Level 7 Apprenticeships Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Department for Work and Pensions
Adam Dance
Main Page: Adam Dance (Liberal Democrat - Yeovil)Department Debates - View all Adam Dance's debates with the Department for Work and Pensions
Level 7 Apprenticeships
Adam Dance Excerpts(1 day, 2 hours ago)
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Sarah Gibson (Chippenham) (LD)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered level 7 apprenticeships.
In the interests of transparency, I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. Before entering Parliament, I taught architecture at the University of Bath and I ran an architectural practice. As my entry states, I still hold an advisory role with the university and I am in the process of winding down the business. I have additional connections in that I was a Wiltshire councillor on planning committees. It will therefore come as no surprise that I am deeply committed to both education and the built environment. In addition, I represent a rural constituency in the west of England, which has no university, but does have an outstanding college of further education, Wiltshire college and university centre, with strong apprenticeship programmes.
A recent Government assessment identified acute areas of deprivation across all four towns in my constituency, driven in large part by limited access to education and skills. For many young people in rural areas, apprenticeships are the only realistic route.
Adam Dance (Yeovil) (LD)
Investment in level 7 apprenticeships is so important. Does my hon. Friend agree that we also need to keep up investment in vocational education facilities, and will she join me in congratulating Yeovil college, which has been awarded more than £2 million in Government funding to upgrade its engineering facility? That is the kind of investment that we need more of.
Sarah Gibson
I absolutely share my hon. Friend’s congratulations to Yeovil college.
The option to study while earning is crucial to reduce barriers, particularly for those from disadvantaged backgrounds. That is distinctly the case for architecture—an industry that historically has been run by a narrow, predominantly male, section of the middle class, and where the apprenticeship route has begun to make a real difference. Benchmarking by the Royal Institute of British Architects shows that apprenticeships have achieved a far better gender balance than the wider profession has ever seen, with level 7 entrants last year almost at parity.