Sections 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5: the LSC.Restructuring the LSC
26.The LSC was established by the Learning and Skills Act 2000 (“the 2000 Act”) as a body corporate. The 2000 Act placed the LSC under a duty to establish a committee of the LSC (to be called a local learning and skills council) for each area of England specified by the Secretary of State. The Act contained provisions about the members and staff of local councils, delegation of local council functions and the preparation of local council plans. The Secretary of State specified 47 such areas of England in relation to which the LSC established 47 local councils.
27.The 2000 Act also placed the LSC under a duty to establish a young people’s learning committee and an adult learning committee.
28.The commitment to restructure the LSC was set out in the March 2006 White Paper ‘Further Education: Raising Skills, Improving Life Chances’.
29.Section 1 reduces the minimum size of the LSC National Council from twelve to ten.
30.Section 2 places the LSC under a duty to establish a committee, to be called a regional learning and skills council, for each area of England specified by the Secretary of State. The section requires a regional council to perform in relation to its area such of the LSC’s duties as the LSC specifies as well as allowing a regional council to exercise in relation to its area such of the LSC’s powers as the LSC specifies. The section also provides for the LSC to be able to specify functions that regional councils must, or may, exercise outside their area.
31.The section gives the Secretary of State the power to make provision about regional councils in regulations. Regulations may make provision about matters including the membership of regional councils, the appointment of the members, chairman and staff of a regional council, the delegation of functions by a regional council, the payment of salaries and allowances of members and chairmen and the regulation by a regional council of its own procedure.
32.Paragraph 15 of Schedule 1 to the Act provides that the first set of regulations made under section 18A(2) of the 2000 Act (inserted by section 2), is subject to the affirmative resolution procedure.
33.Under section 18C of the 2000 Act, inserted by section 2 of the Act, the LSC is required to prepare guidance in relation to each financial year for each regional council, including the objectives which a regional council should achieve in seeking to carry out its functions, and the budget for the regional council in that financial year. The first set of guidance must be prepared as soon as reasonably practicable after section 2 comes into force.
34.Section 3 abolishes the local learning and skill councils and, as a consequence, current statutory provision in relation to them.
Strategy-making bodies
35.Section 24A of the 2000 Act, as inserted by section 4, allows the Secretary of State by order to specify a body to formulate a strategy in relation to specified functions of the LSC for either the whole of England or a part of it, but not exclusively either Greater London or a part of Greater London, and to keep the strategy under review. This will enable strategies to be set either for a specified area in England in relation to specified functions of the LSC or in relation to a particular education and training theme for the whole of England, where a theme relates to a function of the LSC. The LSC will be under a statutory duty to carry out any function or functions to which a strategy relates in accordance with that strategy (see inserted section 24C of the 2000 Act).
36.Section 24B of the 2000 Act, as inserted by section 4, requires the Secretary of State to provide, by regulations, for the establishment of a body to formulate a strategy setting out how the functions of the LSC as specified by order are to be carried out in Greater London. The regulations must provide for the body to consist of the Mayor of London and other members appointed by the Mayor in accordance with the regulations. They must also provide for the Mayor of London to be chairman of the body.
37.The section also makes provision (in inserted sections 24A and 24B) for the Secretary of State to give directions and guidance in relation to the formulation and review of strategies, including such matters as: the form and content of the strategy; the updating of the strategy; the steps to be taken by a strategy-making body, and matters to which the body is to have regard, when formulating or reviewing its strategy; and the consultation to be carried out when the body formulates or reviews its strategy.
38.In formulating and reviewing its strategy, a specified body, or the body chaired by the Mayor of London, must have regard to any guidance, and act in accordance with any directions, given by the Secretary of State. The LSC can disregard the strategy of a specified body, or that of the body chaired by the Mayor, if that strategy has not been prepared in accordance with the requirements set out in the guidance and directions concerning formulation or review. If provision in a strategy of a specified body or the body chaired by the Mayor conflicts with the LSC’s strategy made in accordance with section 16 of the 2000 Act, the Council may disregard that provision in the body’s strategy. Where there is a conflict between provisions in the strategies of different specified bodies, including the body chaired by the Mayor of London, the LSC may disregard relevant provision in one or both of the strategies. The LSC is not required to carry out its functions in accordance with a strategy in a manner that it is satisfied might involve disproportionate expenditure or in a manner that is considered by the LSC to be unreasonable.
39.The LSC may not carry out a function in accordance with a strategy if in doing so it would fail to comply with a duty imposed on it by or under any enactment. Examples of such statutory duties include: the duty of the LSC in section 16(2) of the 2000 Act to have regard to its own strategy in exercising its functions; the LSC’s duty in section 25(8) of the 2000 Act to comply with any directions given to it by the Secretary of State; and the duty of the LSC to comply with a condition of grant made under section 27(1) of the 2000 Act.
40.Where the LSC proposes not to, or does not, carry out a function to which a strategy relates, the LSC must refer the matter to the Secretary of State and the body whose strategy it is may do so. Upon such a reference the Secretary of State may give such direction to the LSC as he thinks fit, including a direction that a strategy be complied with to the extent specified in the direction.
Young people’s learning committee and adult learning committee
41.Section 5 removes the duty on the LSC to establish a young people’s learning committee and an adult learning committee, but the LSC retains its general power under paragraph 1(1)(b) of Schedule 3 to the 2000 Act to establish such committees as it thinks fit. This will give the LSC flexibility to establish committees to consider different issues as and when needed. For example, the LSC may establish a single group advising it on the needs of young learners, adults and the workforce as a whole.
