Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of introducing loans for second degrees to help people in and out of work to meet current and future high skills level gaps in England.

Part-time students starting a second degree course in any Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) subject will be eligible for student support from the 2017/18 academic year. We expect that that these changes will reduce barriers to people studying and help fill the high-level skills gaps that hold back parts of the economy.