Higher Education Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Jim Cunningham
Main Page: Jim Cunningham (Labour - Coventry South)Department Debates - View all Jim Cunningham's debates with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Higher Education
Jim Cunningham Excerpts(6 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)
I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman knows as well as I do what it means when we talk about further education. For example, in Coventry there have been 27% cuts to further education budgets. What impact does that have on apprenticeships? More importantly, if we take that further and look at university education, UCU is in dispute with the Coventry University because it cannot get recognition. To come back to the point, it cannot get recognition in further education or in university education.
Robert Halfon
It is true that for a number of years FE funding was neglected. It has been stabilised, and I welcome the £500 million extra announced by the Government for the technical education reforms in a recent Budget, but further education needs a lot more funding. People say that it is the Cinderella sector, but I say that Cinderella became a princess and we should banish the ugly sisters of snobbery and intolerance.