The sector was rocked on Tuesday by the sudden resignation of skills, apprenticeships, and higher education minister Robert Halfon.
The lifelong Tolkien fan signed off on fourteen years championing further education, particularly apprenticeships, in parliament invoking the wizard Gandalf: “My time is over: it is no longer my task to set things to rights, nor to help folk to do so. And as for you, my dear friends, you will need no help … among the great you are, and I have no longer any fear at all for any of you.”
Unlike Gandalf though, Halfon has no intention of disappearing across the sea, never to be seen again.
“My first political speech in 2010 was about apprenticeships, and my last political speech – whatever day that may be – will be on apprenticeships and skills. I’m actually determined that’s the case,” Halfon told FE Week the day after resigning.
