Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps he has taken to implement the findings of the Government consultation into Sharia-compliant financing for education and the November 2015 Government green paper entitled, Fulfilling our potential Teaching Excellence, Social Mobility and Student Choice.

The government took new powers in the Higher Education and Research Act 2017 to make a system of alternative payments possible. The government has been considering the Alternative Student Finance (ASF) product carefully alongside its other priorities and has decided to align a decision on implementation with the outcome of the post-18 review of education and funding. The interim report of the review was published on 21 January 2021, and the review is due to conclude alongside the next multi-year Spending Review. We will provide an update on ASF at that time.