Adult education budget to be devolved to London

The Chancellor confirmed in the Autumn Statement today that the Government will devolve the adult education budget to London from 2019-20. In response, David Hughes, Chief Executive of the Association of Colleges, said: “The Chancellor today confirmed that the adult education budget will be devolved to Greater London in 2019-20. There are clear potential benefits if this leads to greater flexibility for colleges to meet local employer, community and student needs, but there is a lack of detail currently about how it will work in practice. “We will continue to recommend that the Department for Education and the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) publish a Skills Devolution Green Paper to help clarify responsibilities and priorities and encourage debate about the potential benefits and risks. It is important for colleges to be given the flexibilities to deliver the learning that London and Londoners want and need but there are too many unknowns about how this will work for us to be confident of that outcome. ”