As the latest cohort of students collect their GCSE results (Report, 21 August), we at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors have been pondering the research from the Federation of Master Builders (Construction-sector recovery at risk from skills shortage, say building firms, 28 July). Indeed, our research echoes this and indicates that, unless a new generation of skilled workers joins the construction industry soon, 27,000 building projects a year will be at risk by 2019. We need to make it clear to young people that construction is not an inferior career choice – it’s an exciting, challenging and rewarding industry for all levels of academic ability.
Take surveying – there’s an array of real career opportunities available for young and qualified people. These can involve planning and managing the creation of iconic buildings, and infrastructure projects around the country. What’s more, the routes into careers are ever-expanding. RICS has helped to create a new degree apprenticeship as an alternative to A-levels/university. More vocational routes provide learners with the knowledge they need, and also ensure that young people understand how this knowledge can be applied practically.
Alan Muse
Global director of built environment professional groups, RICS
• This year’s GCSE results show a welcome increase in students studying ICT and computing, but there has been a worrying decline in the number of young people opting for two other subjects: physics, and design and technology. We need to have more young people studying all of the engineering gateway subjects. There is huge demand for engineers, so it is important that young people have the opportunity to continue their studies. The country needs more people studying science and engineering subjects, and taking up apprenticeships. We are at risk of stifling economic growth if we do not encourage more students to study Stem subjects, which are crucial to ensuring a healthy and balanced economy.
Alison Carr
Director of policy, Institution of Engineering and Technology
• Against a background of cuts, you are right to identity the new 0.5% levy on large employers to pay for apprenticeships as the one bright spot on the horizon for technical education (Editorial, 20 August). However, the levy will only have a positive impact if it used to fund training above the basic GCSE level of most current apprenticeships. As I argue in my recent paper for the Higher Education Policy Institute (Raising productivity by improving higher technical education), employers desperately need more job-specific skills at sub-degree level; this is where England and Wales perform particularly badly compared to our main economic competitors.
At present, job-related sub-degree provision falls through the funding gap between universities and further education. If employers are be able to ensure that the new levy pays for training that meets these needs, then much of it will be at higher levels. The Treasury should for once loosen its grip; if it does, higher technical education could well provide a new mission for FE colleges.
Scott Kelly
Lecturer, New York University London campus, former ministerial policy adviser, BIS, Brentwood, Essex
• So Deloitte economists believe that rising incomes have allowed consumers to spend more on personal services, hence the increase in employment of hairdressers (Rise of the machines is a job creator, 18 August). Had this piece been written before 1980 I might have agreed. But the plethora of such establishments on run-down high streets now are actually cited by urban planners as a negative indicator of town centre vitality – along with the growth in charity shops and bookmakers. It is equally possible to conclude precisely the opposite to Deloitte – with the owners of capital driving down wages and forcing workers into self-employment.
Paul Baker
Director, Vector Research, Birmingham
• While Larry Elliott’s appraisal of Jeremy Corbyn’s economic proposals is accurate (Corbyn has the vision, but his numbers don’t yet add up, 21 August), he omits the criticism that can be applied to all contemporary politicians. What can be done to reverse the export of jobs, and the consequent benefit to our living standards, that comes from importing lower-cost products? The budget deficit can eventually be closed by raising taxes and/or by cutting expenditure. If we don’t fix the trade deficit and stop selling our real estate to pay our living expenses, no known version of Keynesian economics will make any difference. We have to face the grim reality: the neoliberal economic model makes sense only when society is prepared to kick the poor out of the contemporary economy.
Martin London
Henllan, Denbighshire
• More letters on the job market: Graduate skills are being squandered
