The Education, Children and Young People Committee has published it’s Stage 1 report on the Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill.
The committee has decided not to make a recommendation on a proposed Scottish Government education Bill due to ‘significant concerns’ about the costs of the changes.
The Bill aims to provide specific funding for apprenticeships and national training programmes, improve processes and governance at the Scottish Funding Council, and clarify the procedure for providing student support to Scottish students studying at private institutions in the UK.
Concerns arose about the ‘lack of clarity’ of the costs of the proposed restructuring. Skills Development Scotland has claimed the costs could be as much as £30 million . This has been disputed by the Scottish Funding Council and Scottish Government. Graeme Dey MSP, Minister for Higher and Further Education, is expected to clarify the costs when he speaks to the Committee again later this month.
Committee convener Douglas Ross said: ‘The value of apprenticeships to learners and businesses across Scotland is clear – and that’s part of the reason why our committee supports elements which underpin this Bill. Funding should be responsive to what Scotland’s learners and economy needs.’
‘However, we’ve taken the unusual step of not making a recommendation on whether the Parliament should support the Bill in principle because of our significant concerns around the lack of clarity over the costs of the proposals.’
The report can be downloaded via the link below- and is available on the Scottish Parliament’s Committee Reports webpage.
Conclusions
The Committee has drawn the following conclusions:
- Apprenticeships offer valuable opportunities to learners and businesses across Scotland, and make a vital contribution to Scotland’s economy. It is clear from the evidence the Committee heard, that the current approach towards administering and delivering those apprenticeships needs to be improved.
- The Committee shares the ambitions for the funding for the tertiary education and training provision to be more responsive to the needs of learners and the economy; and improving the operation and governance of the Scottish Funding Council.
- However, careful consideration needs to be made of the cost benefit of doing so. The Committee has significant concerns about the financial aspects of the Bill, specifically in relation to the transfer of staff between SDS and the SFC.
- As such, the Committee is being asked to agree to a Financial Memorandum which provides a very wide range of costs. In light of all of this, the Committee is not able to make a recommendation to Parliament and reserves its position on the General Principles of this Bill.
