UK plastics NVQ training - where¹s the money gone?

The UK’s leading body for plastics process training; Polymer Training Limited (PTL) is faced with closing down the sector’s Government funded National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) based training activities following the sudden withdrawal of access to the Government Train2Gain budget for the forthcoming year.

Mark Smith, PTL Managing Director of the former polymer industry training board in Telford says ‘while the newly created lack of access to Train2Gain funding is a blow, PTL will most certainly survive and has already started to diversify with new products, services and projects coming on board. PTL will continue to deliver training for plastics as it always has,’ adds Smith. ‘But unless the situation changes, all of this training will be on a purely commercial basis - as a result of which UK plastics will suffer.’

At the present moment PTL begins the forthcoming training year with 181 people from the plastics processing industries across the UK awaiting their ‘Train to Gain’ places. Smith says that ‘over the next few weeks, instead of filling places and arranging start dates for these people we are having to turn down all of the interest; make several of our training and administrative staff redundant and also gear ourselves to lose one third of sales volume turnover for the next year.

PTL’s direct funding for the plastics sector’s vocational NVQ training has been summarily frozen with a shortfall of £28,000 for training programs already started for the year 2008/09 and with no direct access to funds provided for the year 2010/11.

The PTL director says that ‘incredible as it now seems, just a few months ago the UK Government announced a £50m training fund which it said was set to provide ‘ring-fenced’ skills funding for science and technology based businesses – including plastics. As far as I can tell; this money has not materialised – and I see no evidence of any process industries training being delivered on the ground – let alone plastics. What has emerged is the funding and growth of a large quango that has no remit or qualifications to deliver training – only administer it.’

The rules for Train to Gain for PTL allow the plastics industry body to apply to local colleges to channel funding. But Smith points out that ‘firstly, we have to take our chances along with all other courses – from hairdressing to pop music. Secondly, since our own funding is through colleges they know that they can charge whatever percentage cut they want in order to give us some kind of throughput. We are not equipped nor prepared to accept terms when available – for example administration charges as high as 50% of the funding pot to provide access to Train2Gain funding streams - and run vastly reduced training opportunities at a loss.’

Smith adds that ‘given what has just happened to PTL I would like to ask the LSC what ‘ring fenced’ means?– and where the money has gone to? With the best will in the world I find it hard to see where any of this training promise has actually been delivered in the UK to those who need it; manufacturers, process industries and particularly those in plastics manufacture and plastics processing.’

For most of its life – and in previous existences as one of the UK’s levied training boards - PTL has secured direct Government funding for plastics skills training. Smith says that ‘without any special pleading at all, this decision seems fundamentally wrong in a number of ways: Not only is it a mistake for the Government to handicap the very sector it says it purports to help, it also appears content to channel the money to a growing series of networks, offices and administrators – none of whom provide direct training themselves.’

Smith says that ‘we at PTL shall continue to cut our cloth to whatever business conditions prevail and we expect no favours or preferential treatment from the Government’s agencies or their various quangos.

However, it must be of general concern to the plastics industry – and the companies in it - that the Government has ring fenced no sum of skills money at all for UK process manufacturing and has effectively succeeded in turning off up training provision for UK plastics.’

All further details from Mark Smith, Director, PTL, Halesfield 7, Telford, Shropshire, TF7 4QL. Tel. 01952 587020 www.ptlonline.org.uk