The report states;
Some colleges who sub-contract… to GTAs are … keeping back between 15 and 40% of the funding they receive from the SFA as a ‘management fee’.
It is the Commission’s view, however, that as sub-contracting dilutes the amount of funding to be spent on actual training, it should be discouraged.
GTAs should be able to draw down 100% of the funding available from the SFA and HEFCE (in the case of qualifications at Level 4 and above) to deliver qualifications in the same way as FE colleges.
Notes;
The Commission was established by GTA England with the support of the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS) and conducted its independent inquiry between January and April 2012. The Inquiry was hosted by the ESRC-funded Centre for Learning and Life Chances in Knowledge Economies and Societies (LLAKES) at the Institute of Education, University of London.
The Inquiry was guided by the following questions:
- What are the characteristics that provide GTAs with a distinctive identity? (e.g. is employer membership an essential characteristic? Can/should the brand of GTA be applied to any type of organisation involved in the delivery of employer-led training?)
- To what extent should GTAs represent specific sectors of the economy, namely those that have a substantial ‘technical’ dimension to their work?
- Should GTAs follow a specified code of ethical behaviour, and what might be included in such a code?
- How should GTAs be governed? (e.g. do GTAs have to be registered charities?)
- How should GTAs be financed? (e.g. can GTAs operate under one contract in relation to government-funded training programmes such as Apprenticeships? Should they be part-funded by the State?)
- In what ways should GTAs relate to other organisations that are central to the architecture of the UK’s VET system? (e.g. How do GTAs currently work with higher education institutions as well as with further education colleges and other types of training provider?)
- Is the role of GTA England to represent an optimum number of GTAs, or can there be an unspecified number in the membership?
- Could GTA England membership be segmented to reflect different levels of commitment to the GTA model?
