Andy Burnham’s new government has set ambitions around growth, education, employment, innovation and devolution that overlap strongly with the aims of enterprise education. However, there is not yet clear evidence that the government shares the sector’s broader understanding of how entrepreneurial capabilities are developed or used. The opportunity for EEUK is therefore to help turn common goals into more closely aligned approaches.

TLDR version

Andy Burnham became Prime Minister on 20 July 2026 and appointed Jonathan Reynolds as Business, Innovation, Science and Trade Secretary and Lucy Powell as Education Secretary. Jacqui Smith remains a Minister of State across education and employment, providing some continuity from the previous government.

Their records offer reasons for both optimism and constructive challenge:

• Burnham’s work in Greater Manchester shows a strong commitment to place-based growth, technical pathways, universities and colleges as civic partners, and greater local control. It is less clear whether this has included enterprise education in the broader sense recognised by EEUK, QAA and EntreComp.
• Reynolds offers the clearest opening: the SME plan developed during his previous period as Business and Trade Secretary explicitly supported enterprise education across schools, colleges and universities.
• Powell’s previous focus on social mobility, broad educational opportunity and technological change could align well with enterprise education, but her approach as Education Secretary is not yet known.
• The Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper led by Smith contains many welcome ambitions, but its failure to give enterprise education a meaningful place is a significant omission.

EEUK hopes the new government will recognise enterprise education as central to its ambitions for growth, opportunity and economic renewal—embedding entrepreneurial competencies across education, valuing diverse pathways and working with educators and policymakers throughout all four UK nations.

Common goals, but not yet common approaches

In his first Downing Street speech, Burnham promised a new economic model, reindustrialisation and a ten-year plan for Britain. He also said the government would change the education system to help more young people into work. Jonathan Reynolds, Lucy Powell and Jacqui Smith now occupy the roles most directly connected to business, innovation, education and skills.

These ambitions matter to enterprise educators. But enterprise education is not simply business studies, employability, work experience or preparation to start a company. QAA guidance describes it as developing behaviours, attributes and competencies that enable people to lead self-determined professional lives and create social, cultural and economic value. EntreComp similarly focuses on developing the capacity to turn ideas and opportunities into value through action.

Helping people into good work, responding to skills shortages and strengthening technical education are important goals. Enterprise education supports them, but also helps people create new work, innovate, respond to uncertainty and address social or community challenges.

The question is therefore not whether Burnham’s priorities are compatible with enterprise education. Many clearly are. It is whether the government will recognise enterprise education as part of the connective tissue linking education, innovation, opportunity, community development and economic renewal.

What does Greater Manchester tell us?

Burnham’s record as Mayor offers the strongest evidence of how he may approach these questions.

Greater Manchester has pursued a deliberately place-based model, bringing together economic development, transport, employment, skills, public services and local institutions. Its Civic University Agreement united the combined authority and the city region’s five higher education institutions around priorities including education and skills, jobs and growth, digital development, net zero and the creative economy. The universities have been treated not only as providers of teaching and research, but as anchor institutions supporting businesses, innovation and communities.

The Greater Manchester Baccalaureate—the MBacc—provides another indication of Burnham’s thinking. It aims to give young people a clearer technical route into employment, linking subject choices, workplace experiences and local growth sectors. The inclusion of business-related routes is positive, as is the effort to give technical education greater visibility and status.

Enterprise educators when provided with time and resource, can support the workplace engagement, collaboration, local ecosystems and clearer pathways within this approach. However, the evidence does not yet show that it is rooted in the same principles as the QAA guidance or EntreComp.

The emphasis has generally been on progression into employment, meeting regional skills needs and connecting provision to growth sectors. We have found less evidence of an explicit focus on developing entrepreneurial agency: the ability to recognise opportunities, mobilise resources, work through uncertainty and create different forms of value.

This may be a difference of language rather than intent, or it may represent a substantive gap. EEUK should recognise the common goals while making the case for a broader approach.

Member perspective: Dr Andrew Baird – Manchester Metropolitan University

“Under Andy Burnham’s leadership and support for civic collaboration across Greater Manchester, enterprise education has become an important bridge between universities, social enterprises and communities. Through partnerships that connect education, innovation and social impact, students are helping tackle real-world challenges across the city region. However, greater recognition is still needed for the vital role enterprise education plays in driving inclusive growth, social value and community prosperity.”

Devolution raises the importance of local government

Burnham’s belief in devolution is particularly relevant. England’s new devolution framework gives strategic authorities responsibilities and influence across areas including local growth and adult skills, with mayoral authorities receiving the most extensive arrangements. Education and most business development are already devolved to the other Nations of the UK.

This creates opportunities for enterprise education to be embedded in local growth plans, skills strategies, innovation ecosystems and community development. It also means that EEUK’s engagement cannot focus only on education and business departments in Westminster.

Angela Rayner, the new Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, strategic authority mayors and local government leaders will all have a role in shaping the environments in which enterprise education operates.

Local government can connect education, employers, business support, communities and regional investment. The sector must be present when local priorities and delivery structures are designed.

 

“Every nation and region of the UK  will need people who can respond to change, create opportunities and turn ideas into value. Enterprise education is not an optional addition to a growth and skills strategy; it is one of the capabilities that will make that strategy work.”

Dr Emilee L. Simmons, President of Enterprise Educators UK, on behalf of EEUK

Employer involvement—and the entrepreneurial voice

Employer engagement through live projects, placements and contact with practitioners can improve learning. However, an “employer-led” approach also requires care.

Large employers are usually better able to attend boards, host substantial placement programmes and influence policy. Their legitimate focus may be on filling existing roles and addressing immediate workforce needs.

Entrepreneurship can disappear from the discussion unless it is deliberately represented.

Partnerships should therefore include small businesses, start-ups, freelancers, social enterprises, co-operatives and innovators. Learners need exposure not only to current vacancies, but to people who have created organisations, services and responses to social challenges.

The people shaping the agenda

Andy Burnham, Prime Minister

Burnham’s mayoral record suggests an instinct for long-term, place-based collaboration and for treating universities and colleges as partners in economic and civic development. His support for technical pathways also reflects a desire to widen the routes through which people can progress.

The opportunity is to extend that thinking. Enterprise education can help learners across every route take initiative, adapt, collaborate and create value. At present, that broader understanding cannot confidently be attributed to the Prime Minister; it is an area in which the sector has evidence to offer.

Jonathan Reynolds, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade

Reynolds provides the clearest existing policy connection.

The Backing Your Business SME plan developed during his previous period as Business and Trade Secretary committed the government to promoting enterprise education in schools, colleges and universities. It stated an ambition to embed enterprise and entrepreneurship throughout education and referenced the QAA definition. It also recognised smaller firms, self-employment, under-represented founders and co-operative models.

His expanded department now combines business with innovation and science. In his first statement in the new role, Reynolds emphasised commercialising research and using innovation to deliver growth across the UK.

This provides an important opening for EEUK. The challenge will be to connect the full pipeline: enterprise learning across disciplines, student and graduate entrepreneurship, innovation, research commercialisation, SME development and inclusive business creation.

Lucy Powell, Secretary of State for Education

Powell now oversees schools, further education, apprenticeships, skills and higher education in England. Her previous contributions have emphasised social mobility as progress for the many and recognised that automation and digital change increase the need for a rich education and appropriate skills.

These themes can align strongly with enterprise education. Entrepreneurial competencies help learners navigate change, build confidence and networks, identify possibilities and apply knowledge in new settings.

It is too early to know how Powell will translate those concerns into policy. England’s curriculum reforms already refer to confidence, problem-solving, collaboration and preparation for life and work, while the new enrichment framework includes enterprise among wider life and future skills. The next question is whether these elements will become a coherent entitlement or remain dispersed across subjects and optional activities.

Jacqui Smith, Minister of State

Smith offers continuity from her work as Skills Minister. The Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper set out reforms intended to meet economic needs, close skills gaps and strengthen collaboration between employers, colleges, universities and public bodies. It also established an ambition for two-thirds of young people to participate in higher-level learning by 25.

There is much here that EEUK can support, but the absence of enterprise education is striking. Entrepreneurship appears mainly through research commercialisation, business development and spin-outs, rather than as a set of competencies relevant to learners across the post-16 system.

The White Paper’s strong focus on employer needs and priority sectors risks preparing people only for opportunities that can already be described. In a rapidly changing technological and economic environment, learners must also be equipped to recognise emerging opportunities, create new activity and lead innovation.

Schools, colleges and universities: connected rather than competing

The phrase “university is not for everyone” can reasonably support diverse, respected pathways. It becomes less helpful when it presents higher and technical education as competing alternatives, or implies that widening access to higher-level learning has gone too far.

A changing economy will require more higher-level knowledge and capabilities delivered through different routes: universities, colleges, higher technical qualifications, apprenticeships, modular provision and lifelong learning. The government’s own post-16 ambition recognises the need to increase participation in higher-level study.

Enterprise education can connect these pathways.

In schools, it can develop creativity, initiative, teamwork and responsible action before learners are asked to choose a career route.

In FE, it can complement occupational expertise for learners who may become employees, freelancers, business owners or innovators in their sectors.

In higher education, it should reach every faculty and encompass venture creation, social innovation, intrapreneurship, civic engagement and research commercialisation.

The issue is how learners can progressively develop entrepreneurial competencies throughout education and working life.

A four-nation conversation

Much of this article is necessarily England-focused because education, skills and significant elements of business support are devolved.

A UK-wide approach must recognise real differences rather than treating English policy as the default.

Wales’s curriculum is organised around four purposes, including developing enterprising, creative contributors who can apply knowledge, generate ideas and solve problems.

Scotland’s Entrepreneurial Campus blueprint sets out a long-term role for colleges and universities in developing entrepreneurial mindsets and supporting the wider ecosystem; subsequent Scottish reporting has continued to emphasise universities, commercialisation and entrepreneurial activity.

Northern Ireland has its own education, skills and economic structures and has recently set out further reforms to align FE provision with regional economic priorities.

The aim should not be a uniform UK model. It should be an informed exchange in which each nation can learn from different approaches, while UK-wide policies on business, innovation, research and investment recognise their effects across all four nations.

A UK wide perspective: Steve Aicheler – EEUK operations manager

“While devolution brings many benefits, there can be a tendency for devolved governance to result in the re-invention of the wheel. Perhaps proposals for a new baccalaureate style qualification should look to Wales for lessons learnt. The UK government could also look to the ambition shown by the Scottish support for entrepreneurial universities when empowering combined or mayoral authorities.”

EEUK’s hopes for the new government

EEUK hopes to see:

1. Explicit recognition of enterprise education across curriculum, skills, higher education, innovation and economic policy—not only as preparation to start a business, but as the development of agency and the capacity to create value.
2. Entrepreneurial voices within employer engagement, ensuring that SMEs, founders, freelancers, social enterprises, co-operatives and intrapreneurs are represented alongside major employers.
3. Ambitious and connected educational pathways, with technical, vocational and academic routes all supporting progression to higher-level learning and adapting to technological change.
4. Enterprise education embedded locally, so that devolution and local growth planning connect education providers, business support, employers and communities.
5. A genuine four-nation dialogue, respecting devolved responsibilities and learning from the distinctive approaches taken across the UK.

What EEUK will do next

EEUK will seek dialogue with Burnham, Reynolds, Powell and Smith, as well as Rayner and those responsible for English devolution and local growth. We will also approach the relevant education, skills, economy and business ministers in Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

We will offer a concise evidence briefing explaining effective enterprise education across schools, FE and higher education, informed by QAA, EntreComp and the experience of our members.

We will invite ministers and officials from across the UK to engage directly with practitioners through roundtables, Enterprise Exchanges and other EEUK activity.

A call to EEUK members

To make that engagement credible, we need evidence from across our community.

We invite members to share examples that demonstrate what works: curriculum activity, institutional approaches, partnerships with employers or communities, support for founders, intrapreneurship, social innovation and evidence of impact on learners.

We are particularly interested in examples from:

• schools and further education;
• different academic disciplines;
• work with under-represented groups;
• Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland;
• projects with evidence of lasting learner, organisational or community impact.

Members can also help by engaging politically.

Invite your MP, MS, MSP, MLA, mayor or councillors to see enterprise education in practice. Respond to relevant consultations. Explain how your work contributes to local growth, innovation, opportunity and community outcomes. Share what policymakers understand well—and where the sector’s language and evidence are not yet reaching them.

Please send examples, evidence and information about existing political relationships to connect@enterprise.ac.uk.

The new government’s ambitions overlap significantly with those of the enterprise education community. We should welcome that common ground without assuming that it represents a shared approach.

EEUK’s role is to provide evidence, challenge constructively and help policymakers across the UK understand that enterprise education does more than prepare people for the economy as it exists today.

It equips them to shape what comes next.