Skills for Climate consultation launched

[edit] Introduction

An industry-wide consultation has been launched on ensuring the UK has the necessary skillbase for delivering a low carbon economy for the future.

The consultation is being run by ECA, in association with the REA, STA, BESA and The Electrotechnical Skills Partnership (TESP). It is also being supported by an array of bodies from across industry, including EnergyUK, ADE, FETA, SELECT, ADBA, GSHPA, HPF, FSA, BCIA, EDA, JTL, ESF, JIB, AESM and MCS.

[edit] Green jobs for the future

Several reports have indicated that hundreds of thousands of green jobs could be created in the future. The Skills for Climate consultation could play a pivotal role in understanding the current state of play, and could reveal what steps businesses and the Government need to take to ensure there is a skilled workforce available.

ECA Energy Advisor Luke Osborne commented:

“It’s vitally important that the skillbase exists to deliver ambitious plans for a green recovery and a low carbon economy in the UK. This consultation aims to understand the state of play and what actions are required to ensure skilled and competent people fill the likely major expansion in green jobs. ECA urges businesses from across industry to complete this important consultation.”

[edit] Accelerating skills acquisition

Dr Nina Skorupska CBE, Chief Executive of the REA said:

“Achieving net zero means ensuring we have hundreds of thousands of qualified staff in the UK doing everything from installing public charging points to upgrading our gas and electricity networks. Whilst we have made good progress to date, the pace of deployment needs to ramp up and the skills need to be in place to facilitate the transition.

“This is an important and timely survey, the outputs of which should be carefully considered by Government as they prepare the National Infrastructure Strategy and develop plans for a green economic recovery.”

BESA Director of Training Helen Yeulet said:

“This important survey will provide insight into the practical obstacles to solving not only the current skills crisis, but how to ensure we have the capacity to deliver a green recovery in the built environment.

“We suspect small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) are struggling to access the Apprenticeship Levy in order to recruit or retain apprentices, so this survey will help us gauge whether there is the appetite and budgets within businesses to enable the required upskilling and reskilling to happen.”

--ECA

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