Apprentices

Lord Broers Excerpts

Wednesday 10th June 2015 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

My Lords, apprenticeships will be a priority area in the spending review. The noble Baroness rightly talks about the role that FE colleges can play, and I look forward to discussing further with her group how we can ensure that that money is well spent and links in with employer demand, which is essentially the approach that we now have to apprenticeships. There is so much more that can be done.

[Lord Broers (CB)]

My Lords, I of course support the increase in the number of apprenticeships. However, I have heard concern from senior industrialists about the large variation in standards when it comes to what is expected of an apprentice—what knowledge they are meant to have, especially theoretical. There is serious concern about these large variations across industries and other institutions. Are the Government going to become involved in trying to improve the rigour of the standards that are expected?

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

The employer-led approach, with our trailblazers and so on, will actually mean that standards are set that employers want. We have improved quality already, for example by having a minimum duration of 12 months and requiring apprenticeships to be paid jobs. But there is more to do. One thing that we are going to do is hold ourselves to account by reporting every year on progress against the 3-million target, including other details. That plus the target will really make a step change in this area.