors that motivated them to do T-levels. The first is the industrial placement—nine weeks of actual work in an actual workplace—which also appeals very strongly to employers, because it is like a nine-week job interview. It is a fantastic way to see people coming through. Employers are investing in the next generation, but they are also getting to figure out which of the next generation they most want in their business. It is a way to instil so-called soft skills—there is nothing soft about soft skills—which are sometimes called employability skills. When employers talk about the education system and about people who are taking their first job, the thing they complain about most is the lack of such development, and all that can be helped during the industrial placement.

The second distinguishing factor that people talk about is that they know that T-level standards have been designed by those that they want to go and work for. They have been designed by leading employers in the sector, and they have to be kept up to date.

Clause 4 says that the Secretary of State may herself prepare standards, instead of a “group of persons”. It is worth dwelling on that. I am sure everybody knows this, but “group of persons” is a funny old phrase, because in this context it means employers. The clause says that the Secretary of State may insert herself into the process instead of that group of persons if she is

“satisfied that it would be more appropriate”.

The same is true for clause 5, on assessment plans.

When the Bill was debated in the other place, Government amendments were made to try to calm concerns and answer some of the questions that were raised. Lords amendments 3 and 6—the Government amendments—appear here as clauses 4(5) and clause 5(5). They state that Ministers will publish something about the things that the Secretary of State takes into account in making a judgment about whether she, rather than the group of persons—employers—will set the standards.

The suggestion from Ministers is that that would be interpreted in a very minimalist way. I am not doubting that, but at the moment it is only a suggestion, so we do not know. In other words, the Secretary of State would supplant businesses and employers only in the case of something minor—I say “minor”, but it may be an important thing—in its effect on the standard, such as a change in the regulation. I am still a little nonplussed, because I do not know why we would not want employers to be involved in working out what even a change in regulation would mean for what somebody doing this qualification would learn and how they would go about it.

Will the Minister tell us what reason there could be for not wanting employers to be involved in setting those standards? Does she perhaps have a mountain of evidence showing hold-ups in standards because all these regulatory changes have had to be reflected in standards for qualifications and it has been impossible to do so?

As my hon. Friend the shadow Minister said, in the case of rapidly changing occupations, it might be necessary for the Secretary of State to sign off changes so that they can happen quickly. But the most rapidly changing occupations and sectors—things such as advanced electronics or artificial intelligence—are probably the last ones for which we would want to say, “Let’s take employers out of the equation and let Government make the changes.” Generally speaking, employers are much quicker at spotting the changes that are needed and pushing for them.

Amendments 3 and 5, in the name of my hon. Friend the shadow Minister, specify that the group of persons should include

“an organisation that is the representative body for a sector.”

That seems a very sensible and almost unarguable proposition. Amendments 4 and 6, in my hon. Friend’s name, require the body to take account of the needs and interests of both employer and employee. I was trying to imagine whether, if we were having this debate in a committee room of the Bundestag, we would really be debating whether the remit of the group of persons should include considering the needs of both employer and employee; and whether leading employers from those sectors should be included in the design of the qualifications. I suggest not.

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Eighth sitting)

Debate between Ian Sollom and Damian Hinds

Committee stage
Thursday 30th January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Ian Sollom (St Neots and Mid Cambridgeshire) (LD)]

Amendment 46 is very similar to amendment 33, in the name of the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston, in that it removes subsection (3) and condition A, and for much the same reasons. We are extremely concerned that a parent wanting to remove their child with special educational needs and disabilities from a special school will be subject to this extra bureaucracy.

We know that we have a SEND crisis. There are so many parents, even when their child is in a special school, who feel that the school is not meeting their child’s educational needs and that their child is better served through a home education. I would point out that the local authority does not always have the best information on children in special schools. They will be turning to the schools themselves for a view, maybe more so than to the parents. There may be a bit of iniquity there.

I would like to question the Minister on the circumstances in which the local authority can refuse permission. Condition A implies almost an equivalence between children with special educational needs and children where there are safeguarding concerns, which seems quite a parallel to draw in legislation. The other question I have is about the timescale for the decision making. We know that local authorities can get bogged down in their processes. How does the Minister plan to ensure that authorities are not taking a long time to grant permission to parents to take their children out of special needs schools when they feel that school is not meeting their child’s needs?

[Damian Hinds (East Hampshire) (Con)]

It is a very long-standing right in England for a parent to choose to send their child to school or to educate at home. It is a right that the vast majority of parents never take up, but which nevertheless could be considered a fundamental parent’s right. The condition is always that the child must be receiving a suitable education. That phrase, “a suitable education”, has never been defined in law, and on occasion that creates some tensions. School should be right for the vast majority of children. A school system is designed to apply to the vast majority of children. The Bill is right to introduce a register of children not in school. That was also our policy when in government, but I think the balance is wrong between the detail of information required of parents and the support on offer.

Although the number of children in elective home education has been growing, the data collection is relatively new and has been mandatory only since autumn 2024, so some of that growth—as the DFE statisticians themselves say—will be because of that effect. It had been rising even before covid, and then there was a distinct covid effect, which we can see in the numbers. There are multiple reasons why children might be out of school and being educated at home—because of their special needs, perhaps because they have been bullied badly at school, or for various mental health reasons.

Some parents make the most enormous sacrifices in their lives to provide a suitable education for their child. I was reminded by someone who came to my surgery the other day that they are not all in terrible circumstances. This mother said to me, “There’s nothing wrong with our life at all. We do this because we think it’s the right thing for our family.” It is her right, too.

As a society, we have a moral imperative to know that children are safe. That is where exceptions to rights kick in. There is a really important distinction to be made here. Sometimes, people talk about a growth in elective home education as being a safeguarding concern. It is not. There is nothing about educating a child at home that is intrinsically a safeguarding concern, but it is also the case that if a neglective parent had the opportunity to take a child out of school, they might abuse that. That does in no way besmirch or call into question the overall concept of elective home education or the parents doing it.

Like those colleagues who have just spoken, I am worried about condition A in subsection (3)—that a child attending a special school would need the same permission as a family under investigation. From our surgeries, when we meet parents who are educating at home, it quite often concerns a child who was at a special school. It strikes me as very peculiar to say that we should group together a child, because they have special educational needs or a disability, with those families that are a subject of concern.

I hope the Minister can help with me this, because I might have just missed it, or might be being thick, but I am a bit confused about the terminology in the Bill, which refers in multiple places to education “otherwise than at school”. Ordinarily, that has a different meaning from elective home education. Education otherwise than at school, commonly known by its acronym of EOTAS, is different. Elective home education is parent-led; it is a voluntary choice that can be made by any parent for their child, and then it is left to them. They will then have, at least today, minimal support from the local authority.

EOTAS is different. It is something legally mandated but available for children with special educational needs or disabilities. It is agreed with the local authority. The local authority is then responsible for providing support. One often talks about an EOTAS package that is put around the child, which may involve some tutoring, some online stuff and various other things. Often, the child has an education, health and care plan in place. Again, I ask forgiveness if I have just misread this, but when we talk about applying to take a child into education otherwise than at school, I just do not understand how that works. Perhaps the Minister can help me.

For further clarification, subsection (8)(b) talks about notifying

“any other parent of the child…unless exceptional circumstances apply”.

I wonder if it might be helpful to define a little more what those exceptional circumstances are, because one can imagine difficulties where there is an abusive relationship, and the nature of that abusive relationship may not be known to the authorities at the time. There may be an incarcerated parent or various other conditions.

Finally, for clarification, subsection (10)(b) says that, by way of an appeal mechanism,

“the parent may refer the question to the Secretary of State”

That is quite a thing for a regular parent to take on. No doubt the intent is some sort of mechanism to appeal, not personally to the Secretary of State, but to a representative of the Department for Education. Will the Minister say a word about what that mechanism is and how it will be accessed?

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fifth sitting)

Debate between Ian Sollom and Damian Hinds

Tuesday 28th January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Damian Hinds]

Clause 10 will amend the Children Act 1989 such that local authorities can authorise deprivation of liberty of children other than only in a secure children’s home, and will change the term “restricting liberty” to “depriving of liberty”.

In the secure children’s home sector, a distinction is often made between what are called justice beds and welfare beds. There are also children detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 on secure mental health wards and in psychiatric intensive care units, or on non-secure wards. I am assuming that we are talking today only about what are known as welfare beds—I say “beds”, but normally the entire facility is either one or the other.

To speak on justice beds briefly, there has been a big fall in this country since 2010 in the number of children who are locked up in the criminal justice system: the numbers are down from about 2,000 in 2010 to only around 500 now. That has partly been because of a fall in crime, and in the particular types of crime for which young people used to be locked up, but it is also because of the good work of youth offending teams. Most of those children are older and would typically be in a young offenders institution when aged 15 to 17, or indeed, 18 to 21. The very small group of children who are in the secure children’s home sector are a very difficult and troubled cohort of youngsters with complex pasts. I take a moment to pay tribute to the staff; it is an extraordinary career decision to go into that line of work, and they do it with amazing dedication.

The welfare bed part of the secure children’s home sector is where somebody has had their liberty restricted not because of something they have done, but because of something they might do—because of the danger or threat they pose either to themselves or others. It is an enormous decision to take to deprive anybody of liberty on those grounds, but particularly a child. As with those children who are in the criminal justice part of the secure children’s home sector, these are typically extremely troubled children.

On the change in clause 10 to allow local authorities to house those children somewhere other than a secure children’s home, the obvious question to the Minister is “Why that, rather than ensuring that a secure children’s home is properly catering to the needs of that cohort of children?” I am not saying that it is the wrong decision, by the way, but I am interested to know, and it is good to have it on record, why it is a better decision to say, “Let’s take some or all of these children and house them in a different type of facility.” What have the Minister and the Secretary of State in mind for the alternative accommodation that would be set out in regulations? For the benefit of the Committee, and again for the record, it might also be helpful to define what is different. The Minister might clarify the definition of a secure children’s home and explain what it is that we need to deviate from.

My other question is about the change in phraseology. We are talking about moving from the restricting of liberty to the depriving of liberty. I understand from the explanatory notes that this tries to reflect the reality, but it is a legitimate question whether it is a strictly necessary change to make and what the reasoning is. Even when we do deprive people of liberty, we do not deprive them of all their liberty. There are degrees of restriction. We have this as a feature in the criminal justice system, and though this is a different cohort of children, some of the same principles may apply. We may be able to get a lot of the benefit we are looking for from restricting someone’s liberty rather than entirely depriving them of it. I wonder if the Minister might say a word about that distinction and about whether the Government have received representations on the change in wording.

[Ian Sollom]

My understanding is that this change follows a trend of children being deprived of their liberty outside the statutory route by being housed in unsuitable accommodation not registered with Ofsted, often far from home and family. That has been partly addressed in the questions from the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston.

The success of this provision will depend on the regulations. What actually makes a setting capable of being used for the deprivation of liberty? Will there be a requirement with respect to education in that setting? Will they need to be registered with Ofsted? It is not entirely clear. When will regulations relating to this provision be brought forward? Is it the intention that they will mirror the scheme for the secure accommodation?

The law around the deprivation of liberty is incredibly complex. Without proper legal advice and representation, it is very hard for families to understand what is going on and what options they have. It is not clear yet what legal aid will be available to families or the child themselves when an application is made under the new route. Can the Minister clarify what will be available with respect to legal aid, or put a timetable on when we will get that clarification?

Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill (Fifth sitting)

Debate between Ian Sollom and Damian Hinds

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th January 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Damian Hinds]

Clause 10 will amend the Children Act 1989 such that local authorities can authorise deprivation of liberty of children other than only in a secure children’s home, and will change the term “restricting liberty” to “depriving of liberty”.

In the secure children’s home sector, a distinction is often made between what are called justice beds and welfare beds. There are also children detained under the Mental Health Act 1983 on secure mental health wards and in psychiatric intensive care units, or on non-secure wards. I am assuming that we are talking today only about what are known as welfare beds—I say “beds”, but normally the entire facility is either one or the other.

To speak on justice beds briefly, there has been a big fall in this country since 2010 in the number of children who are locked up in the criminal justice system: the numbers are down from about 2,000 in 2010 to only around 500 now. That has partly been because of a fall in crime, and in the particular types of crime for which young people used to be locked up, but it is also because of the good work of youth offending teams. Most of those children are older and would typically be in a young offenders institution when aged 15 to 17, or indeed, 18 to 21. The very small group of children who are in the secure children’s home sector are a very difficult and troubled cohort of youngsters with complex pasts. I take a moment to pay tribute to the staff; it is an extraordinary career decision to go into that line of work, and they do it with amazing dedication.

The welfare bed part of the secure children’s home sector is where somebody has had their liberty restricted not because of something they have done, but because of something they might do—because of the danger or threat they pose either to themselves or others. It is an enormous decision to take to deprive anybody of liberty on those grounds, but particularly a child. As with those children who are in the criminal justice part of the secure children’s home sector, these are typically extremely troubled children.

On the change in clause 10 to allow local authorities to house those children somewhere other than a secure children’s home, the obvious question to the Minister is “Why that, rather than ensuring that a secure children’s home is properly catering to the needs of that cohort of children?” I am not saying that it is the wrong decision, by the way, but I am interested to know, and it is good to have it on record, why it is a better decision to say, “Let’s take some or all of these children and house them in a different type of facility.” What have the Minister and the Secretary of State in mind for the alternative accommodation that would be set out in regulations? For the benefit of the Committee, and again for the record, it might also be helpful to define what is different. The Minister might clarify the definition of a secure children’s home and explain what it is that we need to deviate from.

My other question is about the change in phraseology. We are talking about moving from the restricting of liberty to the depriving of liberty. I understand from the explanatory notes that this tries to reflect the reality, but it is a legitimate question whether it is a strictly necessary change to make and what the reasoning is. Even when we do deprive people of liberty, we do not deprive them of all their liberty. There are degrees of restriction. We have this as a feature in the criminal justice system, and though this is a different cohort of children, some of the same principles may apply. We may be able to get a lot of the benefit we are looking for from restricting someone’s liberty rather than entirely depriving them of it. I wonder if the Minister might say a word about that distinction and about whether the Government have received representations on the change in wording.

[Ian Sollom]

My understanding is that this change follows a trend of children being deprived of their liberty outside the statutory route by being housed in unsuitable accommodation not registered with Ofsted, often far from home and family. That has been partly addressed in the questions from the hon. Member for Harborough, Oadby and Wigston.

The success of this provision will depend on the regulations. What actually makes a setting capable of being used for the deprivation of liberty? Will there be a requirement with respect to education in that setting? Will they need to be registered with Ofsted? It is not entirely clear. When will regulations relating to this provision be brought forward? Is it the intention that they will mirror the scheme for the secure accommodation?

The law around the deprivation of liberty is incredibly complex. Without proper legal advice and representation, it is very hard for families to understand what is going on and what options they have. It is not clear yet what legal aid will be available to families or the child themselves when an application is made under the new route. Can the Minister clarify what will be available with respect to legal aid, or put a timetable on when we will get that clarification?