This briefing paper summarises the background to and operation of the fees system, provides a statistical analysis of its impact and discusses the legal challenges to the Fees Order.
New Enterprise Bill published 22 September 2015
The Government has published the Enterprise Bill which includes protecting the term apprentice in law and capping public sector exit payments at £95,000.
The Enterprise Bill includes:
Preventing misuse of the ‘Apprenticeship’ term
create an offence for a person, in the course of business, to provide or offer a course or training as an apprenticeship if it is not a statutory apprenticeship; strengthen and protect the reputation of the apprenticeship brand for training providers, employers and apprentices; protect the reputation of training providers, employers who offer statutory apprenticeships and apprentices who join those apprenticeships, by maintaining their standards and ensuring that statutory apprenticeships are not confused with lower quality training; ensure a “level playing field” and fairness in the market to the benefit of training providers, employers and individuals; and give employers more confidence that they are investing in high quality apprenticeships. stop six-figure pay outs to the best paid public sector workers by placing a limit on the value of exit payments individuals can receive (for example a cash lump sum or employer-funded contribution to early access to pension); cap all types of payments related to exits, including voluntary and compulsory redundancy and severance payments. This will apply broadly across the public sector as defined by the list of public sector bodies set down by the Office of National Statistics (although some bodies may be exempted); and enable a waiver to be made in exceptional circumstances subject to approval by the relevant Minister. establish a statutory Small Business Commissioner to empower small businesses to resolve disputes and avoid future issues through general advice and information; enable the Small Business Commissioner to handle complaints by small business suppliers about payment matters arising with larger businesses which they supply; support the Government’s ambition to make the UK the best place to grow a business; contribute to ensuring the business environment in the UK helps small businesses to thrive and grow, to help support the UK economy; facilitate better understanding among small businesses of where to seek support when they have issues or disputes with other businesses; help small businesses to take action to deal with disputes more quickly and cheaply than going to court; and promote culture change on late payments. increase the number of apprenticeships in the public sector; provide a power for the Secretary of State to set targets for public sector bodies in relation to the number of apprentices they employ in England; require the public bodies to have due regard to any targets set on them and to report annually on progress against meeting those targets; increase the number of apprenticeships in the public sector; and help meet the Government’s commitment to deliver 3 million apprenticeships within this Parliament.
Public Sector Employment: Restrictions on Exit Payments
Small Business Commissioner
A target for the number of apprentices in public sector bodies
The Enterprise Bill also contains measures to:
CIPP Policy News Journal
25/04/2016, Page 57 of 453
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