CIOB chief executive Dr Victoria Hills returned from September’s Labour Party conference in Liverpool determined to take action after learning from every college head she spoke to at the event about the long waiting lists they had for construction courses.
One head representing a college in a major UK city told her the city was short of 2,000 college places.
Our reporting suggests there could be more than 9,000 16- to 18-year-olds in England who want to study construction at colleges, but can’t due to a lack of funds, faculty and space.
“We’ve got a million NEETs at home, and they get a really bad press, you know, ‘they’re all sat at home doing nothing’,” Hills said.
“But hang on a moment, what I’ve discovered up in Liverpool is that all of the college principals I met have quite large waiting lists of young people trying to get to college to study construction.”
“Who has fallen asleep at the wheel?” she added.
Getting heads together
Hills said she would convene a conversation with college heads and related associations to “get to the bottom of what’s going on” and make recommendations to government.
On the plus side, she said, Andy Burnham’s push for more devolution could help ease the skills crisis and shrink college waiting lists.
Hills, a chartered town planner and veteran executive of the Greater London Assembly, believes devolution has benefitted Greater Manchester and would help other localities, especially with skills.
Can devolution tackle the skills crisis?
The reason is that if local authorities were given money and powers now locked in Whitehall, they could better coordinate training and funds to meet local skills needs in conjunction with colleges.
Hills also welcomed the rollout of “apprenticeship brokerages”, in which combined authorities take some of the burden of managing apprentices off SMEs.
Hear Hills’ remarks in full in this month’s podcast – Manchesterism: How devolution could bring a skills revolution.
Joining the podcast are Manchester enthusiasts Steve Gillingham, partner and executive board member at Rider Levett Bucknall (RLB), and Stuart Sayer, in charge of the north west for Turner & Townsend.
They set out how Greater Manchester’s 30-year devolution journey has brought about a more joined-up skills ecosystem across the 10 boroughs.
Construction is popular now
Also joining are Emma Meredith, director of skills policy and global engagement for the Association of Colleges (AoC), and Claire Barker, AoC’s senior policy manager for skills and industry.
“Construction is one of the most popular subjects in colleges,” said Meredith. “We have over 200 colleges in England and construction will be offered at the vast majority.”
AoC data shows that 56% of colleges in England are reporting waiting lists for construction courses. It’s the highest instance of waiting lists among all courses offered.
Meredith and Barker update us on the pressure colleges are under, new government funding for construction, and the many ways construction employers can collaborate with colleges to get young people into the industry and on a path to a good career.
