The UK has larger skills gaps between different parts of the country than most other European countries, according to research from the Learning and Work Institute (L&W).
Its Worlds Apart report into skills and learning inequality in the UK shows that two-thirds of adults in London have higher education qualifications, compared to just one-third in Greater Lincolnshire.
People are three times as likely to be qualified below GCSE level in the West Midlands (27%), the region with the worst qualification profile, than in West London (9%), the area with the best.
L&W said that these skills gaps are far wider than in neighbouring countries. Another 290,000 people, the equivalent of the population of Coventry, would have GCSE-equivalent qualifications in the West Midlands if the UK had lower skills inequality as found in Denmark, France and Sweden.
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Additionally, the institute warns that, far from improving, the UK’s postcode lottery for skills is on track to get worse over the next decade.
While 71% of Londoners may have a higher education qualification by 2035, only 29% would in Hull and East Yorkshire. The skills base in the capital and other parts of the south of England would match world-leading countries such as Japan, South Korea and Canada.
However, skills in other parts of the UK, which are improving slower and from a lower base, risk falling further down international rankings and being overtaken by countries including Estonia, Latvia and New Zealand.
Stephen Evans, chief executive at the Learning and Work Institute, said: “This report shows a tale of two countries, with the magnetic pull of London drawing in talent from around the country. This has created a skills chasm between areas and has become a self-reinforcing cycle, with employers more likely to create high-skilled jobs in the south of England.
“To break out of this cycle, we must combine investment in jobs and infrastructure with more efforts to improve skills by the government and employers. Otherwise, the government’s ambitions for broad-based growth will fall flat.”
The report suggests that closing the gap between London and the rest of the UK would require 4.1 million more people to gain higher education qualifications outside London.
It warns that improving skills in an area on its own will not be enough, however. Most areas already lose graduates to a small number of cities like London, Leeds, Bristol and Brighton. Even with a step-change in skills provision, people in low-skill areas who gain new qualifications may continue to follow the better-paid jobs into these cities. L&W argues that efforts to improve skills therefore need to be joined up with efforts to improve jobs and opportunities across the country.
The government has said it will publish a post-16 skills strategy and provide more details of its planned Growth and Skills Levy, reforming the current apprenticeship levy paid by large employers, in early 2025. It has also asked local government and mayors across England to draw up growth strategies and will hold a spending review in spring 2025.
L&W argues that all these efforts need to be joined up and have skills at their heart. Any new strategy will need to tackle the £1bn reduction in skills investment by Government investment in England since 2010 and the 26% fall in employer investment in training since 2005.
The report also highlighted that graduates are more likely to move to other parts of the country than non-graduates and that they tend to move to parts of the country where there are higher-paid jobs and more opportunities. This creates a brain drain to London and other cities predominantly in the south of England and a self-reinforcing cycle.
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