Speech for Sir Michael Latham
Chairman, ConstructionSkills
ConstructionSkills SSC Announcement
Thursday 25 September 2003
Thank you Secretary of State for your words and for joining us today. I know I speak for Turlogh and Sean as well as myself when I say that today is a very significant one for our organisations. We are really pleased that you and Ivan Lewis are able to give us such a strong lead in as well. I am also delighted to see the Chair of SSDA, Margaret Salmon and her senior colleagues and other representatives of the Board, the government and the media.
Today is not exactly a new beginning for our industry. CITB and our partners CIC and CITB Northern Ireland have been working to address skills issues in the construction industry for many years. And much of this work will continue in the way that it has always done.
However, today is significant because it is the official announcement of our partnership as the sector skills council for construction. This is a partnership, which I believe will bring very tangible benefits to our industry.
Becoming an SSC is not about a ceremonial name change or the creation of yet another talking shop. It signals a new way of working for us. Although some things will stay the same, for ourselves and our partners, there are many real benefits:
Firstly, it is significant that you, Secretary of State, and Minister Ivan Lewis, are here today. We hope that we will be working more closely with Government, along with funding bodies and educational institutions, to make sure that when considering national policies on education and skills they know the views of the industry. We are also delighted to be joining the Skills for Business network, being developed by the SSDA. It will be a powerful voice for industry, including employers, employees and trade unions. The greatest impact we can make here will be in the funding of training and education initiatives. We are already taking advantage of this opportunity to work with the Learning & Skills Council on a contribution towards a Sector Skills Agreement, which will give us influence over around £300 million in government funding.
Our partnership with CIC and CITB Northern Ireland enables us to take a whole industry approach. We will now be able to work with craft and professional sectors and throughout the whole of the UK. This will mean an integrated approach to recruitment and training. Already, our major recruitment drive this year included a call for more students to construction-related degrees and ConstructionSkills has pledged £250,000 in graduate bursaries for 2003/04.
As an SSC, we will also seek to influence learning supply in schools, further and higher education so that training is relevant to the needs of employers. This will involve, at a central and regional level, close liaison with colleges and local employers to help them keep in touch with each other so that education matches local needs.
Another key area of focus is a partnership approach to training. What does this mean? It means using partnerships to facilitate a more even spread of training across the industry, so that firms of all sizes and at all stages in the supply chain are sharing responsibility for training up young talent by engaging in more project and site-based training solutions at a local level. We’re already working with the Housing Forum on a series of demonstration projects where local authority clients, contractors and training providers work together to solve training needs – another example of where we will be putting the theory into practice.
Finally, we also expect to use our new status to help the industry improve its performance. We’ll be putting increased funds and emphasis into Management and supervisory training and we’ll also be rolling out on-site training for the existing workforces across the UK in our drive towards having a fully qualified workforce by 2010.
All of this means a greater and more influential role for ConstructionSkills. It will be very positive for the common goals and targets of CITB, CITB Northern Ireland and CIC. There are real challenges, including explaining the changes we are making to the industry as well as balancing the widespread interests, which will be looking to us for support. And we will still be administering a levy and grant system, as Parliament requires us to do. I’m very confident we can do all these things, particularly with the combined resources and skills we, as an SSC, now have.
This is a vital next step in our commitment to reduce skill shortages and improve productivity. I very much look forward to our work together, with the support of my colleagues Turlogh and Sean and their teams.
We already have a close relationship with your department, Secretary of State, our Minister Ivan Lewis and with Construction Minister, Nigel Griffiths, who can’t be here today because he is attending a CIC event in Edinburgh. But I look forward to forming an even closer alliance with this government. We would very much hope that ministers will be able to come along to our conference in December when we will be launching ourselves as an SSC to employers. Thank you again for giving us this new role.
It is now my pleasure to ask Turlogh O’Brien, Chairman of the CIC, to say a few words.