Stephen Timms – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Stephen Timms on 2016-10-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to the announcement made by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport on 10 October 2016 that the Government plans to provide training in basic digital skills for adults, what funding her Department has allocated for that purpose; and if she will make a statement.

Robert Halfon

Through a new statutory duty, the Digital Economy Bill will enable the Secretary of State to ensure that, in England, an adult aged 19 or over, who is considered to lack basic digital skills and is studying for a relevant publicly funded digital skills qualification, will not be charged for that training. The costs will be met by the existing Adult Education Budget. The Adult Education Budget is £1.5 billion in 2016-17, with indicative projections remaining at this level up to 2019-20.