14:30 Tony Vaughan (Labour)

My constituency of Folkestone and Hythe has incredible potential for a thriving vocational education and training system. It has strengths in the creative industries, independent retail, tourism and hospitality, as well as green energy and nuclear decommissioning. We are home to the Little Cheyne Court wind farm and the former Dungeness nuclear power station. However, the potential for a technical education system to supply those industries, and others, with skilled workers in both Folkestone and Hythe and the UK as a whole remains untapped. In 2022-23, there were 677 apprenticeship starts in Folkestone and Hythe, but only five in the leisure, tourism and travel sector, despite the size of that sector. And despite the significant number of regeneration projects in Folkestone and Hythe, the number of apprenticeship starts in construction, planning and the built environment fell by 49% in 2022-23 compared with the previous year.

On future policy development, can the Minister provide more detail on the timeline for when we can expect the different phases of development of Skills England? I would also be grateful to know how the Government plan to align Invest 2035 with their post-16 education strategy. Both those strategies require prioritisation, so what sectors do the Government plan to focus on to drive up the number of apprenticeship starts? Are there any other areas of education and skills policy that the Government would like to devolve to local economies rather than combined authorities? For example, there is no combined authority in Kent. What plans do the Government have to ensure more apprenticeship starts in the industries of the future, such as artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, green energy and new nuclear?

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