asked Her
Majesty’s Government what plans they have to fund further
education teachers’ pay increases.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for
Education (Lord Agnew of Oulton) (Con)
My Lords, all teachers are equally important to us. However,
further education providers, including sixth-form colleges, are
private sector institutions, independent of government. It is for
individual FE employers to agree local pay structures, with
unions, based on local needs. We are currently considering the
efficiency and resilience of the FE sector, and assessing how far
existing funding and regulatory structures meet the costs of
delivering quality further education, ahead of the spending
review.
(LD)
But, my Lords, the Government do have an input into this. This is
Colleges Week and we should acknowledge the part which further
education colleges play in education and English education, with
apprenticeships, with further technical and academic
qualifications, and with adult learning. They have been lumbered
with the wretched GCSE and maths resits, which really are an
abomination that the Government need to reconsider. Can the
Minister say why, in the last 10 years, college funding has been
cut by around 30% and the value of staff pay has fallen by 25%?
Why has the recently ring-fenced teachers’ pay grant for schools
not been extended to FE colleges? The Government after all do
have a part to play in this.
of Oulton
My Lords, to reiterate our acknowledgement of the great role FE
colleges play, more than eight out of 10 are judged “good” or
“outstanding” by Ofsted and, in the most recent data, 58% of
pupils leaving go on to jobs and 22% go on into further learning.
We absolutely recognise that. There are a couple of figures that
might interest the noble Baroness. According to the ONS earnings
data—which is, of course, only a survey—when accounting for
inflation, FE teacher pay in England has remained stable since
2013. The other point—to pull on some of the broader strands that
the noble Baroness mentioned—is that, by 2020, funding available
to support adult FE participation, including the adult education
budget, the 19-plus apprenticeship funding and advanced learner
loans, is planned to be higher than at any time in our recent
history.
(Ind Lab)
My Lords, if FE colleges are doing such a good job—the Minister
says that eight out of 10 of them are of high quality—why is it
that Conservative Governments always fail to resource them
adequately? Could he tell the House how he thinks the
Government’s industrial strategy, which is dependent on a more
skilled workforce, can be implemented while FE colleges are being
decimated and their staff are leaving in droves?
of Oulton
My Lords, we have given a number of different strands of support
to the sector. We have a strategic college improvement fund to
help colleges improve and build partnership capacity. We launched
National Leaders of Further Education in October last year,
empowering the best principals and senior leaders across FE to
spread their expert knowledge. We have also created an FE
strategic leadership programme, run by the Education and Training
Foundation, a sector-owned body responsible for professional
standards in the sector.
(CB)
My Lords, can we also include the Workers’ Educational
Association in this discussion? It is doing profoundly
interesting work in getting people out of long-term unemployment
and into work and education. We would like to know what the
Government’s plans are to support the Workers’ Educational
Association because of the work that it does.
of Oulton
My Lords, I do not have that information to hand, but I will
write to the noble Lord with some further information.
(LD)
The Government are always, quite rightly, banging on about the
importance of skills and skills training. We have heard from my
noble friend that there has been a 30% cut in the FE budget and,
in adult education, there has been a 61% cut. How on earth will
we attract staff to develop the teaching to develop those skills?
He mentioned—I was quite surprised about this—that the Government
are looking at this sector. When can we expect to hear about this
assessment of the sector?
of Oulton
My Lords, we have reformed the high-needs funding and
disadvantaged funding in this sector and we are now putting in
some £520 million for disadvantaged students. As I mentioned
earlier, we have the strand of support that I have already
discussed. If we look at apprenticeships on their own, for
example, we see that we have nearly doubled the amount of money
going into apprenticeships since 2010. By 2020, it will be £2.45
billion, which is double the amount in 2010. The other thing we
have done to try to support the sector is offer sixth-form
colleges, where appropriate, the opportunity to academise, which
gives them a VAT-recovery opportunity. So we are looking all the
time at how we can support this important sector.
(Lab)
My Lords, the Minister beggars belief when he says in response to
my noble friend Lady Blackstone that various strands of
additional funding have gone into further education colleges. The
Institute for Fiscal Studies reported recently that funding per
student in sixth-form colleges and further education colleges has
fallen by 20% since 2010. How can the average funding per student
in those sectors be £4,000, compared to more than double that for
universities with their tuition fees? In Colleges Week, which the
noble Baroness, Lady Garden, mentioned, is there any possibility
of the Minister saying that the Government will properly fund the
new cost pressures on further education colleges of pay and
pensions increases to ensure that an age group essential to
filling the skills gaps in the economy in future years will not
be further disadvantaged?
of Oulton
My Lords, we have already committed to holding baseline funding
per pupil until the next spending review in 2020, and I can offer
a couple more examples of where we are supporting the sector. We
have the exceptional financial support scheme, the area reviews
and the restructuring facility, with a fund of some £700 million
that has been made available and is being drawn down upon to
assist colleges in rationalising and improving—so I reiterate our
strong support for this sector.
(Lab)
My Lords, listening to questions from noble Lords to the Minister
this afternoon makes me recall the report of the ad hoc Committee
on Social Mobility on the transfer from school to work, which I
had the privilege to chair. Every single point raised by noble
Lords this afternoon was raised in our report. What is the point
of us having committees if the Government do not take any notice?
of Oulton
My Lords, we certainly do take notice. As I said in my opening
Answer to the noble Baroness, we are looking at this whole area
ahead of the next spending review.
