PEOPLE on low incomes are being denied access to Hampshire's adult education service by high fees, underfunding and lack of planning, inspectors found.

Their report for the Office for Standards in Education has triggered a shake-up of the service involving a new adult and community learning unit to bring together staff from different departments.

A county council spokesman said it hoped to secure more government money for adult education through a new learning and skills council to be set up next year under a new funding system for adult education.

And he stressed that Hampshire began reviewing the service before the report came out by making all adult and community learning the responsibility of its education committee.

The inspectors found a lack of planned provision for numeracy and literacy classes, while high fees, with virtually no concessionary rates, were a barrier to poorer residents.

However, they deemed the service was providing value for money for the needs it did serve - notably those of elderly, middle-class women.

Standards of achievement were good or very good in 68 per cent of sessions - and at least satisfactory in more than 90 per cent, while 95 per cent of teaching was satisfactory, with more than 70 per cent good or very good.

Another strength was providing courses close to people's homes at more than 170 venues across the county.

But the inspectors said an adult learning unit, set up by the county to make arrangements for non-vocational courses after Hampshire's adult education institutes were closed, had too few resources and not enough power.

Financial auditing of nearly 60 organisations providing adult education in Hampshire - including colleges, schools and community centres - was infrequent and unsatisfactory and quality assurance procedures were not applied consistently across the service.

"The adult education service is inadequately funded and the local authority has insufficient strategic influence and control over adult learning development in the county," the report states.

The inspectors said Hampshire County Council should:

Reassess the service's budget so that providers can respond more consistently to the needs of disadvantaged groups

Set up measurable targets for organisations providing adult education and basic skills tuition to ensure they plan a comprehensive and appropriate curriculum for their areas

Councillor Don Allen, county education chairman, said: "This report has given us some useful pointers about organisation, very much in the direction in which we were heading before the inspection."

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