Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
112-119)
MR TIM
BALCON
22 APRIL 2009
Q112 Chairman: Good morning, Mr Balcon,
and welcome to the Committee. I wonder if I could invite you to
say your name and your organisation for the record, please?
Mr Balcon: Thank you. Tim Balcon;
Energy and Utility Skills.
Q113 Chairman: Thank you very much.
It is clear, Mr Balcon, that skills are essential in relation
to the provision of network structures within this country. We
have just heard that in terms of investment there is the potential
for many thousands of jobs. Of course, to fill those jobs you
do need the skilled workers to be available. I wonder if you could
outline the work of Energy and Utility Skills and, in particular,
the role played by the Power Sector Skills Strategy Group, and
what is your assessment of the skill availability at the present
time?
Mr Balcon: Energy and Utility
Skills is licensed by government to, I suppose, address the skills
issue. We are one of 25 Sector Skill Councils and, collectively,
we address 85 per cent of UK skills. The intent there is to make
the UK more productive and increase our economic performance in
this approach. In terms of Energy and Utility Skills, we specifically
cover electricity, gas, water and waste management sectors. In
doing that, the mission of Energy and Utility Skills is to make
sure that those sectors have the skills that they need to fall
on both now and in the future. That is the mission statement.
The way we do that is to ensure that employers collaborate to
address their skills issues. One of the things that we have learned
is that many of the companies that we represent have very sophisticated
skills processes internally. However, what they have not got is
the ability to pull all that together and look at the skills issues
as a sector. I think that is one of the main advantages and opportunities
that we can bring to that particular party. What we have done,
therefore, is created the Power Sector Skills Strategy Group to
do that, and that includes generators, it includes contractors,
it includes networks and transmission; it includes a broad section,
I suppose, of the power industry. We decided that we need to know
the extent of the issue, if, indeed, there is one, and we developed
what we call a "workforce planning tool", which is an
online tool we have developed which identifies the kind of skills
that the power industry requires, and that has probably a longer
outlook but at least a 15-year outlook, determined by the regulatory
framework and time cycles associated to that. We invited the companies
to submit their data in terms of how many people they would required
to meet the capital programme going forward for those 15 years,
and we have at this moment in time some early indications of the
extent of the issues. Some of the early figures, I suppose, are
associated to the networks, the generators or the contractors.
It does not at this point include the transmission companies.
That will come shortly. What I am saying is that over the next
five years there will be a need for 9,000 people to undergo learning
in the power sector. Just let me separate two items, if I can.
We believe that there will be need to be between 3,000 to 4,000
new people in the associated network.
Q114 Chairman: That is additional
jobs.
Mr Balcon: Additional jobs. The
rest are made up from people who are currently in the networks
or associated supply chains to the networks that will need to
upskill their current skills. If we take 9,000 people, that is
51 per cent of the current workforce, so it is a significant amount
of people that is required to undergo training who will be recruited
into the sector.
Q115 Anne Main: I heard the list
of gas, water, electricity. Was nuclear in your list of power
as well?
Mr Balcon: Nuclear is done by
Cogent. We have links with Cogent, we speak to them, and so we
make sure that there is a clear link between the two.
Q116 Anne Main: Are the figures you
are referring to separate figures to anything to do with nuclear
power?
Mr Balcon: Correct.
Q117 Anne Main: When we had the Minister
before us, I specifically asked him about investment in education
and skills training to ensure that there are the courses in place
and the encouragement in place so that young people are coming
into the industry. I do not think we had a particularly concrete
answer, because, of course, it is a Treasury thing and interdepartmental,
but given that Scottish Power have said in their memorandum that
they are facing a dilemma with many people facing the end of their
careers with the necessary skills, do we have the teachers in
place, do we have the courses coming online that you expect to
happen, or apprenticeships, and are you hopeful that there will
be the encouragement to get people into the industry and the availability
of courses growing before they get to a position to do what you
need?
Mr Balcon: Can I take you through
the steps of the process before I get to the answer, if I may.
What we have with the data I have just explained is the extent
of the problem. In a sense, it is the first time that the industry
has collaborated to understand what the problem is. Those numbers
could be considered quite alarming. It is probably good news,
the fact that we now have the understanding of what needs to be
done. When you marry that to the training infrastructure, and
I use that in the broadest sense, which will include the supply
of students from schools, universities, to FE colleges, to universities
and to the kind of trades that employers are already doing, there
is a clear mismatch. As of today, there is not the capability
to do that. However, one of the solutions that the P3SG has developed,
it has submitted a bid to DIUS for a National Skills Academy for
Power, which was accepted and established, supported by DIUS and
the LSE. That business plan is being developed and we should have
a business plan proposal by June. The idea behind the National
Skills Academy for Power is, indeed, to correct the kind of things
that you are saying. First and foremost, it is about getting people
trained, and the large bulk of those numbers are around craft
level two and level three—technician level. There is clearly
work to be done on people who will come through a higher education
route and, therefore, there is a collaborative arrangement required
for universities, but also there is an issue that needs to be
addressed with schools and FE colleges to make sure the students
are being supplied into the sector. If you take those three issues
in terms of the upskilling of the training infrastructure—the
schools, the attractiveness of the sector currently and the current
performance of the HE sector—they are the three main areas
that need to be addressed if we are going to meet those numbers.
Q118 Anne Main: Do you believe at
school level there should be an additional look at the curriculum
to see whether there is encouragement to move forward into energy
and perhaps into green energy?
Mr Balcon: Yes. One of the things
that we do know is there are not enough supply students coming
through science or mathematics courses.
Q119 Anne Main: Are our science courses
up to the job, as they are now?
Mr Balcon: Again, what employers
will say is that once they get students, they then have to correct
some of the things that they have previously been learning, either
to make them better or just to reacquaint them with the context
of the electricity sector. The only way that we can correct that
is for there to be a partnership between the education system
and employers. I will say, at this point in time, that their employers
are up for that. We need now to encourage the schools to make
sure that they also promote this arrangement.
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