Skills Academy

Proskills, the sector skills council for the process and manufacturing sector, has announced that it has secured a National Skills Academy “which will go some way towards helping arrest the talent drain across the Proskills industries”. These include print, paper, glass, extractives and the furniture industry.

General union Unite was a key player in the efforts to bring about the new Academy for Materials, Production and Supply. However, while welcoming the new development, the union warns that it will only deliver the skills needed for the future if industries are prepared to use it and “raise their game”.

Speaking at the Academy launch in June 2009, Unite assistant general secretary, Tony Burke, said: “It is no secret that Unite has been highly critical of the lack of training in some sectors of industry. The negative response from some employers when asked to step up their training arrangements is damaging to our industry…If we are going to come out of this recession in any decent shape, if we are still to have a decent manufacturing base, we will need to have the high levels of production, operational, technical skills, which the current system has not been able to deliver.”