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1. ok

   Simon Boyd on 28th Jul 2010
2. I have just been reading the section on Skill shortages in the Ambition 2020 document and I find it hard to believe that the authors actually bothered to do any work before writing this rubbish.
   In the engineering sector there are severe shortages and I cannot even find this sector mentioned.
   The document mentions business services and agriculture as well as health & social services and even construction. These are all relatively low skill areas compared to engineering and can be easily filled.
   The key reason for the lack of engineers in the UK is the appalling Maths education in school. Far too often it is taught by teachers who have a PGCE, but no actual Math qualification. Now, due to cost pressures even more classes will be presented by classroom assistants who don't even have a PGCE.
   How can we expect the pupils to be turned on by Maths if their teachers don't have a clue?
   Look at any University engineering course and you will see a large percentage of privately educated students for the simple reason that they had decent Math teachers.
   This country needs more engineers and we will only get them if Maths is taught well from the age of 5 to 18.

   John Kitchen on 28th Jul 2010
3. Thank you for your comments John. The skills shortages section in Ambition 2020 is based on detailed research including major surveys of employers in each of the four nations of the UK – these are significant surveys, with sample sizes of 79,152 in England, 6,274 in Scotland, 6,719 in Wales and 4,000 in Northern Ireland. Clearly every sector has its skills needs and will see these as critical, however the report has to look at the broader picture and the evidence reported in Ambition 2020 is as these wider, sectorally representative, surveys find.
   
   It is a fact that during the recession all vacancies fell dramatically – as you would expect – and that all recruitment difficulties fell also. Again, as you would expect in a recession. In England we estimated that in 2009 there were just 63,000 vacancies which could not be filled due to shortcomings in the skills, qualifications or experience of applicants – this represents less than half of one per cent of the total number of jobs in the economy. But it is also true that where these difficulties exist they can create real difficulties for the employers who face them.
   
   The sectoral distribution of recruitment difficulties is reported as employers reported them to us. So the largest volume of skill shortage vacancies simply is in business services and Health and social work – which reflects the fact that these are large sectors of the economy. The greatest density of skill shortage vacancies (ie as a proportion of the number of jobs) are in Agriculture, Electricity gas and water and in Health and social work.
   
   Whilst engineering clearly is a high skill area we would suggest that some of the other areas identified above require high levels of skills also – the skills of a heart surgeon in the health sector for example are arguably as demanding as many of those required by the engineering sector.
   
   Posted on behalf of the UK Commission

   Toby Jenkinson on 4th Aug 2010