BWF uses radio airwaves to highlight skills gap

The woodworking industry has used the airwaves to warn of the dangers of a skills gap in the sector.

The British Woodworking Federation (BWF) was invited onto LBC Radio to comment on claims that design and technology were being "marginalised" in schools and may no longer exist in the school curriculum within about five years.

The BWF told listeners that despite woodworking accounting for about 7% of the UK's construction workforce and the sector being able to offer a rewarding career, inadequate careers advice for school pupils and a failure to invest in vocational subjects meant woodworking and wider construction industries were seeing a shortfall in new home-grown personnel.

"Particularly, in schools, we are seeing a shift in careers advice to broadly favour academic-driven careers through university study, rather than exploring the wide options provided by careers delivered through vocational training and apprenticeships," said Dave Campbell, BWF marketing & training manager.

It pinned some of the blame for this on conflicting work by two government departments – Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and the Department for Education (DOE).

BIS is supporting investment in skilled apprenticeships and science/technology/engineering subjects at universities, whereas the DOE, the BWF says, is "pulling away" curriculum and careers advice that supports these areas earlier in the education system.

"If we continue to fail to invest in the woodworking and other construction industries in the UK, we risk losing not only our competitive edge in these industries globally in what should be an area of growth for the UK economy, but also losing our ability as a nation to meet the demands of our own policies and indirectly investing in the growth of other countries' economies as we look outside of the UK," said Mr Campbell.