A NEW version of individual learning accounts has been launched in Derbyshire while the rest of the country waits for ministers to decide on a replacement scheme.
ILAs, which provided up to pound;200 worth of government-subsidised training, were scrapped in November amid allegations of fraud, and concerns about quality and mis-selling. The promised replacement scheme is still to appear, so Derbyshire Learning and Skills Council is funding a targeted and quality-controlled alternative , which it calls the Learning Reward.
Unlike the scheme it replaces, the Derbyshire version is targeted at those with limited previous education and is designed to ensure the quality of training is maintained.
Checks are in place to make sure training is happening before the cash changes hands - with funds passing from the LSC to the provider without the need for individual account details to be held. The scheme is also designed to incur minimal admin costs.
David Hughes, executive director of Derbyshire LSC, said: “It has been in place since April 1. There is pound;300 per person and it is for people who have not got to Level 2. Obviously, we don’t want to have the problem they have had with ILAs, so we are only using approved providers. The money goes to them when they can show the training has been delivered.”
The scheme is backed by pound;100,000 from Derbyshire LSC, which the 47 branches are allowed to use flexibly to respond to local demand.
The fund has proved an effective weapon in dealing with local emergencies, whether caused by the fluctuations of the economy or the effects of government policy.
In Merseyside, the fund was used to continue the training of modern apprentices after shipbuilder Cammell Laird went into receivership.
The scheme is being “looked at with interest” according to a spokesman from the Department for Education and Skills, which is yet to replace ILAs nationally.
Paul Holmes, MP for Chesterfield and a member of the Commons education select committee, says the Government should learn from Derbyshire LSC’s scheme.
“I think we need to be able to allow new providers into the system, which as I understand, is not happening under the Derbyshire scheme, but that’s something which could be looked at,” he said. “Otherwise, it is a good, simple solution. David Hughes is pretty sharp. You do wonder, if they can do this, why can’t other people?”
The ILA scheme was due to be withdrawn on December 7 but the plug was abruptly pulled two weeks early, leaving a two-week period in which funding was removed for training which had been booked up at the last minute.
Derbyshire LSC also enabled some learners to continue on some previously ILA-funded training which would otherwise have been cancelled.
Local training organisations were given one-off subsidies, so the courses which were already booked for the two-weeks could continue to be public-funded.
Nationally, there is no equivalent emergency fund and providers have been told they will not be compensated. Colleges, which provided much of ILA-funded training, have had to dig into their own resources to keep students on board. According to the Association of Colleges, the sector lost at least pound;1.4 million as a result of the ILA fiasco.
