Apprenticeships hold the key to Growth and NHS Renewal

Petra discusses how higher-level apprenticeships are crucial for both NHS improvement and economic growth. The government’s plan to divert funding away from these programs to support younger learners risks undermining healthcare management training and small business development, while also reducing social mobility opportunities.

Government’s Vision for Skills Reform

As the Government begins to frame what it hopes to deliver through a renewed skills policy, it has rightly identified the need to give younger people the best possible chance of a successful working life – complete with skills that meet the needs of the UK’s rapidly changing economy. 

Difficult Budget Decisions

The plan to divert funds from higher level apprenticeships into new supports for younger learners is one of the ‘hard choices’ that the Government has spoken of as it comes to terms with its budgetary realities.

As with any choice there will be inevitable crunch points where one policy priority bumps into another. This is one of those bumps. And it will likely prompt further hard choices.

Impact on Core Government Priorities

With growing the economy and reforming the NHS as arguably the two most prominent pillars of the Government’s five missions, diverting funds that are being deployed to upskill the country’s small and mid-sized businesses and the health and social care sector risks stalling those missions before they begin

Critical Role in Healthcare Management.

When it comes to management apprenticeships at Level 7 – the funding that is at risk of being removed from the apprenticeship levy – we are talking about a training envelope that is used to train managers across the NHS and social care sector. Fully 60% of Level 7 management apprentices assessed by the CMI work in the public sector and, notably, 27% work directly in health and social care.

These are the people charged by the Health Secretary with delivering a new, more effective and efficient NHS, one that improves the quality of its managers and is then able to grant them more autonomy to do their jobs. The next hard choice facing the Government could well be deciding where the NHS will find the training budget to deliver those better managers if the management apprenticeship route is curtailed.

Sector Responses

The chief executive of the Queen’s Nursing Institute has labelled the change as “devastating for the nursing workforce.” Sheffield Hallam University has warned of a disproportionate “impact on public services.” 

Impact on Small Business Growth

The unintended consequences of restricting the use of higher-level apprenticeship funds will also affect the UK small business ecosystem – the very backbone of the economy that will be denied the chance of levy-funded management training for their future leaders. 

Social Mobility and Skills Development

This training route has emerged as an aspirational programme that is advancing social mobility across the country with data showing that seven out of 10 management apprentices come from families where neither parent went to university, and three in five senior management apprentices come from the UK’s more deprived areas, with many from lower socio-economic backgrounds, often denied the chance to go to university when they left school.

They also pay it forward when it comes to creating a skilled workforce with 97% of management apprentices saying their apprenticeship has increased their commitment to improving the training and development of their direct reports. That is a vital element when it comes to ensuring young people, a clear priority, share in the chance to upskill and improve their life chances.

Way Forward

By working together with public sector leaders, notably in the health and social care sector, and small business leaders, the Government can shape a skills landscape that addresses the country’s most pressing productivity and talent gaps and deliver on its core missions to grow the economy and renew our health care system.

By Petra Wilton, Director of Policy and External Affairs, Chartered Management Institute