It feels almost unbelievable but it was only four months ago that Theresa May launched the independent panel report - known as the Augar review - on post-18 education and funding. There are many vice-chancellors who hoped that the new prime minister Boris Johnson would place the report on a very high shelf to gather dust.

College leaders, on the other hand, are still hoping for many of the recommendations to be  implemented by the new incumbent in Number 10. The contrast between the two viewpoints is easily explainable. It is, of course, all to do with money -  the report recommends a boost to college investment and a reduction in higher education student fees.

Background: Give colleges £1bn and freeze HE funding

News: Williamson vows to ‘super-charge further education’

Opinion:  Why adult education is central to the Augar review

To be fair - and it is important to recognise this - the panel led by Philip Augar had the unenviable task of staying fiscally neutral (aka not spending any more money). Any recommendation to put right the 10 years of neglect that college funding has suffered would need to come from balancing reduction somewhere else. Practically, it could only be from higher education funding.

It’s pretty clear that the evidence and analysis the panel looked at was so compelling that it recommended just that: an HE fee-cap reduction to £7,500 and a significant boost to college funding. 

It’s not difficult to appreciate why college and university leaders responded differently. However, to reduce the report to being simply about money is unfair. It did far more than move the figures in an attempt to design a post-18 system that was more coherent, joined-up and collaborative, and that offered everyone over the age of 18 opportunities throughout their lives. The final report provided good analysis and evidence of the need, challenges and policy options.

FE cap recommendations

In recent weeks, probably inspired by a politician called Johnson (Jo, not Boris), news has emerged that the £7,500 fee cap recommendation has been abandoned. This has been quickly followed, erroneously in my view, with the expectation that the whole report can now be ignored. It’s true that treasury was never overly keen on the Augar recommendations and that new prime ministers often want to distance themselves from the work of their predecessors.

Regardless of the political announcements and shift in leadership, the issues behind the need for such a report and the challenges facing post-18 education have not gone away and must be addressed. My expectation is that policymakers from all parties will have been browsing their copies of the report along with the wider analysis, as they prepare the ground for their general election manifestos. I’m sure that it will inform policy direction, even if it does not completely define it.

There are two fundamental issues Augar recognised that I will unpick. 

1. Opportunity at level 2

The first is that the post-18 education offer is heavily skewed towards one route and barely meets the needs of half the adult population. The result is that for those achieving a level 3 qualification by age 19, the state offers an investment of over £50,000, which most will spend on studying for a bachelor’s degree while living away from home. 

For those who have not achieved a level 3, the offer is paltry and gets no better throughout life, making it very difficult to progress in learning. That’s not right for a rapidly changing, tech-heavy economy, nor is it fair to people who deserve better.

2. Employer engagement 

The second issue is that employers are increasingly struggling to fill their vacancies, at all levels, from semi-skilled to skilled to professional. In part, this reflects the smaller number of young people entering the labour market because of a demographic dip, but it also reflects the reduced numbers of people from the EU wanting to live and work here. Things are likely to get worse, with employers increasingly unable to rely on the labour market to supply them with fully skilled people for every job. Instead, employers will need to engage with education, attract people from different backgrounds and spend more money on developing their existing people for future jobs.

Serious insight 

If those two fundamental drivers are correct, then the Augar report can help. It certainly doesn’t have all the answers, but it is well worth bringing down from the shelf. It was the first full review of the whole post-18 education offering and provides serious insight into the challenges and many of the options.

On top of all of that, college funding has moved seriously up the agenda in recent months. The chancellor earlier this month called colleges “one of the people’s priorities” on the day he injected £400 million funding for next year. 

Today, the secretary of state for education has announced even more investment and said that he wants to “super-charge further education”. The Labour Party, meanwhile, has made clear that colleges will be a vital part of their proposed National Education Service, and the Lib Dems also announced new policies this month that would boost college funding. 

A new and meaningful college consensus after 10 years of neglect. Those of us in the sector may well be thanking Theresa May and Philip Augar in years to come for helping to achieve that.

David Hughes is chief executive of the Association of Colleges. He tweets @AoCDavidH