Issue - meetings

To receive a presentation on the council’s work in partnership, including an update on the Employment & Skills Taskforce.

Members received a presentation about employment and skills which provided information about the Employment and Skills Taskforce, local employment statistics, labour shortages, work underway locally in partnership with other agencies, apprenticeships and the Primary Engineer programmes. A representative of Primary Engineer was in attendance. During discussion, the following points were raised:

·         Whilst the figures showed job vacancies in the borough, there were barriers such as travel due to the rural nature of the borough. It was felt this was a national problem and with rural bus services being cut back even further, the problem would worsen

·         Participation in the Primary Engineer programme could be presented as evidence in an Ofsted inspection – it had been previously commended as a new way of bringing careers-focussed education into schools

·         The need to simplify the qualifications system (for example apprenticeships levies, T-levels) due to its overly complex nature, and the risk of it becoming more complicated with the shared prosperity fund

·         The need to strengthen the relationship between schools and promoting STEM subjects.

Councillor Cope left the meeting at 7.10pm.

In response to questions, it was agreed that more information would be sought on the following matters:

·         The location of job vacancies in relation to the location of unemployment benefit and universal credit claimants to assist members in understanding the reasons for the consistently high number of vacancies

·         Clarification in relation to the definition of those unable to work.