'NEW ALLIANCE' FOR VOCATIONAL STUDY
Businesses, colleges and universities must come together to form a "new alliance" to create a change in vocational education to rival the growth of polytechnics in the 1960s, Labour has said.
Shadow skills minister Liam Byrne said he wanted a single world-class system to help people follow academic or vocational routes to a degree-level qualification.
In his speech he highlighted Department for Business, Innovation and Skills figures showing the number of apprenticeship starts by under-25s has fallen by more than 11,000 under the coalition Government.
Securing an apprenticeship is now twice as hard as getting a place at university and it is almost three times more difficult to enrol on a Rolls-Royce apprenticeship than win a place at Oxford, he said.
In a speech at City of Westminster College he said it was "very hard to get your foot on the ladder" by securing an apprenticeship and it was "incredibly difficult" to pursue a route from an apprenticeship to a degree.
He said: "Just 2% of apprentices are given the chance to study to degree level each year. None of our competitors are making the same mistakes."
Comparing the challenge to that which led to the expansion of universities in the 19th century and the "great explosion" of polytechnics, he said: "Today we want colleges, universities and businesses to come together in a new alliance as they did in the 1960s.
"Not in two different worlds. But in one, world-class system.
"We want to open many routes - not just one road - to a degree and the better life degree-level skills can open."
Last week, the Government said rising numbers of school leavers were choosing to sign up for apprenticeships.
Almost 50,000 young people aged 16 and 17 have signed up for the scheme, up 15% on the same point last year, data published by the Department for Education revealed.
Skills minister Matthew Hancock insisted the statistics showed young people increasingly see apprenticeships as "a great way to fulfil their potential".
