Agenda item

To consider the attached report.

The Joint Assembly RECOMMENDED that the Executive Board:

(a) Extends Form the Future’s contract for a further 12 months, from September 2017 to August 2018.

(b) Sets aside £160,000 for the academic year 2017/18 and assumes a continuation of funding for a brokerage service in 2018/19 at approximately the same funding level.

(c) Reviews the focus and targets for the period 2017/18 and begins contract negotiations along these lines;

(d) Sets aside £35,000 for the period January to December 2017 and assumes a continuation of this into 2018 to develop Career Champions in schools.

(e) Endorses the approach to progressing with the development of Labour Market Information to inform the Information Advice and Guidance for young people, adults, providers, parents and employers and supports the work of the Local Skills Service and National Careers Service.

(f) Begins negotiations with Cambridge Regional College to develop an outcome based activity plan that would support businesses to understand the changes in relation to apprenticeships and the levy and carry out Training Needs Analysis to help businesses to identify their skills needs.

(g) Endorses a revised approach to how progress was measured towards the 420 apprenticeship starts and gain agreement from the Skills Funding Agency and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy to this approach.

(h) Endorses this approach to recording and monitoring the additional skills related to outcomes in the City Deal.

The Joint Assembly considered a report which reviewed the progress made from September 2015 to August 2016 against the skills related commitments articulated in the City Deal agreement.

Stella Cockerill, Skills Lead from the City Deal Partnership, presented the report which focussed on the following three key areas:

a review of the performance of the Local Skills Service, facilitated by Form the Future;
a review of progress against the skills related commitments in the City Deal;
a review about the way progress was measured in the future.

It was noted that the skills related commitments undertaken, which were general as opposed to being focussed on STEM based growth sectors alone, included the following:

creation of a locally funded skills team to work with small and medium enterprises in the area to develop training plans and act as co-ordinators to ensure training aligned with employer need;
establishment of a skills action plan for each of the priority sectors, including identifying the apprenticeship framework offer;
creation of locally funded adult careers teams to enhance information advice and guidance in growth sectors based on strong labour market information;
developing labour market intelligence to inform the provision of information, advice and guidance for young people, providers, parents and employers;
working closely with the National Careers Service local offer.

Over five years, from 2014/15, it had been agreed that the City Deal would deliver:

420 additional apprenticeships to support growth sectors;
50 more employers engaging with schools and colleges;
25 more employers engaging with traineeships;
150 more employers raised awareness of apprenticeships.

Stella Cockerill highlighted that the position nationally in relation to skills and apprenticeships had changed significantly since the City Deal agreement was first made. She made the point, in respect of growth areas, that recognition had to be given to the fact that businesses themselves would set out where they needed to grow, therefore meaning that some of the 420 additional apprenticeships would not necessarily fit into the STEM based growth sectors originally selected as priorities for the City Deal. She added, however, that on a more wider perspective all apprenticeships still supported local economic growth.

Councillor Tim Bick provided an update on behalf of the Joint Assembly’s Skills Sub-Group, which had operated as a sounding board in the preparation of this report and the recommendations contained within, which it supported. He said that the report brought forward a strategic view of what was trying to be achieved and provided a model for discussing the skills thread of the City Deal as it moved forward.

Councillor Bick reported that the City Deal had established a wider view of the Skills Service as a result of this workstream. The Service was being delivered for the City Deal Partnership by Form the Future and managed on the Partnership’s behalf by the Local Enterprise Partnership. This service helped young people to understand their career options and develop their employability through contact with employers. He emphasised, however, that this was only one aspect of the service, with the others being:

· demand from employers who understood the business case for investment in skills and how to go about accessing the rest of the system;

· provision of relevant training and vocational education programmes by providers who understood employer need and were responsive to it.

Councillor Bick said that these two issues presented the Skills Service with some particular challenges to overcome. He made the point that this part of the employer base, where there was a real tradition of investing in apprenticeships, was probably smaller than in many other areas by virtue of the correspondingly larger role played by graduates. The area also had a disproportionately larger number of small and medium sized employers who, separately, lacked the critical mass to assert their demand for training programmes unless they could aggregate that demand together.

Councillor Bick highlighted that the report provided a review of the contract performance of the Skills Service and mapped out its direction of the next two years, adding Careers Champions in schools and moving towards an outcomes emphasis. He added that the report sought approval to fund a negotiated intervention at Cambridge Regional College, designed to improve the reach-out to employers to help them with training needs analysis and reinforce their growth sector focus, as well as support them in aggregation of demand for certain types of programme. Councillor Bick said that, importantly, this was targeted to start from January 2017 to be in place for year one of the new funding and curricular landscape.

Another important aspect of the report, noted by Councillor Bick, was that it refined the approach to measurement of the City Deal’s contribution to the skills system, by revisiting the City Deal agreement and interpreting it for the real world and the changes that had been introduced. In terms of apprenticeship numbers, it recognised that if businesses were demanding additional apprentices they were likely to be doing so for reasons of growth, which would therefore be a growth sector in its own right. He emphasised that growth sectors were not only the hi-tech companies, but the construction companies which built their industrial units, houses and roads and those companies which met the needs of the enlarged population for many other services. Councillor Bick was of the opinion that this would not change the priority the City Deal placed on the technology and life sciences sector, which remained the original drivers of growth. He understood that the Government would be supportive of the City Deal partnership taking this approach, and felt that it was sensible to adopt it.

Sir Michael Marshall questioned whether the Skills Service had engaged with Launchpad, which was an organisation covering a range of companies in Cambridge in parallel with resources such as careers guidance officers. He asked whether a list could be collated of those companies in the area who were taking on apprenticeships so that it was clear where they were being employed.

Stella Cockerill responded by saying that the Skills Service was seeking to utilise what was already in place. She was aware of different providers operating in the area but explained that the difficulty was that they did not have to inform the Skills Service about what they were doing or who they were engaging with. She accepted that the Service may not be working with Launchpad as closely as it could be and was happy to explore this further. In terms of information relating to employers and the apprenticeships they employed, she explained that this information was not published and was not something that the Service would have access to.

Sir Michael made the point that, in his experience, employers would be very willing to share information relating to the apprenticeships they employed.

Councillor Roger Hickford, Chairman of the Joint Assembly, queried whether apprenticeships solely in those STEM based growth sectors originally selected as priorities for the City Deal should be counted towards the City Deal’s target, or whether this should be widened to include other sectors.

Councillor Bridget Smith felt that the remit of the City Deal and the skills workstream was to increase uptake, engagement and standards. She was concerned that opening the remit too widely could dilute the impact of the investment and therefore felt that the focus should be on the higher and medium category apprenticeships, as set out in the table under paragraph 31 of the report.

Andy Williams, as a Member of the Skills Sub-Group, provided clarity that the Sub-Group was recommending that the City Deal’s resources be dedicated to the higher and medium category apprenticeships, but that all apprenticeships should be recorded and counted towards the City Deal’s target. He made the point that small companies all over the area were actively employing apprenticeships, which was extremely positive for the City Deal and the wider area in terms of economic growth, emphasising that the key issue was where the resources would be focussed.

Discussion ensued on the significance of the construction industry in the area, particularly in light of the considerable development occurring in Greater Cambridge. It was noted that construction currently featured under the Skills Service’s medium apprenticeship category.

Stella Cockerill reported that the three most popular apprenticeship subjects nationally were business administration, engineering and retail and explained that, at the moment, the Local Enterprise Partnership had no way of knowing how many business administrative apprenticeships, for example, were employed directly within the City Deal’s priority sectors. She explained that this was the key issue which therefore supported the need to ensure that all apprenticeships were recorded and counted towards the City Deal’s target.

Further to a question by Councillor Smith regarding key performance indicators, Stella Cockerill confirmed that these would be reviewed, agreeing that they needed to be more outcome focused as well as be based on what the Skills Service was actually being asked to deliver.

Councillor Smith, in her capacity as a South Cambridgeshire District Councillor, questioned how the Skills Service could ensure any offer was fair and equitable across the whole region. It was noted that this aspect of the Service, together with the ongoing dialogue with providers and deliverability, would be addressed as part of the Area Review.

Mark Robertson declared a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest at this stage of the meeting as an employee of Cambridge Regional College and left the meeting prior to the vote on this item.