“Legislation will support a lifetime skills guarantee to enable
flexible access to high quality education and training throughout
people’s lives. ”
The purpose of the Bill is to:
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Legislate for landmark reforms that will transform post-16
education and training, make skills more readily available
and get more people into work as set out in the Government’s
Skills for Jobs White Paper.
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Enable people to access flexible funding for Higher or
Further Education, bringing Universities and Further
Education colleges closer together, and removing the bias
against technical education.
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Deliver the Prime Minister’s new Lifetime Skills Guarantee,
as part of our blueprint for a post-16 education system that
will ensure everyone, no matter where they live or their
background, can gain the skills they need to progress in work
at any stage of their lives.
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Increase productivity, support growth industries and give
individuals opportunities to progress in their careers.
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Strengthen the powers of the Office for Students to take
action to address low quality higher education provision.
The main benefits of the Bill would be:
The main elements of the Bill are:
• Putting employers at the heart of the post-16 skills system
through the Skills Accelerator, by enabling employers and
providers to collaborate to develop skills plans aimed at
ensuring local skills provision meets local needs.
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Introducing the Lifelong Loan Entitlement, which will give
individuals access to the equivalent of up to four years’
worth of student loans for level 4-6 qualifications that they
can use flexibly across their lifetime, at colleges as well
as universities.
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Strengthening the system of accountability by extending
existing powers for the Secretary of State for Education to
intervene where colleges have failed to meet local needs, to
direct structural change where required to secure
improvement, and by amending the regulation of post-16
education and training providers to ensure quality.
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Strengthening the ability of the Office for Students to
assess and regulate Higher Education provision in England,
ensuring that they can regulate in line with minimum
expectations of quality.
Territorial extent and application
• The provisions in this Bill will extend UK wide. Most
provisions apply to England, however some also apply to Wales,
Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Key facts
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Only 10 per cent of adults aged 20-45 hold a higher technical
(level 4-5) qualification as their highest qualification,
compared to 20 per cent in Germany and 34 per cent in Canada.
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Only four per cent of young people achieve a qualification at
higher technical level by the age of 25, compared to the 33
per cent who get a degree or above.
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New findings have shown that more people would now prefer
their child to gain a vocational qualification ahead of a
university degree.
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A third (34 per cent) of working age graduates are not in
high skilled employment.
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In 2019 employers were unable to fill a quarter of all vacant
positions (214,000 vacancies) because they could not find
people with the right skills.
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Skills shortages account for 36 per cent of all construction
vacancies, and 48 per cent of all Manufacturing and the
Skilled Trades vacancies.
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Men with a higher technical (level 4) qualification earn on
average £5,100 more at age 30 than those with a degree (level
6).
80 per cent of the 2030 workforce are already in the
workforce today - so reskilling the existing workforce is a
key opportunity.
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● The Government is investing significant amounts into
further education - £1.5 billion to improve our college
estate; £2.5 billion (£3 billion when including Barnett
funding for devolved administrations) in the National
Skills Fund; and £650 million extra into 16-19 further
education.
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● The Skills Bill forms the legislative underpinning for
the reforms set out in the White Paper, ‘Skills for Jobs:
Lifelong Skills for Opportunity and Growth’ which was
published on 21 January 2021.
