Official Report 1069KB pdf
The next item of business is a statement by Graeme Dey on simplifying the post-school education and skills funding body landscape in Scotland. The minister will take questions after his statement, so there should be no interventions or interruptions.
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A fortnight ago, we announced progress on our plans to reform the post-school education and skills system. We announced that the Scottish Funding Council would assume responsibility for all apprenticeships, and that the Student Awards Agency Scotland would take on responsibility for further education student support. Therefore, one body, the SFC, will be responsible for funding provision for teaching, training and related activities, while another body, SAAS, will be responsible for student support. That decision was informed by what stakeholders told us through our public consultation.
Our approach is designed to put the learner at the centre. It aims to ensure that our whole education and skills system works as a single system that is easy to navigate and in which everyone takes responsibility to deliver excellence for all.
Reform is, of course, about more than the individual parts of the system; it is about the whole system working together. Yesterday, the Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) Bill was introduced in the Scottish Parliament. First and foremost, the bill will consolidate the SFC’s responsibilities for securing the provision of national training programmes, apprenticeships and work-based learning. The bill will establish, for the first time, a statutory framework for apprenticeships in Scotland, recognising the value that we place on apprenticeships and on the delivery of the First Minister’s mission to drive economic growth. It will also give ministers the power to commission the SFC to deliver new national training programmes and will mean that we can address training needs that might not otherwise be met, making it easier to ensure that programmes are aligned to the Government’s four priorities.
Furthermore, the bill will improve the SFC’s governance and how it oversees tertiary education, including by creating a greater focus on the needs and interests of learners. It will also knit together the SFC’s existing responsibilities and its new responsibilities for apprenticeships and work-based learning in a coherent way, which we hope employers will welcome.
Today is a significant milestone for tertiary education and training. The bill will enable us to move from three funding bodies to two. In our programme for government, we said that we would
“Reform the education and skills funding system so it is easier to navigate and responsive to learners and skills priorities—breaking down silos and reducing bureaucracy”.
The bill moves us closer to that.
The other half of funding body simplification is the movement of further education student support from the SFC to SAAS. That change does not require legislation, which means that we can progress at pace, and we are doing so. I make it clear that there will be no immediate change to funding arrangements for college or university students, but bringing student support responsibilities together will unlock opportunities. The change will enable new ways of administering student support, collecting data and providing coherent information and guidance to learners and institutions.
Before I go on, I thank our three public bodies—the SFC, SAAS and Skills Development Scotland—and their staff for their help in getting us to this point. I am also grateful for the input from colleges, universities, employers, training providers and others whose insights have absolutely informed our decisions.
I know that change can be unsettling. If the bill is passed, the SFC will need to evolve to encompass its expanded remit. Responsibilities for apprenticeships and national training programmes will move from SDS to the SFC. The work that SDS has done on apprenticeships has given us firm foundations on which to build, and the skills and experience of SDS staff will be invaluable in establishing the new arrangements and shaping an improved offering. A refocused SDS will continue to play a vital role in skills planning, careers advice and support for employers.
It would be remiss of me not to acknowledge the influence on our reforms of James Withers and his review, and I thank him once again for his important work.
I want to be clear about why we are doing this. First and foremost, we want to deliver the best service that we can for learners and employers. Secondly, we want to make things simpler for colleges, universities, training providers and employers. Last but not least, we have to get maximum value from every pound that we invest.
The bill makes provision for Scottish apprenticeships and work-based learning, laying the foundations for apprenticeship reform. We can take the best of what works now and change what does not. The bill will enable improvement but leave room to develop future apprenticeship policy with stakeholders.
Employer engagement is critical to all of this work, so we are building a dedicated employer network to guide it. We will sharpen the focus of the apprenticeship approvals group and the standards and frameworks group to ensure that they play a vital role in the transition process, and we will broaden employer participation at every stage across the reform landscape. The bill also includes provision for a new apprenticeship committee of the SFC and provision for apprenticeship certificates to help apprentices to demonstrate that they have gained the relevant training, experience and qualifications.
That leads me on to qualifications reform. We must have up-to-date, accessible qualifications that are fit for learners at all stages of their lives. Work is under way to fully understand the qualifications landscape in tertiary education. The qualifications must be valued by employers and learners, they must clearly signal the skills and knowledge that individuals have acquired and, crucially, they must be flexible enough to adapt to the ever-changing demands of the modern economy.
Tertiary education and training must deliver the skills that employers need and, importantly, meet our skills requirements in 21st century Scotland so that we can address net zero, support our national health service and grow a thriving Scottish economy. I have engaged extensively with ministerial colleagues across the Government and with our key stakeholders to develop our approach to skills planning, which is rooted in evidence of what works and what is needed. Tertiary education and training must be responsive to both regional and national skills needs.
A few weeks ago, I met the regional economic partnership network again, and we had a good discussion about skills planning across regions. We still have work to do, but I am pleased with the progress that we are making and the co-design approach that we are taking.
High-quality careers advice is essential to getting the right people into the right jobs, tackling poverty and growing the economy. It is vital to have that advice in schools in order to help young people to realise their potential.
We will shortly be announcing new arrangements for the career services collaborative. The outgoing interim chair Grahame Smith, the secretariat and all members of the collaborative have achieved much since its formation. Their work forms a great base for progressing to the next phase, which is, importantly, focusing on improving careers advice and support.
I have spent a good deal of time meeting stakeholders, especially employers and training providers that are engaged in apprenticeship delivery, and listening to their views as we developed our thinking. I have also engaged with a number of MSP colleagues along the way, and I am grateful for that engagement. With the bill beginning its formal processes today, I am committing to ramping up that engagement over the coming months to ensure that, if the Parliament supports the bill, we will be ready to implement the outcomes in a way that best serves the interests of our future apprentices and employers and the needs of Scotland’s economy.
Lastly, I want to work with members from all parties in the Scottish Parliament to lay the foundations for lasting reform of the kind that I think that we generally recognise is needed.
The minister will now take questions on the issues that were raised in his statement. I intend to allow around 20 minutes for questions, after which we will move to the next item of business. As ever, I would be grateful if members who wish to ask a question pressed their request-to-speak buttons if they have not already done so.
I thank the minister for advance sight of his statement and for his engagement with members on the bill to date. There are some welcome reforms in the bill, which the Scottish Conservatives agree with, but we also want to see the Scottish Government move further. Yesterday, the Education, Children and Young People Committee heard from college leaders on the impact that the loss of both the skills boost fund and the flexible workforce development fund has had on upskilling and supporting key employers as well as on skill shortages, especially around social care. I hope that there is an opportunity to correct that with what the minister has announced. It is clear that we also need to see more business involvement in regional skills development work. The Scottish Conservatives would like to see additional reforms to make more private sector funding available to the college sector in the delivery of key sector courses.
I have two questions for the minister. First, how does he envisage the employer network helping businesses to influence, secure and embed funded courses of the type that many employers are telling us are not currently being provided to upskill the workforce? Secondly, as employers in England can access support from the apprenticeship levy not only for training but for apprenticeship pay, is that a reform that ministers will look to introduce to help significantly increase the number of apprenticeships that small and medium-sized enterprises can deliver in communities across our country?
There is a lot to unpack there. Securing non-public money for colleges is an area that we are actively engaging with the college sector on, because there is a great opportunity there. Some colleges do very well in that space and others do much less so. There is an appetite from both national and local businesses for that sort of access.
With regard to the influence that colleges can bring, we have to be careful. It is about ensuring that the employer voice is heard so that colleges and other training providers can understand what employers require colleges and other institutions to produce. That already happens in some localities but not so much in others, so we are trying to bring in a bit of standardisation on that.
I do not necessarily agree with the approach to the use of the apprenticeship levy that Miles Briggs has articulated, but, on his point about SMEs, there is undoubtedly more to be done. We repeatedly hear that one of the issues that puts SMEs off taking on an apprentice is the bureaucracy around it. We have been exploring whether there is an opportunity to do something on that to take some of the load off SMEs, because they are the bedrock of the Scottish economy.
I look forward to continuing to engage with Miles Briggs on those matters.
Although I note the minister’s attempt to strike a collegiate tone, I will repeat what I said to him in private: my fear is that the Government is moving too slowly and putting structural change ahead of functional reform. It has been many months since he has met any members of the Labour front bench, and his statement falls short of what we understood the Government’s direction to be, and it begs some serious questions. Although it was imperfect, the previous system with the Scottish Apprenticeship Advisory Board and SDS had a very clear role for employers and trade unions in the governance structures. The proposals for an employers network have no such formal governance structure, so how can industry have confidence that it will be at the forefront in shaping the future skills landscape when it appears that its role is being diluted?
Furthermore, it appears that the Scottish Government has taken inspiration from the Monty Python dead parrot sketch on its approach to SDS. It appears to be an ex-agency that no longer has a function. I am surprised that the minister did not describe it as being the Norwegian blue of agencies. A bit like Michael Palin’s pet shop owner, the minister is claiming that it still has a function—but what is its function if it is no longer even providing careers advice, which we understood would be its primary function?
I will start with the end of Mr Johnson’s question. My speech made very clear what SDS will continue to do, including providing careers advice. Far from diminishing SDS’s role in that space, I talked about an expanded role for the careers collaborative and SDS’s continuing role in employer engagement and in skills. On the point about diluting the employers’ voice, I have been very clear in the Parliament and with employers that we are expanding that role, which is why I think employers will take confidence from what we are doing. We are trying to weave the employers’ voice into absolutely everything that we do, because that is vital.
I met SAAB a few months ago. In our most recent conversation, when we talked about the future role for employers, it said that it was not precious about a structure or forum, but it wanted to be assured that the employers’ voice would continue to be heard—we intend to continue to ensure that. If the member was listening to the start of my speech, he will know that I made the point that SAAB has two committees that will continue through the process—certainly through the transition and perhaps beyond that. I anticipate that its members will be heavily involved in the work that will be taken forward.
The outline business case for reform talks about building on the best of what we have. Can the minister speak to the strong foundations of Scotland’s post-school education and skills system and about how simplifying the funding body landscape can unlock further potential in the sector?
We are trying to create a more transparent and agile system. There is no doubt that the system as it is currently configured, as well as being quite complex and confusing, does not make best use of public money—I do not think that anyone believes that it does. The bill provides an opportunity to take forward a series of reforms. I am not going to stand here and pretend that it is the endgame—it is far from that. Essentially, it will be an enabling power that will allow us to make the changes in conjunction with employers and other stakeholders to get it right for the future. That is what we intend to do.
Scotland’s apprenticeship system is essential for skills development, which needs sustained investment. With on-going labour market challenges, it is crucial that funding structures are better aligned to support apprenticeships and the economy. Given the recommendations in the Withers review, which highlights the need for better co-ordination between the Scottish Government, the Scottish Funding Council and Skills Development Scotland, can the minister confirm that the transfer of funding responsibilities from SDS to the SFC will ensure that apprenticeships will finally be properly funded and will be aligned with Scotland’s needs? How many additional apprenticeship places does the minister think the proposed changes will create?
The member makes a good point about the nature of the landscape. There is no doubt that, as it is currently configured, we do not get the best value or the best return, partly because the system is fragmented and two different bodies are funding the same provision, in some respects. As I said before, we believe that making the changes that we have alluded to will give us the opportunity to get a hold of this and to shape the offering in a way that will be more transparent and more responsive to the needs of the economy.
Everyone says to me, “We would like more apprentices and more money for them.” That is the nature of it. No one ever says, “Minister, we’ve got enough money.” I am not going to stand here and say that we have forecast that we will be able to create X more apprentices as a result of the changes. Assuming that the Parliament agrees to the reforms, we need to use them to develop the offering in parallel, so that we will have an offering that is much better aligned to what employers are looking for and what our young people deserve. At the heart of this, we need an approach that shows that we want to give our young people long-term, sustainable and well-paid employment. If we take that alongside the point about the economy, we will make progress.
I am interested in what the minister said in his statement and in what he said in response to the last question. How will consolidating funding streams for post-school education and skills development contribute to the Scottish Government’s mission to grow the economy?
The issue, if one understands the landscape, is that, at the moment, the funding mechanism for apprenticeships sees very obvious funding provided by SDS through the SFC but additional funding provided in some instances through the SFC by way of college credits. It is not a transparent system. We need more transparency and agility so that we have the opportunity to better align what we are offering and providing with the needs of the economy. If we pull that together, we will get to the place that we are looking to get to.
Yesterday, Colleges Scotland told the Education, Children and Young People Committee that
“Colleges are vital anchor institutions that are dedicated to delivering skills training and providing education at all stages of life and in our communities.”
I think that that is vital to our future. It also said:
“To keep doing that, colleges need their Government to deliver reform to deliver the agile and flexible system that their learners need and that employers want, to improve collaborations with both schools and industry.”
The bill proposes structural reform, but what will the minister do to deliver the real reform that colleges need?
I think that I am right in saying that Colleges Scotland welcomes the reforms because it sees the opportunity that arises from them to produce a system that may well benefit the colleges in some instances but, more than anything, because the reforms will benefit learners.
I have to be clear that we will have a continuing mixed apprenticeship offer that will involve the private training providers. Colleges Scotland welcomes what we propose, and I am committed to working with it and with others to sharpen up the model. There is an opportunity for colleges to step forward, because, although they do not currently occupy the apprenticeship landscape, they can provide the holistic wraparound support that our apprentices are entitled to expect from the system.
I welcome the minister’s statement. He is aware of skills shortages in many traditional areas, such as engineering and construction—shortages that impact on economic growth. How will the reset help to deliver the key skills that Scotland requires, and will the Government redouble its efforts to encourage more women and girls to study and seek apprenticeships and employment in those vital sectors?
Work is under way across the Government with key stakeholders to develop our approach to skills planning. For example, we are in the process of developing an advanced manufacturing skills action plan, and we will engage with the sector to assess options and agree a package of interventions aimed at increasing skills supply. We are progressing with the apprenticeship reform that we have heard about today.
As part of that work, we will look to see whether we can break down any barriers—perceived or actual—to the participation of women and girls in occupations where they are underrepresented. The changes also provide the opportunity to ensure that education and training, including apprenticeships, are readily accessible to young people with disabilities.
Over the past decade, a number of colleges and universities have reneged on the fair work agreements that they have come to with their campus trade unions. When asked about that last year, the then chief executive of the Scottish Funding Council explained that it lacked the powers to intervene effectively in such situations, but that she had proposed such powers to the Scottish Government ahead of the bill. Have those proposals been reflected in the bill? Will the SFC have the power to intervene where a college or university management breaches a fair work agreement?
The bill contains a power that strengthens the ability of the SFC to require universities and colleges to do certain things, particularly in relation to the provision of information, and it specifically requires secondary legislation to allow ministers to list what those areas could be. At the moment, it is sufficiently open for those things to be explored, and I am happy to discuss that with Ross Greer, because it is imperative that fair work is at the heart of what all our institutions are delivering.
I support the bill. The single source of funding and the careers reforms are welcome, but there is clearly a nervousness, including from the chambers of commerce, about the employer voice. There is clearly nervousness about moving the funding from an employer-based body—SDS—to an education-based body—the Funding Council. In particular, as we heard yesterday in the Education, Children and Young People Committee, there is concern that the funding model for further education is not necessarily flexible enough to meet the needs of employers. I invite the minister to have a meeting with me and the chambers of commerce to see whether we can find a solution to that nervousness.
I met representatives from the chambers of commerce some time ago, but I am happy to take Willie Rennie up on his invitation.
I reassure members that the bill requires ministers to have regard to the desirability of including in the membership of the SFC persons who
“have experience of, and have shown capacity in, the provision of ... apprenticeships or work-based learning”.
That is one of the changes that the bill allows us to make. I am keen to take the opportunity that this year affords us, with changes in the membership of the SFC, to ensure that that experience is on the board. That is essential.
I have already highlighted the work that will be done around the committee experience, but I am disappointed if the chambers of commerce have paid attention to what has been going on over the past year and are still nervous. We have engaged extensively with employers and gained a lot of positive feedback from them. If there is that nervousness, I am happy to do something to address it.
Now is the time to significantly ramp up investment in green skills, and reforming the post-school learning system is key to that investment in Scotland’s economic future. I therefore welcome the Scottish Government’s recent announcement on funding for colleges to support the offshore wind skills pipeline. Can the minister comment on how simplifying the skills funding body landscape will further help colleges and universities to deliver the green skills agenda?
The post-school education and skills system is already supporting the transition to net zero, but we can and must go further. The system must be able to respond at greater pace and with greater impact to meet the challenges and opportunities that the transition to net zero is placing on it. That is one reason why reform is a must and the changes are important.
Our proposals will help to make the system more responsive to the Government’s four priorities, including tackling the climate emergency. Taken together with the work on skills planning, the changes can help to deliver more green skills. For example, the bill will establish for the first time a statutory framework for apprenticeships in Scotland. That is anticipated to facilitate different and more transparent ways of funding apprenticeships. It could be used, for example, to shift the emphasis on to more or different apprenticeships that have a focus on achieving net zero.
Kevin Stewart rightly referenced colleges and universities, but I reiterate that we will have a mixed apprenticeship offering, in which private training providers will have a role.
Earlier this week, I visited West College Scotland in West Dunbartonshire in my region. I witnessed the excellent work that it does in training apprentices in various fields, such as engineering, nursing, construction and building. As the minister knows, apprenticeships play an important role in Scotland's economy. However, college officials expressed concern about uncertainty when it comes to funding.
The minister has just said that there will be no immediate change to funding arrangements of college or university students. Therefore, can he guarantee that further education institutions will get the funding that they deserve?
We all know where this is going, but it is a bit rich for a Conservative member to rock up here today and talk about more money for colleges and universities when her party wants money for tax cuts. As I keep saying, we cannot square that circle. If Ms Gosal wants to go to a college and sympathise with officials about more funding, I hope that she would be good enough to be honest with them and say, “By the way, if we had got our way, there would be even less money available.”
As we have heard, there will be a shift from three post-school education and skills funding bodies down to two. Some might ask why the Scottish Government did not take the opportunity to reduce that to a single funding body. I would like to hear the benefits of consolidation and having those two funding bodies.
The option was chosen because it simplifies the tertiary education system by providing clear and separate remits for our public bodies. It means that the SFC has responsibility for funding all teaching and learning provision, and SAAS has responsibility for all student support funding. It is less disruptive than moving to a single funding body, but it still takes us in the direction of what James Withers rightly called for.
The decision to proceed with the two-body approach was also based on consultation with stakeholders and the findings of the outline business case.
I will make a point that goes to some of the comments that we have heard today: changing structures alone will not deliver the reform that we all know needs to happen here. This is an enabling process that will allow us to make the changes that we require to make.
The minister generously did not take up his full allocation of 10 minutes, so I can take the two colleagues who still want to ask a question.
I am very grateful, Deputy Presiding Officer. I refer the minister to his comments about careers advice. In his statement, he talked of a “refocused SDS” having a “vital role” in careers advice. In response to one of the questions, he said that SDS will “play a part”. However, in another part of the statement that dealt with the career services collaborative, he talked about announcing shortly new arrangements for that.
The CSC exists in part as a mechanism for the Scottish Government and other policy makers to consult and engage with careers services. Going forward, who will have responsibility for giving expert, tailored careers advice to our young people at school?
The role of SDS, as the national career service, will continue. Its role in the career services collaborative will change. The career services collaborative, with co-chairs, will report to ministers and deliver to a vision that ministers will set. It is quite a simple and straightforward vision.
I am looking for the component parts of the career services collaborative to all take responsibility for the delivery of careers advice. SDS delivers in schools—that is its responsibility, although it has a degree of wider responsibility—but we need to see careers advice delivered through the developing the young workforce programme, and in our colleges and universities. The challenge that will be set for all the participating members is to take forward that responsibility, delivering to a clear and agreed message.
The minister is a good chap, but he has to accept that he has dismembered SDS and yet, somehow, it lives on. Perhaps he can elucidate on how the changes will ensure that apprenticeships and college places are held in equal esteem with university degrees, because that is a critical issue. Will he also reflect on my previous suggestion to rename graduate apprenticeships as degree apprenticeships?
I took that suggestion away and tested it with university colleagues, and they were split roughly 50:50. The critical point about graduate apprenticeships is not their name but the place that they hold in the landscape. Stephen Kerr touched, rightly, on parity of esteem, but I want to see the graduate apprenticeship model improved. We currently have a group, led by Steve Decent, the principal at Glasgow Caledonian University, looking at how we further develop the graduate apprenticeship model and how we expand that offering as part of the overall package.
Stephen Kerr makes a very good point about parity of esteem. The issue is also about read-across. We need to ensure that there is a cohesion to the offering of foundation apprenticeships, modern apprenticeships and graduate apprenticeships, so that we capture the maximum number of young people who want to go down those pathways and that we ensure that it is the right pathway for them.
That concludes this item of business. There will be a brief pause before we move to the next item of business to allow front benches to change over.
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