SummitSkills, the Sector Skills Council for Building Services Engineering (BSE), welcomes the Government’s announcement which set out the pathway for three-quarters of young people to go to university or earn an advanced technical qualification, such as a high-level apprenticeship.
Announced by Business Secretary Lord Mandelson, Skills for Growth – The National Skills Strategy marks a shift in the Government’s skills priorities to give people and businesses the skills they need to help drive economic growth. The targets announced include creating 35,000 new places over the next two years for advanced apprenticeships, allocating adult learners a personal skills account and simplifying the way in which skills policy is delivered.
Furthermore, the Government has promised to work with businesses to focus funding on the areas of the economy that can do most to drive growth and jobs, deploying around £100m to support around 160,000 training places in areas such as life sciences, digital media and technology, advanced manufacturing, engineering, construction and low carbon energy.
They will also offer 1,000 new scholarships worth £1,000 each, to encourage the best apprentices to progress into higher education and give more employers the chance to drive and shape training provision through launching a fifth competitive bidding round of the National Skills Academies programme.
Keith Marshall OBE, Chief Executive of SummitSkills, comments: “At SummitSkills we have long recognised the need for our sector to train and upskill its workforce in the low carbon sectors. We are delighted that this strategy acknowledges this skills gap and we look towards any other support which will allow us to meet the skills challenge head-on in order to secure the future productivity and success of the BSE sector.”