The Department for Education is eyeing an earlier release of next year’s apprenticeship funding rules as part of efforts to help providers and employers meet their obligations.
The DfE’s head of apprenticeship funding policy, John Myers (far left seated in main image), told Thursday’s Streamlining the System conference in Birmingham that the department would release the rules before May.
While not wishing to put a firm date on that, Myers said the department is currently working on a schedule roughly four weeks earlier than this year’s.
Conference delegates said that July – when the rules have been released in some previous years – was too late to implement all of the requirements needed.
Funding rules go live on August 1 each year.
Myers said: “We want to be ahead of the game this year, we want to publish rules earlier. We started earlier.”
He added: “We need to pitch it where it is just right where we get the rules out more quickly, but we allow the policies to settle. It will be out before May this year, but I don’t want to put a date on it just yet until we know clearly the policy changes we want to make.”
