Been to university? No apprenticeship for you, argues SMF
Michael Salmon is News Editor at Wonkhe
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There’s a lot to like in a new Social Market Foundation (SMF) report on the future of level 7 apprenticeships, which sees erstwhile head of now-defunct think tank EDSK Tom Richmond continuing his former outfit’s critical commentary on the apprenticeship system.
It’s neatly timed as well, landing on policymakers’ desks just as – you would hope – a final decision is being made on the future of level 7 courses. If you’ve not been keeping up, the government announced that “a significant number” of these would be removed from scope of levy funding.
While the devil will be in the (imminent) detail, the pushback has been firm from the sector, with a recent University Alliance-coordinated letter to the Treasury pointing out that levy receipts are already substantially higher than what’s spent on apprenticeships in England (plus what’s sent out in Barnett consequentials) – if Rachel Reeves fancied giving up that topslice, there is probably enough cash around to keep doing level 7 apprenticeships and fund the “foundation apprenticeships” at lower levels that Labour is keen on.
That said, until we have the detail on how much employers will be able to spend the levy on non-apprenticeship training in Labour’s new “growth and skills” re-working of the system, it’s hard to calculate with any certainty.
What the SMF report particularly homes in on is the number of apprenticeship starts from those with prior level 6 and level 7+ attainment (an undergraduate or postgraduate degree in almost all cases). This table, showing 2023–24 starts, is a useful contribution to the debate:
| Level | Starts | Prior attainment at level 6 | Prior attainment at level 7+ | % at level 6 or 7+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Level 2 | 70,840 | 1,040 | 320 | 1.9% |
| Level 3 | 146,520 | 9,950 | 3,030 | 8.9% |
| Level 4 | 41,170 | 7,600 | 2,880 | 25.5% |
| Level 5 | 30,950 | 5,510 | 2,570 | 26.1% |
| Level 6 | 26,250 | 5,060 | 910 | 22.7% |
| Level 7 | 23,860 | 12,780 | 4,390 | 72.0% |
| All levels | 339,580 | 41,930 | 14,100 | 16.5% |
I’ve added in the percentages to highlight that this is particularly an “issue” for level 7 apprenticeships. Those against restrictions would point out that these qualifications are widely used in NHS trusts, for example – in this cases you’d likely often have someone with an undergraduate qualification in nursing, say, taking a postgraduate course in leadership. It might also reasonably be argued that level 6 attainment is really a prerequisite for any level 7 study.
The report’s recommendation is simply to ban anyone with a level 6 or above qualification from accessing levy-funded apprenticeships. The two sides of the debate are typically characterised by whether you think degree apprenticeships are being snaffled up by the middle class (a recent article on Wonkhe set out why this is an issue which varies depending on which subject area we’re talking about – it’s less likely to be the case in the health example above), or whether you think calls for apprenticeships to be better targeted at the disadvantaged are the other side of the same coin as calls for fewer disadvantaged students to waste their time at university, and that a bit of middle-class capture is good for the long-term prestige of the route.
Anyway, the elephant in the room in a lot of these arguments is about whether organisations should be able to spend levy funding on management-related programmes. The report proposes all of these should be turned into non-apprenticeship courses, though still funded through the growth and skills levy – but with co-payments from employers on a gradated scale.
At the heart of the reasoning behind picking this slightly arcane route to changing what training programmes are studied and by whom is the following assertion:
The Government would be wise to avoid a situation in which they (or Skills England) are seen to be hand-picking the specific Level 7 apprenticeship standards that will be funded in future because there is unlikely to be a process that could be considered fair and objective to all stakeholders in such a scenario.
Now we might point out that the proposed route of reclassifying various management and leadership apprenticeships as non-apprenticeship training would clearly be a form of “hand-picking.”
But the bigger question is why Skills England would be worried about been seen to pick winners – if anything, it seems very in keeping with its skills stewardship badging and theoretical join-up with an industrial strategy. Whether it will go down this route remains to be seen, but it’s likely the simplest way to make changes to levy eligibility. We should get answers soon enough.
I fundamentally disagree with the recommendations in this report.
By his own admission, the author’s recommendations ‘prioritise the best interests of apprentices and taxpayers’ but there is little focus on the best interest of employers.
The recommendations are damaging; they include banning people who are already qualified at level 6 or higher from accessing levy-funded apprenticeships, funding management apprenticeships as non-apprenticeship training within the Growth and Skills Levy, and employers being expected to pay up to 50% of non-apprenticeship training costs.
I encourage different perspectives in this ongoing funding debate, but I believe these recommendations could hinder career mobility and the development of a dynamic workforce for the following reasons:
1) Individuals often seek to change careers and acquire new skills, and apprenticeships are essential for such transitions – regardless of prior educational background. Look at the surge in nursing apprenticeships applications during the pandemic.
2) Apprenticeships offer pathways for individuals from diverse backgrounds to advance to higher-paying roles. Denying access based on prior education may reinforce existing inequalities.
3) Employers require flexibility with their levy (not increased rigidity) as it allows them to train new and existing staff to meet evolving business demands in the longer term. Restricting apprenticeship funding could undermine efforts to address skills shortages in growth-driving sectors and may exclude some staff from developing further due to budgetary constraints.
4) With regards to budgetary constraints, make no mistake, employers will be tightening their belts even further in coming years due to upcoming tax increases. Learning and development budgets are often the first thing to be cut during difficult times. This will impact staff who are deemed ineligible for apprenticeship funding.
Thankfully, this report is only a recommendation but let’s hope the author, as a former government advisor, doesn’t manage to get this onto the desk of someone influential.
I agree that further thought is needed and think level 7 funding can and should play an important role in the nation’s growth strategy and meeting public service needs – a wider, more nuanced, perspective is required, in my view, to avoid as many unintended consequences as possible. Point 1 in the comments above highlight a crucial issue that faces many workers in the health and social care professions (or those wishing to join such professions); indeed, many of these sectors face perennial staffing shortfalls. Points 2 and 3, also offer a more balanced perspective that takes into account the necessity for flexibility; permitting responsiveness to employee developmental need and employer avenues to growth.
One thing that any review into apprenticeships architecture, including the distribution of funding, would be wise to consider is the increased bureaucracy this adds to degree apprenticeships, pointedly those that carry a PSRB requirement and are already overseen by a professional regulator. My own discipline of social work is one such area where the added regulatory requirements, including a second inspection regime in the form of Ofsted (all qualifying social work programmes must already be approved and inspected by Social Work England), creates unnecessary complexity and duplication, this not only costs and takes time, it also removes resource from areas where it might be better used. Would it not be beneficial to consider how degree courses like these could be funded, as they are now, but treated as apprentice-lite in terms of reducing the additional red-tape that this can bring to already regulated degree programmes?