The exclusion of colleges from the government's "catch-up" plan shows FE is seen as an "afterthought", Labour's shadow apprenticeship minister has said.

The Department for Education today confirmed a £1 billion Covid-19 catch-up plan to tackle the impact of lost teaching time – however, the funding is for primary and secondary institutions only. 

Toby Perkins, shadow apprenticeships and lifelong learning minister, said excluding FE was "a disgrace".

"If what they’ve done is that they will sort FE out once they’ve done 'the important stuff' from their perspective, then that’s still revealing what I feel and what many people feel is their attitude towards the FE sector," he said.

“While to an extent it may be about the reality of the funding, it’s still very much reflective of what we see from the DfE that’s not competently handling the crisis and sees FE as an afterthought.”

Further education leaders have also voiced their disappointment over the exclusion of funding support for 16 to 19-year-olds in this morning’s billion-pound announcement.

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David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said that he expected “rapid” clarification on funding and support for college students.

"There are a million 16- to 18-year-olds in England, and almost 700,000 of them study in colleges," he said. "They deserve as much support to overcome the challenges thrown up by Covid-19 as every other age group, including their peers in schools. That’s why we have been working with officials to help design a funding boost for colleges to support their students.

Coronavirus catch-up funding: What about 16 to 19 students?

“The government is right to take action to help school pupils catch up for lost time and to focus on those who are already disadvantaged, but it is indefensible to overlook the needs of the 700,000 in colleges. I expect their exclusion from this announcement to be followed rapidly by clarification on the funding and support for college students. We are in contact with the Department for Education and hope to have this rectified as soon as possible.”

Bill Watkin, chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association, said that it would be entirely unjustifiable to exclude sixth-form students from the package of support announced today.

“Our understanding was that 16 to 19 providers would be able to access at least some of the proposed Covid catch-up support," he said. 

“However, the announcement specifically excludes 16 to 19 providers so we await further clarification on what elements of the package and related funding our members will be able to access.

"Young people of all ages have shown great resilience in response to the Covid crisis; it would be entirely unjustifiable to exclude sixth-form students from the package announced today”.