Time to end ‘skills gap’ talk and grasp nettle on training – college

Construction employers across the region should rethink the narrative around a ‘skills shortage’ and focus on stronger collaboration with training providers if they’re to realise the opportunities that lie ahead, writes Rebecca Waterfield, head of employer engagement at South and City College, Birmingham.

From Birmingham’s major regeneration schemes to new housing and infrastructure projects across the wider West Midlands, the construction sector in the region faces a period of extraordinary opportunity.

Demand is strong, investment is flowing and the pipeline of work looks healthy for years to come.

Yet alongside this optimism is a growing concern shared across the industry and frequently cited in the media: do we have the workforce capacity to deliver? Is the skills gap just too significant to meet demand?

I want an end to that narrative. Simply, I don’t believe that there is a ‘skills gap’.

As a leading provider of construction training courses, we can attest to there being no shortage of willing and enthusiastic learners hungry to develop technical construction skills across a range of trades.

However, those learners require not only classroom and workshop-based learning, but real, authentic, hands-on, practical experience. That experience is gained via work placements, apprenticeships and on-site visits and right now there just aren’t enough construction employers coming forward to offer those opportunities.

These learners are motivated, engaged and ambitious but their ability to gain real-world experience, complete their studies and progress to careers in the construction industry are being limited.

Yet, there are countless opportunities for the construction industry to take advantage of.

From Smithfield and Digbeth to Ladywood, Langley and the forthcoming Sports Quarter, not to mention HS2 – this is transformation at an unprecedented scale. Add to this, the West Midlands Combined Authority’s recent announcement of plans for at least 10,000 new affordable homes, backed by £1.7bn of government funding, and the wider national government’s plans to accelerate the delivery of 1.5 million new homes.

The opportunities are enormous, but so too are the pressures on the existing construction workforce.

It’s a situation that can’t be allowed to continue. Without a strong pipeline of trained, site-ready workers, firms risk being constrained not by demand, but by capacity.

A stark example that perfectly highlights the issue is the fact that, despite widespread concern about a national shortage of qualified bricklayers, our bricklaying apprenticeship programme enrolled just three learners this year.

The reason was not a lack of applicants, but a shortage of employer placements. It is a contradiction the sector cannot afford to ignore.

This is certainly not about apportioning blame.

Construction employers face myriad challenges from rising costs and employee taxation to ever complex red tape and administrative burdens. They’re also grappling with an increasingly ageing workforce. What happens when skilled workers retire and take with them decades of knowledge and expertise? There’s also technological innovation that requires investment in new skills or upskilling of the existing workforce.

The intensity of these combined pressures can create an environment in which supporting apprentices or offering work placements is, understandably, perceived as an additional burden. However, it is precisely because of that intensity that collaboration matters more than ever.

There is also a wider social context that cannot be ignored. Birmingham faces one of the highest youth unemployment rates in the UK, at the same time as record levels of construction activity. Bridging that gap is not only an economic necessity, but a chance to create long-term opportunity and resilience for both businesses and communities.

Encouragingly, solutions already exist and they don’t require radical overhaul.

Across Birmingham and the wider Midlands, colleges and employer partnerships are working to make engagement simpler, more flexible and more responsive to business needs. Initiatives such as the Building Birmingham Skills Partnership were created to remove barriers, particularly for smaller firms, and to provide clear, practical support around placements, apprenticeships and workforce planning.

Often, the first step is simply a conversation. Employers often tell us they want to help but are unsure where to start or worry about the time commitment involved. In reality, even modest engagement can make a huge difference. If every construction employer offered just one placement or apprenticeship opportunity, the cumulative impact on the regional skills pipeline would be transformative. There really would no longer be a need to use the term ‘skills gap’.

We’re at a crossroads. The Midlands has all the ingredients it needs – enthusiastic learners, strong training provision, major investment and a proud construction heritage. What is needed now is stronger alignment that sees employers working with educators to shape provision, plan ahead and ensure that training reflects the realities of modern sites.

Together, we can turn opportunity into long-term economic strength and put the ‘skills gap’ narrative firmly behind us.