About one million people aged 16 to 24 are classified as NEET, reflecting a youth labour crunch. The skills minister says young people are “queuing up” for apprenticeships and employers have many choices. Application and acceptance figures show Cambridge and Oxford have low acceptance rates, but some apprenticeship schemes receive far more applications per available place, especially degree-level engineering programmes. Department for Education data reports 353,500 apprenticeship starts in England in 2024-25 and 761,500 participants overall, with higher-level apprenticeships rising by more than 15% year-on-year. The minister pledges £600 million to fund 60,000 additional apprentices to address skills gaps in construction, engineering, and digital roles.
"Baroness Smith of Malvern, the former Commons home secretary turned Strictly Come Dancing contestant who now holds the skills brief at the Department for Education, told The Sun on Sunday that young people the length of the country were "queuing up" for apprenticeships, with employers spoilt for choice. Her remarks landed as Whitehall figures laid bare a deepening youth labour crunch: roughly one million people aged between 16 and 24 are now classed as Neets - not in education, employment or training."
"The arithmetic appears, on the face of it, to back her up. Cambridge received 22,820 applications for the 2025 intake and offered 3,716 places, an acceptance rate of 16.3 per cent. Oxford was tighter still, admitting just 3,245 of 23,061 hopefuls, 14.1 per cent. By comparison, several blue-chip apprenticeship schemes, especially degree-level engineering programmes, routinely attract north of 150 applications per slot, eclipsing the odds at the dreaming spires."
"According to the latest Department for Education apprenticeship statistics, there were 353,500 apprenticeship starts in England in the 2024-25 academic year and 761,500 people participating overall, with higher-level apprenticeships up more than 15 per cent year-on-year. Business, administration and law remains the largest single subject area."
"To unblock the bottleneck, Lady Smith pledged £600 million of new funding to bankroll 60,000 additional apprentices, part of a broader push to plug skills gaps in construction, engineering and digital roles. "It can sometimes be easier getting into Oxford or Cambridge than it can be getting an apprenticeship," she said, adding: "Sometimes people say"
Read at Business Matters
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]