Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will make an equalities impact assessment of (a) the length of placements and (b) the timing of funding payments for the Turing Scheme.

The Secretary of State for Education carried out an Equalities Impact Assessment (EIA) into the Turing Scheme during the design stage of policy development as a way of facilitating and evidencing compliance with the Public Sector Equality Duty contained in Section 149 of the Equality Act 2010. This requires public authorities to have due regard to several equality considerations when exercising their functions.

Under the Turing Scheme, eligible organisations in each education sector have flexibility to design projects in line with their needs and those of their students, including setting the duration of mobilities within a broad window above 4 weeks to 12 months in higher education (HE), 2 weeks to 12 months in further education, and 3 days to 6 months in schools. The department reduced the minimum duration of HE placements to 4 weeks, which is half the shortest duration previously permitted under the Erasmus+ Programme. This is intended to widen access to international opportunities to people from disadvantaged backgrounds for whom the duration of an international placements may represent a potential barrier to participation.

The Turing Scheme is creating more opportunities than ever before for students across the UK who were previously unlikely to take up international exchanges. Of the more than 40,000 pupils, learners and students who will have the opportunity to do study and work placements across the globe this year, nearly two thirds of these opportunities will be for participants from disadvantaged backgrounds.

The Turing Scheme is a demand led, competitive programme with an annual application cycle. Successful applicant institutions are notified of their funding allocation before the start of the academic year and before the funding period for international placements commences. Once the grant agreement is in place, it is the responsibility of grant recipients to make timely requests for payments, so that they can disburse funding to their participants at the point of need.

The department will continue to work closely with the scheme’s delivery partner to collect and act on feedback from participating organisations and sector stakeholders, including on the payment mechanism and timing.