Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of removing funding for Level Seven apprenticeships for people aged 22 and above on (a) gender equality and (b) social mobility.

This government has a driving mission to break down barriers to opportunity. That is why we are moving funding away from level 7 apprenticeships for learners aged 22 and over, to ensure that funding is prioritised for learners at lower levels, who need the skills and training to progress in their careers.

This decision was informed by a wide range of evidence, including Skills England’s analysis of official apprenticeship statistics and engagement with a wide range of stakeholders. Skills England’s evidence suggested there was unlikely to be a significant or unavoidable fall in the supply of these skills in the long term, post-defunding, and alternative routes are well supplied. A significant proportion of level 7 apprentices are from non-deprived backgrounds and are significantly less likely to be deprived than apprentices at lower levels.

Women are slightly less likely to be represented in the 16 to 21-year-old cohort of level 7 apprenticeships starts than those aged 22 and over. This is likely to be due to the recruitment norms in the standards that have a higher proportion of starts in the 16-21 age group, such as accountancy. The department will monitor trends over time and consider how this gap could be narrowed.