Sarah Green column
Apr 24 2007 By Sarah Green, The Journal
You don't need to be a rocket scientist to understand the UK will only maintain its place in the leading group of world economies if it has a skilled and flexible workforce.
But UK workers are wrongly branded as laggards in the skills stakes, even though employers are spending more on training than in the rest of the EU, the US and Japan, because the national qualification system does not recognise the excellent training schemes many undertake at work.
The CBI is therefore urging the government to reform the qualifications framework to ensure that high quality training given to staff is recognised, as Lord Leitch proposed in his recent skills report and acknowledged by ministers.
Allowing companies to award their own nationally recognised qualifications would be a vital first step to achieving this and this proposal is set out in our latest report - Shaping up for the future: the business vision for education & skills. UK businesses invested £33bn on staff training last year which, as a share of payroll, was the highest in the EU and considerably more than France, Germany, the US and Japan.
But only one pound in three spent was recognised with a formal award and the UK ranks poorly in the international league table of staff with intermediate qualifications, like NVQs.
Just 40% of British adults have such a qualification compared to 57% in the USA and 63% in Germany.
This is not because UK workers are less skilled than their overseas counterparts, but the primary focus of employers is on developing their staff's abilities, rather than acquiring qualifications.
Companies like Rolls Royce or Nissan, for example, provide first class training which too often goes unrecognised by the national qualification framework. Many smaller firms also operate very good training which falls between the cracks in the system.
The Government should recognise the value of this training by giving employers who train their staff the same power to award qualifications as universities who give diplomas and degrees to their own students.
As well as tackling the fallacy that British workers are poorly skilled, it would also help attract more inward investment to the UK as the country rises up the league tables of skilled workers.
- Sarah Green is regional director at CBI North-East.
