Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether T-levels will replace existing vocational qualifications.

We would expect the new technical education qualifications that form part of T levels to replace some of the existing vocational qualifications that purport to serve the same purpose. Our reforms will replace the sometimes confusing patchwork of thousands of qualifications of variable quality with fifteen routes to skilled employment. The new routes will include far fewer, but consistently better, qualifications. These will be shaped by industry professionals and will provide stretching technical content, delivered to industry standards.

We plan to fund the new technical qualifications once they have been approved, and over time we expect to cease funding similar qualifications. We will not withdraw funding for students who are partway through their courses. We are currently working through the detail of our proposals and expect to publish further information in due course.