Post-16 Education and Skills Strategy

Gareth Snell Excerpts

Monday 20th October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Bridget Phillipson]

We are investing more in further education and also in our schools system, but we recognise that one in seven young people aged between 16 and 24 are not in education, employment, or training. We urgently need to bring that figure down, because every single day we see the consequences of that failure, both for the individual young person and for our wider economy. That is why many of the measures in the White Paper are about how we can give young people the support that they need. If the hon. Gentleman writes to me, I will respond to his specific point about ESOL.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

I should draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, as a governor of a sixth-form college in Stoke-on-Trent and as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on sixth form education.

The V-levels provide an exciting opportunity for vocational qualifications, and the Secretary of State is right to praise colleges, but she will know that those same colleges are deeply worried about the defunding of BTECs and what that means for student choice in the 2026-27 academic year. Will she give a commitment from the Dispatch Box that BTEC funding will continue until V-levels are in place, and if she cannot, can she explain what young people accessing further education next year will be able to look to before they are in place?

[Bridget Phillipson]

Students wishing to study for a large qualification should study for T-levels where they are on offer, but to ease the transition to V-levels, the DFE will retain funding for qualifications with 719 guided learning hours or below in T-level areas until the new V-levels are introduced for that area, so we will be keeping funding for most existing qualifications. We will keep that in place until the new V-levels and other qualifications come in, and we will confirm the list of qualifications that will have funding removed in due course.