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Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill

I shall speak to Amendment 274, which is grouped with this amendment. We take the opposite view. In the Bill, we are setting up a system whereby the Government will decide their educational objectives; the QCDA will research and develop the curriculum; Ofqual will recognise the awarding bodies and their qualifications; and the schools will be all set to teach them. The children will then sit the exam and the awarding bodies will mark and grade them. However, what happens if the Government decide not to fund some of the qualifications that have gone through that fairly rigorous process? It seems to us only right that when a qualification has jumped through all the hoops laid out for it and a young person wants to take that qualification, it should be funded by the department, particularly in the light of the involvement in the system of the QCDA. That is what our amendment seeks to ensure.