§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on the decision to impose a maximum contribution of £200 in individual learning accounts to students taking a private sector course to obtain(a) CLAIT or (b) ECDL. [138344]
§ Mr. Wicks[holding answer 15 November 2000]: The main purpose of the 80 per cent. discount is to encourage people who would otherwise be unlikely to do so to take steps towards improving their computer literacy skills. The discount is available for a targeted range of provision, much of which is of short duration and therefore not expensive, but includes CLAIT and ECDL. We have introduced a maximum contribution of £200 for each person to ensure that as many people as possible benefit from this discount. The maximum contribution is available to people who want to undertake learning in both the public and private sectors.
§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what steps he is taking to ensure(a) value for money and (b) quality control in the issuing of individual learning accounts to private training providers in connection with the enhanced 80 per cent. fees contribution for CLAIT, ECDL and qualifying mathematics courses. [138345]
§ Mr. Wicks[holding answer 15 November 2000]: We have placed a cap of £200 on the 80 per cent. discount on learning, available to holders of Individual Learning Accounts, to contain overall costs to the public purse and encourage value for money. This will ensure that as many people as possible will be able to access learning at lower costs from learning providers in both the public and private sectors.
We have restricted additional public support through the 80 per cent. discount to a range of courses leading to a recognised qualification. These courses include CLAIT, the European Computer Driving Licence, GCSE Maths and Key Skills 2 Maths. We will also conduct customer satisfaction surveys on a regular basis to see whether learners are satisfied with the quality of the learning they have undertaken. Wider issues of added value will be covered by a comprehensive evaluation of Individual Learning Accounts.
§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many individual learning account credits have been issued to(a) further education colleges and (b) private training providers since the scheme went national. [138346]
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§ Mr. Wicks[holding answer 15 November 2000]: Since Individual Learning Accounts (ILAs) became available through the national framework, a total of 3,327 training providers have registered with the service provider, Capita. Of these 263 are FE colleges, 862 are other public training providers (such as Higher Education institutions with continuing education departments, local education authorities and voluntary sector providers), and 2,202 are private training providers. About 437,000 people have opened ILAs to date (237,000 since the introduction of the national framework, adding to the 200,000 accounts opened locally through Training and Enterprise Councils). It is for the individual to decide with whom they register for learning.
§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment what consultations he has had with(a) further education colleges and (b) private training providers in connection with the capping of maximum individual learning account entitlements for IT training. [138347]
§ Mr. Wicks[holding answer 15 November 2000]: Althougth the introduction of capping the Individual Learning Account 80 per cent. discount on the cost of IT courses was discussed with a number of private and public learning providers, no formal process of consultation took place. When the 80 per cent. discount was introduced a small number of learning providers used the lack of a cap on the amount of public subsidy available for this discount to their advantage, finding ways to divert the moneys available into paying for very expensive courses. Had this been allowed to continue, the Department would have been able to help far fewer people than intended through this incentive. We intend to review the way the new arrangements are working early in the new year, at which point we will consult with both colleges and private learning providers.
§ Mr. BoswellTo ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment if he will make a statement on public resources available for IT training in the private sector for the individual student through(a) ILAs and (b) the previous tax allowance against vocational training. [138348]
§ Mr. Wicks[holding answer 15 November 2000]: The total amount of money available to holders of Individual Learning Accounts is approximately £80 million. We expect the total to be made available to learners through the 80 per cent. discount for IT training introduced in September to be around £20 million. £60 million is being made available to 400,000 account holders through the £150 incentive available to the first million people who enrol for learning, including IT training. Because many of these accounts were opened locally by Training and Enterprise Councils, we do not have national data on the amount of money spent through these accounts on IT training.
In the last full year of Vocational Training Tax Relief (1999–2000) Exchequer costs across the UK were estimated to be £55 million; the estimated cost of the final period (April 2000—August 2000) was £30 million. As information about personal taxation is confidential, these figures cannot be disaggregated to give information about IT training.