As we look ahead towards the future, we now stand ready to play an equal part with Government to support an inclusive economic recovery – helping young people to ensure that the next generation doesn’t become a lost ‘pandemic generation’ with scars for years to come.
Local communities want better jobs, opportunities to improve their skills and ultimately more prosperous lives. This means that Work Local – the LGA's ambitious but practical programme to improve employment and skills services in England through local public-private collaborations – is needed more than ever.
We have one of the most centralised employment and skills systems in the developed world. Different central government departments and their agencies are directly responsible for employment and skills policy, design, funding and oversight. Local areas have little ability to influence priorities, funding or delivery.
Across the country, there are significant employment and skills challenges which we believe the fragmented national system is at best failing to address and, at worst, contributing to.
Among other things, it finds that:
• Government has set out an ambitious house building and infrastructure programme which will put demands on the construction industry.
This report, commissioned by the LGA and published by the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR), examines how a sample of councils, working with local partners, designed and delivered schemes to provide one-to-one mentoring, training, work placements and apprenticeships.
