In direct contrast to last year, Apprenticeships and the ‘Skills Gap’ are very much at the forefront of political thinking at the moment, as a solution to the 1 million + unemployed young people. They’ve been discussed more this conference season than ever before!

Terms like ‘parity of esteem’ between vocational and academic qualifications, and ‘employer input and ownership’ are on the lips of politicians across the traditional political divide.

Conservative party conference

• Germany is once again in the spotlight as the ‘ideal’ model nation for apprenticeships and vocational training. The counter-point was also raised that Germany has had approximately 4 reforms of its skills system in the last 40 years, whereas England has had about 40!
• There is a perception that the skills system has not moved with the times and therefore is a disconnection between employers and the skills the system can provide. The government are exploring broader use of the tax system in incentivising employers to invest in skills.
• Skills Minister Matthew Hancock is a man with a mission: to create a skills system that is rigorous and responsive, and not Westminster-led. He is keen to take advantage of broad cross party agreement on vocational education, and to simplify the system to future-proof it.
• The government have also articulated a pressing need for quality careers Information, Advice and Guidance (IAG) in schools and colleges, measured by OFSTED.
• Jürgen Maier, managing Director at Siemens UK stated a common concern form employers: ‘The Skills landscape of the UK is too complex.’ The Association of School and College Leaders CEO Brian Lightman echoed this sentiment; that the on-going volume of reforms will need time to bed in, and not just to be reversed by the next government. Are employers suffering from ‘initiative overload’?
• Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove used his keynote speech to reiterate his purpose to reform education, with a high quality, rigorous curriculum to fight the ‘poverty of aspiration’.
• The Prime Minister concluded the conference with a speech establishing what the key parts of the Conservative manifesto would be. On education and skills, he set out his aim for a University Technical College in every major town, and for young people to either take an apprenticeship or go to university. 

Labour Party Conference

• Labour views their Education policy as a ‘fault line’ – which divides them from the conservatives. Stephen Twigg (shadow education minister) sees the high youth unemployment and child poverty as a result of a failure to help hard pressed families and provide the skills people need – education is the ‘Engine of Social Mobility’.
• For older learners (16-18), Labour are still set on a ‘Technical Baccalaureate’ – which would contain high quality Vocational Qualifications (similar to Conservative plans), with an ‘accredited work experience aspect’ required to complete the Technical Baccalaureate.
• Labour would reverse any decision to decouple AS level qualifications from performance tables, and leave learners aged 18 with a choice to either undertake ‘an apprenticeship of high quality’ or a university place (they’d envisage a 50/50 split with young people taking either option).
• The Labour Skills Taskforce has delivered its recommendations for the apprenticeships formulated by the Husbands review (Chris Husbands, Institute of Education). The key recommendation is the plan for ALL apprenticeships to be Level 3 or above, (with a minimum duration of 2 years at Level 3, 3 Years for Level 4), with an improved traineeship system for Level 2 learners.  The key difference between coalition plans is that this isn’t a full system level reform; it just builds on current best practice and increases quality on this basis.
• Stephen Twigg set out a proposal for a network of ‘Colleges of Excellence’ to embed best practice throughout the sector’.
• Tristram Hunt talked of the transition from education to work, mainly due to the ‘cataclysmic’ careers advice that young people currently receive. He feels the ‘vocational route’ out of schools as so complex that qualified professionals are needed to guide young people.

What do you think of the points raised at the party conferences? Share your thoughts with us!