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UK plans 3 billion pounds of new education funding in budget

Sat, 23rd Oct 2021 22:30

By David Milliken

LONDON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - British finance minister Rishi
Sunak plans to announce an extra 3 billion pounds ($4.1 billion)
of new funding for further education in next week's budget as
part of the government's push to boost vocational training,
officials said on Saturday.

Their remarks follow 6.9 billion pounds of funding for
regional transport investment, 1.5 billion pounds more than
previously planned, as the government seeks to boost living
standards outside London through its 'levelling-up' agenda.

Sunak is expected to set fairly tight limits for most areas
of day-to-day public spending in his budget on Wednesday, which
will seek to lower public debt after a record surge in borrowing
during the COVID-19 pandemic.

But unlike his Conservative predecessors' policy after the
2008-09 financial crisis, he will allow more leeway for
long-term public investment designed to reward voters who backed
Prime Minister Boris Johnson in December 2019's election.

Most of the education money will support 16- to 19-year-old
students in England who are studying a new alternative
qualification to the traditional school-leaving exams which are
the normal pathway to university, the finance ministry said.

Some 550 million pounds will fund education and training for
older adults, including numeracy skills and three- to four-month
courses in areas such as digital skills, construction and roles
in the rail and nuclear industries.

Johnson's government wants to promote apprenticeships and
other alternatives to standard university degrees, which it
believes offer poor job prospects for many students and do too
little to tackle skills shortages in industry.

Just over half of English school-leavers went to university
in the 2018/19 academic year, up from 42% in 2006/07.

"Our skills reforms and this additional investment will
support more people to continue to upskill and retrain
throughout their lives and open the door to careers in
high-skilled industries," education minister Nadhim Zahawi said.

Separately, business organisations gave a cautious welcome
to announcements they expect from Sunak which will promote
inward investment to Britain, and extend a lending programme for
companies struggling to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.

So far, the government has published no data on how much has
been lent under the Recovery Loan Scheme, which launched in
March and was originally due to end in December.

"The acid test for the scheme will be whether it is able to
support the recovery by getting credit flowing to the firms who
need it most," said Suren Thiru, head of economics at the
British Chambers of Commerce.
($1 = 0.7272 pounds)

(Reporting by David Milliken, Editing by Timothy Heritage)

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