Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support skills development in retrofit and traditional construction methods, including heritage crafts such as stonemasonry.

On 20 May, we published the Post-16 Pathways Implementation plan, setting out our plan for post-16 technical and vocational qualifications.

It sets out that we are exploring options with the sector for introducing an Occupational Certificate in stonemasonry from 2028/2029. We will update the Implementation Plan with more detail on this by early 2027.

In addition, there is currently a level 2 Stonemason apprenticeship standard, and we are working with the sector to consider the development of a level 3 Stonemason apprenticeship standard.

There are also apprenticeships available in retrofit coordinator and a range of craft trades. These can be viewed on the Skills England website on occupational maps available at: https://occupational-maps.skillsengland.education.gov.uk/.