Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of including Level 2 qualifications for butchery and poultry dressing on the Free Courses for Jobs scheme.

The core Adult Skills Fund covers a very wide breadth of qualifications including those related to butchery and poultry dressing (for example the Level 2 Certificate for Proficiency in Meat and Poultry Industry Skills). The department sets funding rates which are designed to incentivise the delivery of “high value” courses in the Adult Skills Fund. Butchery courses (insofar as they are included in the Manufacturing Technologies Sector Subject Area) are in the “High” funding band which means providers receive more funding per learner than courses relating to other industries.

The government also funds training through the Level 2 Butcher apprenticeship standard and the Level 3 Advanced Butcher apprenticeship standard.