Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether an Equality Impact Assessment been completed and published for changes to scene-based competencies; and what assessment she has made of the potential impact of those changes on (a) participation and (b) regional access.

On 20 October 2025, alongside the publication of the Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper, the department published a consultation on Post-16 level 3 and below pathways, which closed on the 12 January. The reforms set out in the consultation simplify the level 3 qualifications landscape into 3 pathways: T Levels, V Levels and A levels. They also reform the level 2 landscape so that it better supports students to progress to level 3 or into employment.

V Levels will focus on core knowledge and skills linked with occupational standards, enabling progression to higher education, apprenticeships, or employment. T Levels combine sector-specific core content with a specialist component that develops competence in an occupation.

As part of our consultation, we have been engaging with the sector on transition arrangements. We will set out our response to the consultation in due course.

The department is working with awarding organisations, training providers, Skills England and sector representative organisations to develop these new qualifications, which will go through a series of checks for their quality and appropriateness for learners before being approved for funding.

The UNICEF Availability, Accessibility, Acceptability and Quality framework is used primarily in humanitarian, healthcare, gender-based violence, and child protection settings to assess barriers to service access, rather than qualification content design. As with all new policies the department needs to meet the Public Sector Equality Duty, and the consultation included an equality and diversity impact assessment.

The information requested on participation and regional access is not held centrally.