Launch of catering T-level delayed 'beyond 2024'

The launch of a T-level qualification in catering, which was supposed to welcome its first students in September, has been delayed ‘beyond 2024'.

The announcement that four of the government's new technical qualifications (catering, hairdressing, barbering and beauty therapy, craft and design and media, broadcast and production) will be delayed comes just six months before their slated launch dates.

Explaining the reason for the delay Minister for Skills, Apprenticeships and Higher Education Robert Halfon said: "T-levels are part of our long-term reforms and while I want to see them rolled out as quickly as possible, the most important thing is to ensure that every student that takes a T-level knows they are taking a great course that will set them up well for the future.

"For these T-levels we will therefore take a little more time to ensure that they are right when they are introduced – that is the right thing to do to ensure that T-levels are rolled out successfully, but it is also the right thing to do for T-level students."

David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said: "The Department for Education is right to ensure only T-levels of high enough quality enter the market. Sadly, though, colleges will be massively disrupted by this announcement happening so late in the year.

"Colleges already had plans in place for how to deliver these now delayed T-levels and have been marketing them to potential learners. Alternative arrangements will now need to be made urgently. Department for Education must guarantee any providers which are affected have the support they need to ensure no student misses out on learning because of these delays.

"This delay highlights the risks involved in implementing new qualifications and shows why T-levels need to be tested fully before other qualifications are defunded. That requires at least two full cohorts of students to complete each T-level before we can be sure that it is secure and working well."

The first delay of what had originally been expected to be a catering and hospitality T-level was announced in 2018. In the intervening years the two-year course has dropped ‘hospitality' from its name. The government's website states that during the course "students will learn the core knowledge and skills that are needed for entry to a range of catering occupations".

T-levels have been developed to provide 16-year-olds with another educational avenue outside of A-levels or apprenticeships.