As a Sector Skills Council licensed by government, SEMTA is the employer-led organisation at the heart of the Government’s skills agenda for Science, Engineering and Manufacturing Technologies in the UK. It’s role is to the raise skills levels and competitiveness in the 75,000 companies and 2 million-strong workforce.

SEMTA helped to develop the project three years ago in conjunction with a number of other partners, including EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation, which secured the necessary funding. It followed a report by the South West of England Regional Development Agency (RDA), which focussed on skill shortages within the engineering industry. Among the findings were that 65% of all engineering job vacancies required higher levels of skills than were available.

Having the right skills in place is of significant importance for the future success of the area with engineering the second largest sector in the South West, in terms of employment, providing almost 10% of the region’s Gross Domestic Product compared with 8.4% nationally.

So far the project has helped over 440 companies to pinpoint areas for improvement through a detailed skills analysis. As a result almost 125,000 hours of training worth £1.2m have been taken up and grants totalling £600k, which pay employers 50% towards the cost of technical training, have been awarded.

One company which is reaping the benefits of the extra support is Plymouth-based Alderman Tooling, a subcontract manufacturer of metalwork components and structures. Almost half of Alderman’s 50 employees have received training support in areas as diverse as power press regulations, wiring and health and safety. The most dramatic benefit to the organisation, however, followed ‘Six Sigma’ training, which is saving over 100 man hours every year.

www.semta.org.uk