Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, whether the technology used for the digital voucher system for accessing funds from the apprenticeship levy will allow companies to direct unused funds to smaller companies in their supply chains.

In the first year of the levy, employers will be able to use funds in their levy account to pay for apprenticeship training and assessment of their own employees. We know that some employers will want to use funds in their digital account to pay for apprenticeship training of other employer’s apprentices, for example, someone in their supply chain. We will make an assessment of the pros and cons of any approach, including the trade-offs with other design choices, before providing further information in June.