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Government IT spend to boost workers skills & job prospects
Companies winning Government-funded IT contracts will have to fulfil a commitment to skills training, Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills Minister John Denham has announced.
The Government currently spends nearly £14 billion a year on procuring IT services and Mr Denham wants to make sure this spend contributes to improving the skills base of the IT workforce. The IT sector has significant potential for providing the jobs of the future and economic growth.
The Government's Chief Information Officers have committed all Government departments and agencies to look at requiring successful contractors to have in place a development plan for their workforce. Improving skills across the whole IT sector will ensure the industry can compete internationally and take full advantage of job opportunities that will arise in the future.
Skills Secretary John Denham said:
"We have to make every taxpayer's pound work as hard as we can. Wherever possible Government spending should not just provide good public services, it should also ensure young people are trained in the skills we need for the future."
"The IT industry is one of the industries which is critical to the future of the British economy and its ability to survive and thrive post-recession. It's vitally important that British business has IT skills to draw on at all levels."
At a summit held on 22nd May, the Secretary of State met the Government's Chief Information Officer, John Suffolk, and leading IT industry representatives to discuss how Government and industry can work together to promote investment in skills in the IT sector through procurement.
The move is part of a radical shake-up of the skills and training system instigated by John Denham to tackle expected skills shortages and to ensure that we have a workforce with the right skills in the right place at the right time.
The public sector spends £175 billion a year on buying goods and services.
Mr Denham wants to make sure that this money does more than just pay for new buildings or IT projects and that the companies who win public contracts make a commitment to invest in the future skills needs of the UK workforce.
The Government is committed to using levers such as procurement whenever possible to promote investment in skills and professionalism of the sector's workforce. At the summit, Government and industry representatives discussed how they can best work together to maximise the benefits of the sector through procurement.
The IT industry faces challenges, not least finding the right people with the right skills to enable us to compete internationally. The Sector Skills Council for IT, e-skills, has said the IT industry will need around 131,000 people each year for the next 10 years and that most of these will be graduates. There is also a need to up-skill the current workforce, not just with technological skills but with managerial and business skills as well.
UK digital industries alone produce an annual gross value added (GVA) of around £86 billion, 10.9% of the UK total, and have the potential to contribute a further £35 billion over the next five to seven years.
Mr Denham added:
"In tough economic times like these, there is a danger that employers will reduce their investment in the skills of their employees as they look to cut costs. But research shows that companies who don't train are 2.5 times more likely to fail than those who do."
"A failure to train now will mean that when the economy begins to grow again we will not have the skilled workers we need to seize those opportunities that growth presents."
The summit was held at the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills.
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