Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment he has made of the trends in the number of apprenticeship starts in (a) Coventry North East constituency, (b) Coventry, (c) the West Midlands and (d) England.

Apprenticeships are more important than ever in helping businesses to recruit the right people and develop the skills they need as we build back better from the COVID-19 outbreak.

As part of the government’s Plan for Jobs, the department has created a strong incentive for employers across England to take on new apprentices. We have introduced a higher incentive payment of £3,000 for each new apprentice they recruit as a new employee between 1 April and 30 September 2021. We are also making a range of improvements to help more employers benefit from apprenticeships, including developing flexi-job apprenticeships, a £7 million flexi-job apprenticeships fund and making it easier for levy payers to transfer their levy funds to other businesses.

The number of apprenticeships starts for the Coventry North East constituency, Coventry, the West Midlands and England since May 2010, can be found in the table below.

A more detailed breakdown by academic year can be found in the 'Supporting tables - Apprenticeship starts since May 2010 and 2015 by region, local authority and pcon' file that accompanies the apprenticeships and traineeships statistics August publication, found here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/apprenticeships-and-traineeships/2020-21#dataDownloads-1.