Training and enterprise councils have come under fire for the third time in just over a month for failing to do enough to boost skills.
A progress report on TECs by Coopers Lybrand supports recent parliamentary Employment Select Committee claims that they have made only a “modest contribution” to improving the system of training for the unemployed.
It also echoes research commissioned by the Department for Education and Employment, published in February, arguing that an employer-led training system had served mainly to promote individual deals with training suppliers.
The Coopers Lybrand report, completed in November 1994, is only now available as a public document. It measures the success of TECS in six areas in providing training and enterprise support since an earlier baseline study commissioned in 1989.
It finds that TECs have “achieved little more than the simple rolling forward of existing initiatives”, and have failed to persuade local employers to contribute to their funds.
