Funding for basic skills training for workers is good news

Jo Faragher

Businesses have long bemoaned the fact that too many school and university leavers come to them with inadequate skills in maths and English.

But there are many individuals who may have been working for years that lack skills and confidence in these areas, too.

According to the National Literacy Trust, around 16% of (or 5.2million) adults in England are “functionally illiterate”. This means they would not pass an English GCSE and have literacy levels at or below those expected of an 11-year-old.

So it was good news this week when the National Consortium of Colleges and Providers (NCCP) introduced its For Business For Life scheme, which aims to cover the cost of numeracy and literacy training for employers large and small, subject to assessment.

As NCCP chairman Harvey Young points out, there is a great deal of focus on school-leaver schemes such as apprenticeships and how we can get young people into work.

This is all positive (especially when there’s an election looming), but what about those employees who may be ‘getting by’ in work by hiding their lack of numeracy or who “slipped through the net at school”, as Young calls it?

While these workers may be exceptional at their job, improving their skills in English and maths could really impact their career prospects and improve their confidence. Not only that, but a misspelling or a calculation mistake, however simple, could result in reputational damage for their employer.

Or perhaps they have simply forgotten what they’ve learnt, and refreshing their skills could be the difference between them taking on management responsibility or staying stuck in the same role for years.

Either way, acknowledging that a broad spectrum of people in the workplace – not just those at the start of their career – could do with some support in maths and English, can only improve performance in the long term.