Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent estimate she has made of how many (a) colleges and (b) universities offer Higher Technical Qualifications (i) nationally and (ii) in each English region.

The department is delivering reforms to increase profile, prestige, and uptake of higher technical education. Central to these reforms is the introduction of Higher Technical Qualifications (HTQs). HTQs are level 4 and 5 qualifications (such as HNDs and Foundation Degrees) that have been approved against employer-developed standard and quality marked by the Institute for Apprenticeships & Technical Education (IfATE). This means students and employers can have confidence that HTQs provide skills employers need.

HTQs are currently available across the country and are being taught in colleges, universities, Institutes of Technology’s (IoTs), and Independent Training Providers (ITPs) across Digital, Construction and Health & Science subjects. These qualifications give the learner the skills for a range of great jobs including Cyber Security, Quantity Surveying, Sports Coaching and Nursing Associate.

There are 140 providers approved to begin teaching of HTQs in the 2023/24 academic year available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/list-of-higher-technical-qualifications. The published list can be broken down by provider type and includes 111 FECs and 18 HEIs which are able to deliver HTQs from the 2023/24 academic year. While the data cannot be broken down by region, it is instead broken down by postcode and location. The department is updating the list of approved providers as new HTQs enter the market and more providers are onboarded to deliver the qualifications. An updated list will be ready in Spring 2024.

To support HTQ provision, £115 million in funding has been provided to colleges, universities, IoTs and ITPs to help grow provision across the country, on top of up to £300 million to create a network of 21 Institutes of Technology.

To date 172 qualifications have been approved as HTQs across seven occupational routes (Digital, Construction & the Built Environment, Health & Science, Business & Administration, Education & Early Years, Engineering & Manufacturing and Legal, Finance & Accounting), for first teach beginning between September 2022/20 to 2024.

To help HTQs be studied flexibly and around other commitments, since September 2023, HTQ learners are eligible for both tuition fee and maintenance loans whether they are studied full or part-time, on the same basis as degree level courses. HTQs will also be among the first courses eligible for modular funding when the Lifelong Learning Entitlement launches in the 2025/26 academic year.