Thank you for your letter of 11 October, regarding Functional Skills in Apprenticeships.

As I advised in my letter to you on 7 May 2011, we extended the option of Key Skills within Apprenticeships for a temporary period only. In addition, on 14 July, following consultation with key partners and the identification of a need for additional development time, I agreed an extended, temporary transitional arrangement involving parallel running between Key Skills, Functional Skills and the new GCSEs (with increased functional content), from April 2011 until the end of September 2012. I want to re-assure you that I am committed to replacing Key Skills with Functional Skills in English and Maths (and ICT if required by the framework), as a mandatory component of all Apprenticeship frameworks, from the end of September 2012.

I was interested to read the finding from your own survey, particularly that there is a high level of confidence with Functional Skills across providers, colleges and schools. We know that Functional Skills involve high quality teaching away from the job and this is important to provide apprentices with an essential base of high quality transferable skills to support their career progression.

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Thank you for your continued support and commitment to Functional Skills qualifications.

Yours sincerely,