Labour Market Event - Key Points Continued

The second contribution – “Skills for Scotland: Accelerating the Recovery and Increasing Sustainable Economic Growth” - came from Steven McMahon, Scottish Government Skills Division. You can download the presentation here.

The presentation covered four main themes: (1) overview of the economy. (2) Public finances. (3) The refreshed skills strategy. (4) Future work.

Economic Overview

- The Government’s current main objective was economic recovery.
- The economic strategy, despite the differing economic conditions, was still “bought into” by civil servants.
- The data (see slides 16-24) tells the story of Scotland lagging behind not only the UK but small EU countries.

Public Finances

- Due to the UK Comprehensive Spending Review, Scottish DEL will fall by 11.3% in real terms between 2010/11 and 2014/15.
- The money we have at our disposal now is the same as 2006 levels.

Refreshed Skills Strategy

- The new strategy can be viewed here - http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Education/skills-strategy/overview
- It provides increased policy alignment with the economic recovery, national performance framework and the economic recovery plan as well as increased alignment with enterprise policies.
- Key focus = increased flexibility and greater simplification.
- Contains a host of achievements the Government has made since 2007 (see p31 of slides).
- Key commitments include (p33): over 40,000 training opportunities in 2010/11, flexible training incentives for employers, simplification of funding of employability support locally and improved linkages between colleges and local employers.

Future Work

- A review will be conducted by Willie Roe into post 16 education and vocational training.
- Further information can be found in his presentation (p35-36).