When the Learning and Skills Council launched on 1 April, it was given an annual budget of around £6 billion and responsibility for funding around five million learners each year in England. This watch page charts the development of the new Council since it was announced in a White Paper at the end of 1999.
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25 May 2001: The Learning and Skills Council's first corporate plan, launched at the beginning of March, has been put out for public consultation.
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31 May 2001: The Learning and Skills Council is to launch a nationwide programme of 'bite-size' training courses on Monday 4 June. The new courses, which will last between one and three hours, plan to attract 50,000 adults into learning around the country in a range of venues.
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8 May 2001: The outgoing Training and Enterprise Councils left a surplus of over £40 million for the incoming Learning and Skills Council, Baroness Blackstone announced today. The money, which is termed 'legacy funding', is being paid back from liquid assets retained by the TECs over the next year, and will go to fund the LSC's 'Local Initiative Fund' aimed at supporting education-business links and improving general provision for community education.
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5 April 2001: A statement detailing the initial functions of the local arms of the Learning and Skills Council has been agreed. They'll be expected to prepare a local learning plan, review the quality of providers and to approve an equal opportunities strategy, in addition to having statutory responsibilities for creating or abolishing FE colleges.
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2 April 2001: The Learning and Skills Council officially becomes reality, along with its Welsh equivalent, Education and Learning Wales.
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28 March 2001: With just 6 days to go until its launch, the Learning and Skills Council is to benefit from yet another funding handout. The Council will get an additional £6.4bn of funding in two years time, to be used to support further increases in participation by young people and adults in Further Education and spending on building improvements, including increasing disabled access.
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24 January 2001:Secretary of State for Education and Employment David Blunkett announced that he intends to stop contracting for NVQ training from September 2002, when the first LSC-funded contracts with providers expire.
In January:
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19 December 2000:Publication of the Learning and Skills Council Operations Guide, giving guidance on funding issues, programmes which will come under the responsibility of the LSC and information for providers.
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18 December 2000:The Learning and Skills Council website went live today. It can be found at www.lsc.gov.uk
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4 December 2000:Board members of all 47 local LSCs in England have now been appointed. Each local board has about a dozen members of which at least 4 are private sector employers. Every board has a trade union member, a Regional Development Agency representative and members drawn from colleges, higher education, work-based providers, local authorities and from voluntary sector organisations.
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9 November 2000:The Financial Times reports that Education and Employment Secretary David Blunkett is to announce extra funding of £600 million to support the development of the incoming Learning and Skills Council.
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9 October 2000:Details of the new staffing arrangements for the UfI are made available to staff who are affected by the creation of the new organisation.
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26 September 2000: The Guardian questions whether the LSC will simply be another re-birth of what it calls the 'officially discredited' and 'past their sell-by date' TECs. The question arises because it appears that many of the 'top jobs' within the LSC have gone to TEC staff.
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28 July 2000: The Learning and Skills Bill is passed through parliament, receives Royal Assent and is now an Act.
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18 July 2000:John Harwood is appointed as the new Chief Executive of the LSC. He will take up his four-year contract in the Autumn.
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23 June 2000: Education and Employment Minister Malcolm Wicks tables some last-minute amendments to the Learning and Skills Bill, which is due for discussion on 27 June. Amendments relate to the use of assets currently owned by TECs, and to give the LSC responsibility for developing workplace skills locally and nationally.
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7 June 2000: Bryan Sanderson is appointed as Chair Designate of the LSC.
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2 March 2000: The location of the 47 regional Learning and Skills Council offices is announced. Minister Baroness Blackstone says that the new regional arms will have more discretion over budgets than TECs currently do.
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14 December 1999: David Blunkett launches the Learning and Skills Council prospectus.
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19 November 1999:Formal legislation is announced in the Queen's speech to provide the mechanisms for the LSC to come into being. The Learning and Skills Bill is due to be passed the following Autumn.
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3 November 1999:The DfEE publishes details of the regional borders for each of the local arms of the LSC.
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28 October 1999:The DfEE announce that business leaders will make up the largest single group in the Learning and skills Council network. Forty per cent of members of the council and its local arm, together with the national chair and a majority of local chairs will be people with substantial recent business or commercial experience.
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11 October 1999: The second update of the proposals is published. It includes information about progress towards establishing the head office for the LSC and the local arms of the council.
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11 October 1999:TEC performance indicators are published.
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5 October 1999:The first update of the proposals is published, which includes descriptions of how consultation will take place to take forward the plans set out in the White Paper and plans for the location of the LSC.
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30 September 1999:Chris Hughes, chief executive of the Further Education Development Agency (Feda) underlines a growing role for FE colleges in vocational training as a result of the new council.
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1 July 1999: Education and Employment Secretary David Blunkett addresses the TECs on the subject at their national conference.
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30 May 1999: The publication of 'Learning to Succeed', a white paper from the government setting out proposals for a national Learning and Skills Council to provide coherence and reduce bureaucracy, with 40-50 local Learning and Skills Councils to develop local plans.
The Training & Employment Network (TEN) and the National Training Federation (NTF) are producing a weekly briefing on activities in the run up to the launch of the new Learning and Skills Council. They've also published an agenda for the progress of the new council which can be found on the TEN/NTF website.
A more general 'government watch' covering the DfEE can be found here.
