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Closing the UK "skills gap"

Summary

This document ‘World Class Skills: Implementing the Leitch Review of Skills in England’ (Cm. 7181), produced by the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills, sets out the Government's policy direction to build world class employment skills in England by 2020.

This publication aims to explain how the Government will provide the right supporting framework to act as a catalyst for a skills revolution.

Currently, more than a third of adults in the UK don't have the equivalent of a basic school-leaving certificate, 6.8 million people have serious problems with numbers and 5 million people are not functionally literate.

As part of this skills revolution, the Government has set out new rights that learners and employers will have, under what are called Skills Accounts and the Skills Pledge. The Skills Accounts will be part of the new adult careers service done through Jobcentre Plus, which aims to give every adult easy access to skills and careers advice. The Skills Pledge enables employers to demonstrate their commitment to improving skills in their workplace, with the Government supporting employers through Train to Gain brokerage.

In addition, current funding entitlement for adults to free training in basic literacy and numeracy skills will be strengthened.

It is a companion document to the Green Paper ‘In Work, Better Off’ (Cm.7130), also published 18th July 2006 (More on this story on Have Your Say), and follows on from the ‘Leitch Review of Skills’ (More on this story on Have Your Say), published in December 2006.

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Law-Making Explained

This is a Command Paper (Cm. 7181 2006-07): it is a Green Paper from the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills.

Find out more about Green Papers.

How does it affect me?

If you work in education, are studying or are an employer, this affects you.

Have Your Say Now

See more on the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills website.


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