MPs demand: Cut funding of apprenticeships for City high-flyers

Call comes after The Independent revealed abuse of scheme meant to help young workers at the start of their careers

Experts say prospects for young people will ‘continue to look unnecessarily bleak’ unless imbalance is addressed (Getty/The Independent)

The taxpayer-funded apprenticeships scheme should be overhauled to focus on young people at the start of their careers, instead of millions being spent on courses for senior executives, MPs will warn in the wake of an investigation by The Independent.

We revealed last month that the current system is being “gamed” to help pay for masters courses, with more than £1bn spent to subsidise these studies since 2017, including £100m used to part-fund MBAs for high-flyers.

Official figures show that in 2021-22, almost half (47 per cent) of apprenticeships were begun by people aged 25 and over. And the number of under-25s starting an apprenticeship has plummeted by more than 100,000 since 2016.