PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Apprentices (7 October 2020)

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many new apprentices in (a) SMEs and (b) large employers taken on in (i) August and (ii) September 2020 are in placements where the employer benefitted from the Government payment announced in its Plan for Jobs.

Asked by:
Karin Smyth (Labour)

Apprenticeships will be more important than ever in helping businesses to recruit the right people and develop the skills they need to recover and grow. To help support employers to offer new apprenticeships, employers are now able to claim £2,000 for every new apprentice they hire under the age of 25, and £1,500 for those aged 25 and over until 31 January 2021. The new payment means it is a great time for employers to offer new apprenticeship opportunities and take advantage of existing flexibilities to train their apprentices in a way that suits their needs.

We are in the very early stages of monitoring the take-up of the new payment to employers, and its impact on apprenticeship starts. The first payment is made 90 days from the apprentice’s start date and as such no payments have yet been made.

Answered by:
Gillian Keegan (Conservative)
15 October 2020