Focus on service sector growth amid threat of automation, says Gordon Marsden
Ministers must pay more attention to promoting apprenticeships in the services sector, a Labour frontbencher has said, as automation threatens to take away a number of jobs in other industries.
Gordon Marsden, the Shadow Minister for Higher and Further Education, said there would be a “significant fall out rate” in the UK economy from the use of machines to replace labour over the next decade.
The Blackpool South MP said the Government should focus more on the retail, tourist and social care sectors rather than manufacturing to protect against the effect of increased automation on employment levels.
Labour’s apprenticeship spokesperson also warned that Brexit poses a “serious issue” for ministers in training young people and reskilling older workers in case a “significant number of EU nationals” leave post-Brexit.
Mr Marsden was speaking during the Apprenticeships Forum at the Labour party conference in Brighton, which ran in partnership with KPMG, the Chartered Insurance Institute, the Rail Development Group, Warwick University, United Utilities and World Skills UK.
During the hour-long session, chaired by PoliticsHome Editor Kevin Schofield, Mr Marsden fielded questions on Labour’s apprenticeship programme and vision for the future.
Turning to Brexit, Mr Marsden said: “There is a really serious issue here in terms of needing to train young people, and retrain and reskill older people, if significant number of EU nationals go away. You will feel the pinch, not necessarily in your central planning, but in your subcontracting. Therefore that is an absolutely key thing to get right. The Government needs to be as supportive as possible in that process.”
He added: “The challenges for the future, leaving aside the whole Brexit thing, are challenges of a world in which a whole raft of jobs and apprenticeships that go with them sadly will go in the next 10 to 15 years because of automation.”
“I am convinced that there will be a significant fall out rate [from automation]… with that. So, how are we going to fill those gaps? I think we are still not looking enough at other routes to growth outside the manufacturing sector.”
Mr Marsden cited apprenticeships in retail, such as in marketing, distribution and logistics; the visitor economy and social care sector as areas that should receive more attention.
“The reality of it is, that those jobs, those skills, if properly developed and properly funded and properly attractive with their terms and conditions, could engage hundreds of thousands of older people and young people as well.
“This is absolutely crucial of what we’re going to need to do.”
LABOUR’S VISION
Elsewhere in the fringe event, Mr Marsden elucidated on Labour’s programme for government and insisted the party would not overhaul the UK’s existing apprenticeship infrastructure.
“Are we in the business if we come to the power for tearing up everything that has been done by the previous government? The answer is no, we are not in that business,” he said.
“Over recent years, there has been and needed to be a strong consensus as to the huge value of apprenticeships and apprentices.”
But he added: “Where there are of course significant differences is in approach and detail. We have substantial concerns about the way in which the Government have brought forward many of their reforms.
“The 3 million target for apprenticeships by 2020… we’ve always had our doubts – not opposed to it – about the precise figure. If you’re not careful, as I did tell a previous skills minister, you will end up getting more and more hysterically like an old-fashioned Soviet factory manager talking about a five-year target.
“This industry, this area, has been riddled in the past 20, 30 years with initiatives that came forward without enough resources… or so changed to meet particular targets that they became unrecognisable from what they were supposed to do.
“We’re working on the principle that we need to give these new institutions the tools for the job. We’re very worried – we’re delighted about the new Institute for Apprenticeships… we are very worried about the limited resources both in terms of funding, personnel and expertise that has so far come into it.”
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