Progress and update on outcomes from consultation

I am conscious that I haven’t updated this blog recently.  Only excuse is that I have been a bit busy reading all the responses to the consultation document and generating the implementation plan, which we are still aiming to have completed by the end of this month.  We have published some statistical results from the consultation on our website and below is a more descriptive view of some of the main feedback we received.  A fuller report should be finished later this week and we will then publish on the web. As I said on the website, overall support was positive and constructive as well as a little cautious in some areas due to the many unknowns.  Equally, it did give us confidence that we were broadly on the right track and thus it is full steam ahead with writing the implementation plan.

One aspect that will be a bit different from the consultation plan is around the proposals for sector, including practitioner and learner, engagement.  Here there was virtually unanimous agreement that this will be an essential feature for the future, but also some questions about exactly how this should be achieved and, for example, the almost inevitable tension between being all inclusive and not being too unwieldy or over bureaucratic.  In addition, the sector engagement/consultation activities are likely to be different in the early formative stages compared to those needed when the Guild is fully up and running.  Thus in the Implementation Plan we are going to describe the types of engagement processes needed without being over prescriptive about exactly how they will be implemented. .

General feedback from consultation exercise

Overall there was good support for the general proposed aims and remit for the Guild giving confidence of strong sector support for the concept with 83% supporting the aims and 80% agreeing with the remit.  As you might expect in any debate about overall aims, there were some who suggested a wider scope, with others questioning some elements, e.g. the ability of the Guild to really impact of sector reputation.  A number of replies emphasised the need to be more specific about the Guild’s potential role in recognising and promoting equality and diversity issues, including support for people working with learners with disabilities or learning difficulties. There were many interesting comments made about the appropriate definition or definitions of professionalism across this very diverse sector. Thus reaching a common understanding with the sector on what professionalism means for different roles will be an important task for the Guild when formed.

During the consultation events some attendees still had questions about the potential value of the Guild, although this was partly due to a lack of understanding as many groups were more enthusiastic at the end on the session compared to the beginning. 

The scope of the Guild in terms of which parts of the workforce should be included generated quite a lot of debate, between the Guild covering all staff and those preferring it to focus on just staff involved in teaching, learning and assessment and those directly involved in support to learners.  Based on discussions at the consultation events, this is not so much an ideological difference, but concern that if given a very wide remit the Guild could end up trying to do too much and not doing anything well.  Although some suggested the Guild should be a professional individual membership body, the majority supported the proposal that it should be based on the proposed organisational subscriber model.

The Governance structure.  Overall there was good support for the proposed formal with two key themes emerging: 

·         The need to ensure the company members covered the whole sector and not focussed entirely on colleges and private providers.
·         Secondly, whilst virtually everyone agreed that some form of sector engagement was essential, there were some points made about:
·         The need to have clarity of any relationships between any consultative group/s and the main board.
·         The risk of an over bureaucratic sector engagement process and the ability to reach a consensus with such a diverse sector.
·         The processes for engaging other sector general and membership bodies and organisations, as well as Unions.
·         The importance of trying to void duplication with existing sector networks and groups.

Not unexpectedly funding was a much debated topic throughout the process, with three underlying themes:
·         A concern that if the Guild is centrally funded then the real power of the sector employers to decide on the way forward will always be somewhat limited.
·         Affordability issues with decreasing budgets if individual providers are expected to pay a subscription in future years.  Although there was some lack of understanding about the proposed levy approach, there was also concern that in future years this might still result in a reduction of funding for providers if the current ‘top slice’ from the skills budget to fund organisations such as LSIS disappears.
·         Equally whilst not unanimous the majority of respondents believe that without some form of ongoing central funding support the Guild would probably not survive.

There were clearly many other very valuable comments and suggestions, which will form an invaluable source of initial information for the Guild during the formative stages.  A few key points which need to be considered in formulating this plan include:
·         Concerns about the potential loss of some the services currently offered by LSIS, which may not be part of the Guild’s remit – e.g. intervention service.
·         The vital importance of not losing the rich legacy information and expertise in the sector, and specifically the need to somehow retain the excellence gateway whilst also improving access and relevance.
·         Relationship and need to avoid duplication or confused areas of responsibility with other bodies, especially the large provider membership bodies (AoC, AELP etc), the Unions, awarding bodies, Ofsted etc.

Ah well that's an overview.....now back to drafting the Implementation Plan!
Peter