Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress she has made on implementing the recommendations of the Maynard Review into apprenticeships for people with a learning disability.

From this autumn, apprentices with an Education Health and Care Plan or legacy statement can apply for an adjustment to English and maths requirements to Entry Level 3, and British Sign Language (BSL) will be an alternative to English Functional Skills for those who have BSL as their first language.

We are evaluating how the new funding system is working to encourage the successful take up and likely achievement of apprentices with a disability, embedding apprenticeships into the wider Civil Service diversity and inclusion strategy, as well as developing communications and guidance for employers, including toolkits and diversity training.

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has continued to develop the Access to Work funding stream to consider pre-existing assessments of need agreed by other agencies. DWP has further updated the Access to Work Pre-employment eligibility letter and is developing supporting case studies, as well as promoting the Mental Health Support Service to apprentices. It is also embedding the Disability Confident scheme in the apprenticeship recruitment service and using the scheme to promote public sector good practice.

We have set a public measure of success to increase apprenticeship starts by people with learning difficulties and/or disabilities by 20% by 2020.