I would be happy for FE to be left out of the manifestos for the upcoming election.

Having spent the last few months lauding the fact that politicians have started to pay a bit more attention to the sector, this may come as a surprise. But now that all of the major parties have woken up to the importance of skills and apprenticeships, what the sector needs more than anything is some stability.

As Martin Doel points out, there’s a difference between big picture policy and the details. In the case of the former, Doel argues that there seems to be a broad consensus around the need for the UK to grow its own skilled workers. As a recent report into the future of FE shows, there are plenty of people prepared to do bold and imaginative thinking to help the sector continue to progress (bit.ly/SMFFETL).

But the devil, as ever, is in the detail. Take the example of apprenticeship funding allocations for non-levy provision. According to the AELP, its members have received allocations down by as much as 89 per cent for the rest of this calendar year following protracted delays over approving new players in the market (bit.ly/AELPwarning).

The radio silence from the DfE over this and many other issues (using the excuse of pre-election purdah) is causing even more problems on the ground.

At this point, a grand manifesto pledge is not what is needed. While the last thing FE needs is to be totally ignored, the best thing politicians could do would be to let the sector get on with making their plans a reality.

@stephenexley