UK Inquiry Tracker

Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

Public Accounts Committee Closed Inquiry

Opened: 6 Sep 2022 Closed: 24 Feb 2023 Parliament page

In July 2022 the NAO reported that the UK “faces a major challenge in ensuring it has a sufficiently skilled workforce”, with the head of the NAO, the Comptroller and Auditor General, concluding that “There is a risk that, despite government’s greater activity and good intent, its approach may be … Read more In July 2022 the NAO reported that the UK “faces a major challenge in ensuring it has a sufficiently skilled workforce”, with the head of the NAO, the Comptroller and Auditor General, concluding that “There is a risk that, despite government’s greater activity and good intent, its approach may be no more successful than previous attempts to provide the country with the skills it needs.” A skilled workforce is critical to the country’s economic success and to achieving other government aims such as “levelling up”. Economic and societal changes are making the skills challenge more acute - the UK’s exit from the EU has reduced the supply of workers from member states and potentially increased the need for the country to train its own workers. The Government’s commitment to achieve ‘net zero’ greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 will create new skilled jobs and around one in five existing jobs is likely to be affected by the transition. But the NAO found that participation in government-funded further education and skills training has declined significantly, particularly in disadvantaged areas. The number of adult learners fell by 48% over the last decade, from 3.2 million in 2010/11 to 1.6 million in 2020/21. From 2015/16 to 2020/21, the number of participants aged 19 and over in England’s 20% most disadvantaged areas dropped by 39%, compared with a 29% drop overall. Largely because of the drop in learners, there was a 46% fall in the Skills Index – government’s measure of the impact of the further education system on productivity – from 2012/13 to 2020/21. The 2022 white paper Levelling Up the United Kingdom set out the government’s plans to address regional and local inequalities, but according to the NAO report “its aims go only some way towards addressing the decline in participation in skills training”. By 2030, the government wants 200,000 more people in England to successfully complete high-quality skills training annually, including 80,000 more people in the lowest skilled areas. Achieving this would only partly reverse the fall of around 280,000 learners in the 20% most disadvantaged areas since 2015/16. The Committee will question senior officials at the Departments for Education. If you have evidence on these findings and issues to inform PAC’s questioning of the departments, please submit it through the tab below by 6pm on Monday 10 October 2022. Show less

6 Recommendations

22 Conclusions

1 Report

1 Oral session

1 Event

Activity timeline 4 events

24 Feb
2023

Report published

Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Thirtieth report from Session 2022-23

14 Dec
2022

Report published

Thirtieth Report - Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

17 Oct
2022

Oral evidence

Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

17 Oct
2022

Formal meeting (oral evidence session) · The Grimond Room, Portcullis House

Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

Oral evidence sessions 1 session

17 Oct 2022

View on parliament.uk

Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

Carl Creswell · Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Paul Kett · Department for Education Susan Acland-Hood · The Department for Education

Reports 1 report · click to expand

Title	HC No.	Published	Items	Response
Thirtieth Report - Developing workforce skills for a strong econ…	HC 685	14 Dec 2022	28	Responded

Recommendations & Conclusions

28 results

2 Recommendation Rejected

Thirtieth Report - Developing work…

DfE has not made clear what level of performance would constitute success for its skills...

DfE has not made clear what level of performance would constitute success for its skills programmes. DfE ultimately relies on measuring learners’ subsequent earnings as a proxy for the value of government-funded skills training and the extent to which that … Read more

Government Response

The government disagrees with the Committee’s recommendation that DfE should set out what level of improvement in the FE Skills Index it is aiming to achieve and by when.

HM Treasury

Developing workforce skills for a strong economy

Activity timeline 4 events

Oral evidence sessions 1 session

Reports 1 report · click to expand

Recommendations & Conclusions

DfE has not made clear what level of performance would constitute success for its skills...

The multiplicity of government skills programmes makes it hard for employers and individuals to navigate...

Employers are spending less than they used to on workforce training, which risks leaving the...

We are concerned that continuing financial pressures and workforce challenges are hampering colleges’ ability to...

DfE has high expectations for its new Unit for Future Skills, but the Unit does...

On the basis of a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, we took evidence...

We asked DfE about the causes of the decline, both in overall participation and among...

DfE suggested several possible reasons for the particular decline in participation in disadvantaged areas and...

In written evidence, the Federation of Small Businesses told us that making the apprenticeships system...

DfE has a framework of performance metrics for its portfolio of skills programmes which includes...

DfE emphasised the importance of the FE Skills Index as its key measure of the...

Overall, the FE Skills Index fell from 100 in 2012/13 to 54 in 2020/21, a...

We asked DfE, given the data available to it, whether it planned to adopt a...

DfE has a range of programmes to support workforce skills development, including well-established programmes such...

Skills Bootcamps are courses lasting up to 16 weeks for people looking to change sectors...

The NAO report highlighted that there exists a complex and sometimes overlapping set of skills-related...

We asked how DfE was ensuring that the incentives for employers to take part in...

We also asked DfE about the multiplicity of available programmes.

DfE’s overarching philosophy is to put employers at the heart of the skills system, specifically...

DfE carries out an employer skills survey every two years.

The NAO found that government had not made clear to what extent it was seeking...

In written evidence, several organisations raised concerns about the apprenticeship levy, and suggested that reforms...

In January 2021, we reported on the financial sustainability of the college sector.34 Our report...

Our 2021 report also noted, however, that the financial health of the college sector had...

We asked about colleges’ ability to recruit and retain teaching staff.

In February 2022, DfE announced the creation of a Unit for Future Skills to look...

We asked how DfE could give the Unit for Future Skills a profile so that...

DfE told us that the Unit for Future Skills currently had 18 staff.

Government Response AI assessment · 25 of 6 classified