Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress his Department has made on meeting the target of three million apprenticeship starts by 2020.

There have been 1.4 million apprenticeship starts since May 2015. In May, we published an update on the progress of apprenticeships reforms, including progress against the 3 million target:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/707896/Progress_report_on_the_Apprenticeships_Reform_Programme_May_2018.pdf.

The government is moving away from old apprenticeship frameworks, which employers said were often not suitably equipping apprentices for the job, towards new, higher quality apprenticeship standards, designed by employers themselves. The number of people starting on new apprenticeship standards is growing fast. Starts on higher apprenticeships standards continue to grow and we have seen a 12.7 per cent increase compared to this time last year. In addition, over 40 per cent of individuals completing an apprenticeship are now starting on standards, compared to 2.5 per cent this time last year.