Consultation on the Scottish Governement Response to the UK Apprenticeship Levy

Responding to This Consultation

3. Responses should reach us by 26 August 2016. We would welcome earlier responses.

4. Please complete your response using the online system at http://consult.scotland.gov.uk/employability-and-training/apprenticeship-levy/ or send your response with the completed Respondent Information Form included at the end of this paper (see 'Handling your response' below) to: apprenticeshiplevy@gov.scot

or:

5. If you have any questions please send an email to apprenticeshiplevy@gov.scot

6. This consultation, and all other Scottish Government consultation exercises, can be viewed online on the consultation pages of the Scottish Government website at https://consult.scotland.gov.uk/

7. The Scottish Government has an email alert system for consultations http://register.scotland.gov.uk/Subscribe/Step1 . This system allows stakeholders, individuals and organisations to register and receive a weekly email containing details of all new consultations.

Handling your response

8. We need to know how you wish your response to be handled and, in particular, whether you are happy for your response to be made public.

9. Please complete the consultation online at http://consult.scotland.gov.uk/employability-and-training/apprenticeship-levy/ or complete and return the Respondent Information Form (included at the end of this paper) as this will ensure that we treat your response appropriately. If you ask for your response not to be published we will regard it as confidential, and we will treat it accordingly.

10. All respondents should be aware that the Scottish Government is subject to the provisions of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 and would therefore have to consider any request made to it under the Act for information relating to responses made to this consultation exercise.

The consultation process

11. As well as publishing this consultation paper, the Scottish Government will be discussing these issues with a range of organisations, including organisations that represent employers' interests.

Next steps in the process

12. Where respondents have given permission for their response to be made public and after we have checked that they contain no potentially defamatory material, responses will be made available to the public in the Scottish Government Library and on the Scottish Government consultation web pages by 15 September 2016.

13. You can make arrangements to view responses by contacting the SG Library on 0131 244 4552. Responses can be copied and sent to you, but a charge may be made for this service.

What happens after the consultation?

14. We will analyse responses to the consultation and information gathered from any workshops, group discussions and meetings carried out during the consultation period. Scottish Ministers will then consider the responses as part of the forthcoming budget process.

Comments and complaints

15. If you have any comments about how this consultation exercise has been conducted, please send them to the contact details above.