historically placed a very low value on vocational education and training (VET) and as such
had little interest in reviving apprenticeship. This position was a manifestation of their firm
belief that the State should not interfere with firm’s education and training practices (Lawson
cited in Hutton, 1995, p. 187). This active disinterest in VET was compounded by the
prevailing criticisms against the I-R model voiced by amongst others the Manpower Services
Commission (MSC). The MSC condemned apprenticeship’s ‘time-serving rituals’,
proclaimed that it needed to be replaced by a focus on measurable outcomes (Hodkinson and
Bloomer, 2002) and argued that the knowledge-based approach to the vocational curriculum
enshrined in FE Colleges had lost contact with the main purpose of vocational education - the
development of workplace competence (Young, 2006).8
In parallel to these criticisms of apprenticeship, there was rising concern across the political
spectrum that UK firms were uncompetitive in the current market conditions and would
struggle to survive in the emerging highly competitive global economy. Probably, the most
famous and influential encapsulation of this argument was Finegold and Soskice’s (1988)
thesis about the ‘low-skilled equilibrium’. They argued that poor training for both managers
and workers led the majority of UK companies to produce low-quality goods and services and
resulted in a poor national economic performance. In the case of apprenticeship the remedy
was, according to, Finegold and Soskice, to revitalise it as a vehicle for the skill development
of the workforce and as a means for employers to upgrade their product and service strategy,
and this presupposed the development of more robust social partnership structures in the UK.
The Thatcher government embraced Finegold and Soskice’s argument that VET is central to
economic growth but believed that the most effective incentive for companies to train is to
help them to develop greater ‘knowledge and understanding of their skill needs’ because
employers’ voluntary commitment to training will ‘yield better and more cost-effective
results’ than government prescriptions (DFE cited in Senker 1992, p. 3-4). To secure
employer involvement, the Government introduced ‘quasi-markets’ to foster greater
competition and to stimulate greater efficiency and quality between further education (FE)
colleges and private training providers (Keep & Mayhew 1999, page, 2-3), established
organisations, known at the time as Industry Lead Bodies (ILOs)9, to represent employers and
to actively involve them in the design of National Occupational Standards (NOCs), and
contracted the development of NOCs to private sector consultancies because they had little
8 The Conservatives also faced another pressing agenda - rising youth unemployment. ‘The government became
seriously concerned about the political implication of high unemployment’ and did not feel that apprenticeship
provided a solution to this problem and instead chose to introduce an entirely new ‘vocational initiatives’ such as
the Youth Training Scheme (YTS), later renamed Youth Training (YT) and pre-vocational initiatives such as the
Certificate of Pre-Vocational Education to address youth un-employment (Senker, 1992).
9 ILOs were subsequently replaced by National Training Organisations (NTOs) and Sector Skills Councils
(SSCs).