Apprentices
(asked on 15th September 2023) - View Source
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of trends in the number of individuals applying for apprenticeships in each of the last five years.
Apprenticeships offer a high-quality and popular route into over 680 occupations, from entry level to expert roles.
The below table shows the number of apprenticeship vacancies advertised on the Find An Apprenticeship (FAA) service in each of the last five academic years.
Academic year | Vacancies posted | | |
2018/19 | 151,720 | | |
2019/20 | 98,530 | | |
2020/21 | 134,460 | | |
2021/22 | 189,430 | | |
2022/23 | 165,760 | | |
669,450 applications were submitted through FAA in the 2022/23 academic year, and 681,090 applications were submitted in 2021/22. Due to the data protection policy in place prior to 2021/22, the department does not hold an accurate record of the number of applications submitted between 2018/19 and 2020/21.
Employers can choose to advertise apprenticeship vacancies through their own websites, recruitment agencies, or local job centre, instead of, or in addition to FAA. As a result the actual number of apprenticeship vacancies and applications will be higher.
The department is encouraged to see consistent and strong demand for apprenticeships, and are committed to supporting more employers and individuals to benefit from the high-quality training that apprenticeships offer.
Flexible training models have been created, like flexi-job and accelerated apprenticeships, to make apprenticeships accessible for all sectors, and have developed career starter standards to attract more young people to apprenticeships.
The department is also providing an additional £40 million over the next two years to support degree apprenticeship providers to expand and help more people access this provision, on top of our £8 million investment in 2022/23.