Economic survey highlights urgent need for construction apprentices

Economics survey from the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry highlights urgent need for construction and utilities apprentices.

According to the latest quarterly economic survey from the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, 58% of businesses currently looking to recruit sufficiently skilled candidates have encountered difficulties.

An issue that the UK construction industry currently faces is the skills shortage, which makes the UK government’s ambitious target of building enough houses to end the housing crisis extremely difficult.

Develop Training Limited, a training specialist in the utilities sector, has called for industrial firms to ramp up their response, after warning that changes in the education sector along with other factors, has left the construction industry and the utilities industry with a major skills shortage. As a result of this, plans are being put on hold and less progress is being made.

The company say that currently, training schemes are not working due to being insufficient or inappropriate, making skilled labour in short supply. In addition, the situation is worsened by individuals being taught skills that do not match up to the job that they are employed to do.

Chris Wood, CEO of Develop Training, said: “We cannot rely solely on the politicians. Looking to the long-term, businesses facing skills shortages need to grab the bull by the horns and invest in real training. As a part of this, Trailblazer Apprenticeships need to be encouraged. They are a direct response to calls for workplace training to be made more relevant and can be directly aligned to individual firms’ actual business needs.”

Chris Wood added: “The Trailblazer methodology is a potential game-changer in supporting the recruitment and training of the next generation of engineers and technicians. However, closing the skills gap and attracting suitably able people into these sectors requires wider action. Apprenticeships are seen by some as inferior to other channels of higher education such as the universities. This needs to change. In addition there needs to be a commitment on the part of employers to provide the financial rewards which are no less than those to be found elsewhere.”

 

 

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