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Jonny HarrisonJonny Harrison is sailing to Australia from the UK via the Panama Canal before he starts work in Sydney on a secondment at his firm PricewaterhouseCoopers »
Andrew HebdenAndrew Hebden is Assistant Editor (Business) of The Journal »
Katie PringleKatie Pringle has started her own business, Rock, Paper, Scissors »
Andrew MerninAndrew Mernin is the Digital Journalist for nebusiness »
Matthew RipponMatthew Rippon is an IP lawyer for BHP Law »
Jez DavisonFormerly editor of a national business lifestyle magazine, Jez Davison is a business writer for the Evening Gazette in Teesside »
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Norma FosterNorma Foster from the North East Regional Portal writes about e-business »
Ian BrownIan Brown, Northumberland farmer and businessman writes about the agricultural industry »
Steve WilkinsonAccessibilty Champion Steve Wilkinson on the importance of inclusion »
Andrea WilkinsonAndrea Wilkinson of Shared Interest is visiting Swaziland to deliver business training »
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Mark LisgoMark Lisgo is a Northeasterner who works for law firm Eversheds in Abu Dhabi, UAE »
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The region awaits

Posted by Andrew Mernin on July 16, 2007 1:50 PM | 

With the dust now settled on Gordon Brown's appointment at number 10, the Prime Minister is set to announce his plan to tackle the impending skills shortage.

The Government will reveal its tactics to meet the recommendations of the Leitch Review of Skills, which was published in 2006.

The study, conducted by Lord Leitch, found that the UK must urgently up its achievements at all levels of skills to become a world leader by 2020.

Among the many objectives set out by the report, the Government is looking to boost the number of apprentices by 500,000 a year and ensure that 40% of adults are skilled to graduate level and above by 2020.

So what could the implementation plan mean for the region? Hopefully we'll see more investment aimed at keeping talented workers in the North-East. Perhaps there'll be the launch of initiatives to increase employer investment into skills development from the region’s corporate heavyweights. And, we could even see the creation of new specialist training academies across the North-East.

See nebusiness later this week for an exclusive interview with Chris Roberts, regional director of the Learning and Skills Council North East to find out more on the Government's plans for the region..

Comments (3)

Spinsta wrote...

Why is is that the region is still lagging when it comes to addressing the skills agenda? Business has long understood the problems. Admittedly, it's often been a bit reluctant to dip into its own pockets to put its money where its mouth is. However, we have now had almost two decades of TECs and more recently LSC's - with millions of tax-payers money - and we are still failing to meet the requirement. Why have the public bodies and quangos consistently failed to meet the challenge? The region still comes bottom of most league tables you care to invent for skills and learning. When will The Journal and other business press ask some awkward questions of Chris Roberts and our business support organisations?

Posted by: Spinsta  | July 16, 2007 2:25 PM

Peter Kerr wrote...

Surely it's time we stopped relying on central government to sort out the region's future and started to look long and hard as to why countless previous initiatives have failed to deliver.

Posted by: Peter Kerr  | July 19, 2007 5:02 PM

Paul wrote...

When talking of the skills needed in the region there was talk not so long ago of bringing major new offshore work to the north bank of the Tyne.
John Harrison - mayor of North Tyneside, Newcastle city council and One North East were making very optomistic noises in this regard.
And there were articles on icnewcastle and BBC Tyne on this subject.
Surely with the demise of Swan Hunter and traditional shipbuilding industry this is the ideal time to push ahead with this.
We have maritime industrial skills here - the success of the Walker Offshore park is testamount to that - but surely we need to bring in any companies willing to invest sooner rather than later.
The skills base won't survive without new investment.
I would be interested to read if there has been any progress made regarding this.

Posted by: Paul  | August 20, 2007 9:14 PM

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