National Infrastructure Plan for Skills outlines need for 100,000 new recruits by 2020

Delivering the £411bn NIP pipeline will only be possible with major refocus on recruitment and training across all sectors of  infrastructure, says new Treasury report.

Antony Oliver
30 September 2015

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National Infrastructure Plan for Skills

The infrastructure sector must recruit and train some 100,000 new apprentices and graduates across all sectors of the industry if the UK is to meet the challenge of delivering its vital multibillion pound infrastructure investment pipeline, according to Treasury.

In its new National Infrastructure Plan for Skills report published this week, Treasury also highlights the need for industry to retrain and up-skill around 250,000 of its existing workforce over the next decade if it is to meet the investment challenge.

“We are already seeing shortages of skills in some key sectors and specialist trades. We want to do more to assure the delivery of our infrastructure plans.” Jim O'Neill

“We face challenges to ensure that we can build a skilled and productive workforce to deliver these plans,” said Jim O’Neill, Commercial Secretary to the Treasury in his foreword to the report. “And it’s not just more skilled people we need, it’s also a different blend of skills.”

The National Infrastructure Plan, published in July 2015, contains details of a £411bn investment across 564 projects and programmes from 2015/16 onwards. However, to deliver this investment, explains the report, the infrastructure sector will need over 250,000 construction and over 150,000 engineering construction workers by 2020. 

This, says the report, means investing in new apprentices, technicians and graduates and attracting skilled workers from other industries.

Action to tackle this need was identified by the government’s recent “Fixing the Foundations: Creating a more prosperous nation” report, through its commitment to three million apprenticeships, a vision to refocus vocational careers, simplifying and streamlining the number of qualifications and a new network of technical institutes.

But O’Neill pointed out this week that while these actions will help to address some of the longer term challenges, “as investment levels build, the demands on the workforce grow”. 

"CECA feels that this better visibility of skills demand should work hand-in-hand with a policy environment that encourages companies to invest in these skills,” Alasdair Reisner, CECA chief executive

“We are already seeing shortages of skills in some key sectors and specialist trades,” he said. “We want to do more to assure the delivery of our infrastructure plans.”

The new NIP for Skills analyses and models the challenge across three strands:

• Demand side analysis for infrastructure projects and programmes 
• Supply side analysis for infrastructure projects
• Identification of key labour and skills gap challenges 

The report points out that a lack of detail on demand and supply makes it harder for workers to move easily between sectors and projects, adding to skills shortages on key projects and programmes.

It also highlights that ensuring the UK has the right skills in place is a key part of addressing the curent productivity lag which is vital to improving infrastructure delivery and yielding economic benefits for the nation.

The challenges facing the industry in its bid to tackle the on-going skills crisis as it delivers projects across the UK and across different sectors are analysed and quantified by the report, and grouped under five main themes.

• Providing leadership and coordination
• Improving data on supply and demand
• Incentivising skills investment through procurement
• Improving mobility and up-skilling the existing workforce
• Encouraging young people and greater diversity

The report also highlights “a historic lack of clear, regional pipelines across the UK meaning that clients and suppliers do not have a coherent, long-term picture of demand across regions.” 

It adds: “The lack of visibility and certainty of a forward pipeline has been cited by industry as a key barrier to investing in skills.”

It also points to a number of ‘mission critical’ areas in which the lack of skills will affect the delivery of specific projects within the NIP pipeline “demonstrating the urgent need to recruit and train new entrants and retrain and up-skill the existing workforce”.

"The lack of visibility and certainty of a forward pipeline has been cited by industry as a key barrier to investing in skills.” Treasury

Civil Engineering Contractors Association (CECA) chief executive Alasdair Reisner welcomed what he described as a "mapping document", as a resource for industry to prepare for the work coming online over the next few years.

"However, we can only meet the anticipated skills demand with the right environment,” he said. 

"To this end CECA feels that this better visibility of skills demand should work hand-in-hand with a policy environment that encourages companies to invest in these skills,” he added. "In two years our members are looking to double the number of apprenticeships that they deliver. Industry needs to be sure that the funding models that allow them to do this are not disrupted at a time when there is such a high demand for such training.”