Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to reform student finance.

The government announced that it will introduce a Lifelong Loan Entitlement (LLE) from 2025 to provide a streamlined funding system for provision across levels 4 to 6. The LLE will enable people to train, retrain, and upskill to meet the needs of the economy and advance their careers.

The LLE will provide individuals with a loan entitlement to the equivalent of four years of post-18 education to use over their working lives (for example £37,000 in today’s fees). It will be available for both full years of study at higher technical and degree levels, and, for the first time, for modules of high-value courses, regardless of whether they are provided in colleges or universities.

Loans for living costs and targeted grants will be available in respect of all designated courses under the LLE, including part-time courses, subject to need.

Under this flexible skills system, people will be able to space out their studies and learn at a pace that is right for them, including choosing to build up their qualifications over time within both further education and higher education (HE) providers. They will have a choice in how and when they study to acquire new life-changing skills.

The government has legislated through the Skills and Post-16 Education Act 2022 on the LLE. On 1 February 2023, building on these measures, it introduced the HE (Lifelong Learning) Fee Limits Bill as a further step towards delivery of the LLE from 2025.

As part of the pathway towards the LLE, as of the start of the 2022/23 academic year, the government began trialling loan-funded access to tuition fees for designated short courses at levels 4 to 6 at 22 providers across England through the HE Short Course trial, which tests a more flexible approach to funding learning at levels 4 to 6.

On 7 March 2023, the government published its response to the LLE consultation, providing a detailed conclusion to the consultation and a clear description of the key changes being brought in as part of the LLE.