The offer is part of a wider productivity plan, which would also require large firms hiring skilled workers from outside the EU to create 100,000
apprenticeships over the parliament, a move that would inevitably increase the cost of hiring foreign workers.
The application comes at a critical time for both teacher recruitment and
apprenticeship creation, with education ministers under pressure to boost the number of trainees entering the profession and meet a pledge made by the prime minister during the general election campaign to generate three million
apprenticeship starts
over the course of this
parliament.