Draft Industrial Training Levy (Construction Industry Training Board) Order 2026

Matt Western Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd March 2026 General Committees

[Matt Western]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for South West Devon for her contribution and for the thoughtful scrutiny applied to the draft levy order. The evidence is consistent: market forces alone will not deliver the pipeline of skilled workers that the industry urgently needs, which I suspect is what is driving her questions about how the Government will tackle that. Whether it is meeting the demand for new homes, retrofitting and repairing existing properties, or delivering the critical infrastructure needed for economic growth, there is work to do.

The levy is the mechanism that enables the collective benefits of a focused skills strategy for the construction industry and ensures that employers of all sizes can access support for training and share the benefits of a skilled, competent and resilient workforce. It also creates opportunities to help apprentices and other new entrants complete high-quality training, and enables existing workers to reskill or upskill to progress their careers. If it is okay with the hon. Lady, I will write to her with the specifics on the percentage of apprentices still in meaningful employment, as well as on her question about workforce retention.

On the question of recruitment, particularly through the mechanism of apprenticeships, the hon. Lady will have noted the changes the Government are bringing forward to apprenticeship funding to introduce new foundation apprenticeships, of which construction apprenticeships form a key component. We think that will be essential to driving more young people towards construction apprenticeships and meeting the skills demand that we face if we are to deliver on the 1.5 million homes target.

Clearly, it is our intention to ensure that areas without a strategic authority are not disadvantaged in any way. The number of areas for which that is the case is changing all the time. I represent an area within a combined authority, but it is certainly not our intention for anybody to miss out on opportunities as a consequence of their local governance arrangements.

I am grateful to the hon. Member for South West Devon for her questions and for the opportunity to participate in this debate. I will come back to her, as I said, on the specifics. For the reasons set out in my opening speech, with which the Opposition spokesperson largely agrees, I commend this levy order to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.