Oral Answers to Questions

Nick Boles Excerpts

Monday 21st July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

10. What assessment she has made of the effects on performance for sixth-form colleges of funding changes since 2010.

[The Minister for Skills, Enterprise and Equalities (Nick Boles)]

Although sixth-form colleges have had to make a contribution to our efforts to deal with the massive budget deficit left by the previous Government, the number of students in sixth-form colleges attaining level 3 qualifications by age 19 has increased by almost 8% since 2010.

[Paul Blomfield]

The Minister will know that recent figures show that academies have access to 35% more funding per student than sixth-form colleges, yet sixth-form colleges still have to pay VAT, insurance and capital costs, diverting money away from teaching and learning. As the Minister settles into his new job, what will he do to secure fairness in education for all young people?

[Nick Boles]

Fairness is exactly what we are trying to achieve, and we want a system whereby students receive the same level of backing for their studies regardless of the institution to which they go. Despite the previous Government having had 13 years to sort out the unfairness of the school funding system, we inherited a system that was byzantine in its complexity, and it is taking us some time to work it out.

[Julie Hilling]

A number of sixth-form providers across Bolton have contacted me to say that the funding regulations for sixth-form colleges mean that they are under pressure to place students on additional courses to meet the minimum hour requirement, which is detrimental to those students who succeed better when they are focused on just three subjects. Will the Minister look again at the regulations that are pressurising students to follow educational pathways that are not in their best interests?

[Nick Boles]

I am happy to look into any question that the hon. Lady raises, because she is a great expert in this area. I do not recognise the charge, but I am happy to look into it if she would like to send me more information.

[Sir Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD)]

The Minister is right to remind the Opposition that they had 13 years to put right the anomaly, but we have had four years. What is the justification for continuing for another year a funding formula under which sixth-form students at an 11-to-18 school have two thirds more funding than if they go to a sixth-form college?

[Nick Boles]

The great Sir Bob—my hon. Friend—is of course so experienced in the House that he knows he has attacked Ministers for withdrawing funding from one institution too quickly, and I am sure that he has argued for damping mechanisms for any sudden effects of changes in the funding formula. There is always a balance to be struck between ensuring that the funding is fair and ensuring that no institution has the rug pulled from under it. It is a balance that we are determined to achieve.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

Notwithstanding the undoubted unfairness of their funding arrangements, sixth-form colleges are the most successful institutions in our education system, with regard to both the quality of education provided and value for money. When will the Government take steps to increase the number of sixth-form colleges across the country, and would the Minister care to visit the superb Luton sixth-form college in my constituency to find out how good they really are?

[Nick Boles]

I am happy to take up any invitation; as the former planning Minister, I do not get so many. I will simply say that there are more places in sixth-form colleges this year than there were in 2010. Despite the funding constraints and the need to make some difficult choices, this Government are backing sixth-form colleges.

[Chris Evans (Islwyn) (Lab/Co-op)]

8. What recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of work-related learning in schools.

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[Ian Lucas (Wrexham) (Lab)]

9. What assessment she has made of the effect on admission numbers for sixth-form colleges of funding changes since 2010.

[The Minister for Skills, Enterprise and Equalities (Nick Boles)]

In case it was not clear the first time, let me explain that despite a fall in the population of 16 to 19-year-olds, sixth-form colleges have been allocated 2% more places in 2014-15 than in 2010-11.

[Ian Lucas]

My question is different from the one that the Minister answered earlier, so it would be helpful if he addressed himself to it specifically. The Sixth Form Colleges Association tells us that £100 million has been taken out of sixth-form colleges since 2010, and we have also heard about the disparity they face in connection with VAT. Why are this Government treating sixth-form colleges so badly?

[Nick Boles]

I do not want to be pernickety, but the hon. Gentleman’s question reads as follows:

“What assessment she has made of the effect on admissions numbers for sixth-form colleges of funding changes”.

The answer is that the funding changes have produced an increase in admission numbers to sixth-form colleges.

[Mr Geoffrey Robinson (Coventry North West) (Lab)]

May I ask the Minister to turn his mind from the general to the specific—namely, City College Coventry, which trains about 50% of 16 to 18-year-olds in Coventry and which, for the year 2015, is receiving an 18% cut? Will he look at that specifically and perhaps come with me to visit the college?

[Nick Boles]

I would be happy to look at the particular financial situation of the college in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency and to see how the damping mechanism that is in place is working in that case.

[Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham) (Con)]

11. What progress has been made on the traineeships programme; and if she will make a statement.

[The Minister for Skills, Enterprise and Equalities (Nick Boles)]

The Government launched traineeships last August to help 16 to 23-year-olds to develop the skills and vital experience they need to get an apprenticeship or a sustainable job. Some 7,400 young people have already started a traineeship.

[Rehman Chishti]

I welcome the Minister to his new post, and I know he will do an outstanding job. What commitment have the Government received from major national employers to offer traineeships to young people that will also help to benefit the 640 NEETs in Medway, which covers my constituency?

[Nick Boles]

I am delighted to be able to tell my hon. Friend that Virgin Media, Jaguar Land Rover, Siemens, the BBC, National Grid and Barclays, to name just a few, are committed to setting up and offering traineeships. I will certainly be happy to look into seeing whether any of those could be available to his constituents in the Medway area.

[Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)]

We now have a raft of opportunities for young people—traineeships, apprenticeships, sixth-form colleges, further education colleges—[Hon. Members: “Hear, hear!”] That is not to say that they are all something that Government Members should claim credit for. Does that not underline the importance of good, transparent, independent careers advice from a young age—from 14? Would the Minister be willing to come to speak to constituents of mine who have expressed to me very strongly their desire for access to face-to-face careers advice at an early stage so they can make the right choices in life?

[Nick Boles]

The National Careers Service does provide face-to-face meetings for up to 1 million young people, but I am of course happy to meet the hon. Lady and her constituents. We recognised that not all schools were doing exactly what we expected of them. That is why we produced new guidance on making sure that schools are doing what is required of them in offering young people a choice of opportunities, not just within the school but among all other institutions, to take their education forward.

[Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)]

12. What progress she has made on introducing the technical baccalaureate.

[The Minister for Skills, Enterprise and Equalities (Nick Boles)]

This feels a little like machine gun fire, but I am always happy to take bullets from the hon. Lady. The technical baccalaureate will be available in all schools and colleges from this September. Students will need to pass one or more tech levels and a maths qualification, such as AS maths or the new core maths qualifications, and to undertake an extended project.

[Lyn Brown]

I will do my best with the bullets. When the Leader of the Opposition announced the “tech bac” at the Labour party conference in 2012, the Tories briefed that it would leave thousands of young people unemployable. How many young people does the Minister predict will be taking up the Government’s “tech bac” from September 2014, and how many of them does he think will be unemployable?

[Nick Boles]

The reason we are in government and the hon. Lady is not is that we are very good at taking ideas that are not yet perfect and making them perfect, which is exactly what we have done with the idea of a “tech bac”. I am very hopeful that about 25% of young people will take up the opportunity of a “tech bac”. The key thing is what is in it—that the qualifications that make it up are themselves demanding. That is what we are ensuring.

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab)]

15. What steps she is taking to improve the quality of child care.

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[Nadhim Zahawi (Stratford-on-Avon) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is a national scandal that under the previous Government an estimated 350,000 young people a year were studying for post-16 qualifications that offered no route into stable employment or higher education?

[The Minister for Skills, Enterprise and Equalities (Nick Boles)]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This Government have got rid of 3,000 poor-quality qualifications allowed in by the previous Government who, in doing so, debased the currency of qualifications and led young people up the garden path with no real prospect of getting a job at the end of it.