Further written evidence to be reported to the House
Education and Skills Bill
10:30 am
Ian Pryce: Autonomy has been very important for colleges and it is one of the reasons why the sector has been very successful over the past 15 years. It is important to have a good relationship with the local authority, but as long as that autonomy is preserved we will continue to be successful.
We would prefer a national funding system, partly for administrative reasons. At Bedford college, we draw students from more than 100 local authorities, so having a relationship with that many bodies would be very difficult and might deny people the opportunity to come for specialist subjects such as sustainable technologies.
I welcome the McDonald’s development. On balance, I come down in favour of compulsion to stay on, with the necessary proviso that all employers must be able to offer apprenticeships so they have to become more flexible. We have to achieve an increased volume of apprenticeships, and I see that development as part of the way of doing that—as long as companies can offer high-quality programmes. Quality is clearly an issue, but as long as there is high quality, then I have no problem with that.