Tory youth training policy is a right royal mess

theguardian.com:

K ing Charles is well known for his support of Britain’s youth. Arguably, he has done more to train the under-30s in practical skills over the last decade than the government – and financed it without lumbering them with huge debts.

The Prince’s Trust passed its one millionth trainee milestone in 2020 and has carried on without much fanfare while the government’s skills programme has floundered – undermined by Theresa May’scomplicated and misused apprenticeship levy.

Employers left confused by the levy’s byzantine rules turn to further education (FE) colleges for training support. Yet these are the Cinderellas of the education world, forced to rely on staff who sign on each year to teach a course, apparently out of the goodness of their hearts. They certainly don’t do it for the money.

About 6.7 million working-age adults in the UK have no or low qualifications, according to the Local Government Association, which means they have no more than an F or G at GSCE, or only got to the first rung on the NVQ (National Vocational Qualification) ladder.

Someone with only a few low-grade GCSEs or a level 1 NVQ has not just been let down by the education system: they are also likely to find themselves in a cycle of deprivation that prevents them from investing in their own future.

Then there is the added pressure from artificial intelligence, with hundreds of books, academic papers and newspaper articles arguing that a significant proportion of people’s work can be automated even more than it is now. These warnings should be heeded because, as we know from bitter experience, most employers are desperate for easy solutions as a substitute for strategic discussions about how to work better. Demands for staff to embrace AI, however, sit