Agenda item

Business, Enterprise and Skills Working Group of the County Durham Economic Partnership - Overview:

(i)      Joint Report of the Corporate Director of Resources and the Corporate Director of Adult and Health Services.

(ii)      Presentation by the Chair of the Business, Enterprise and Skills Working Group of the County Durham Economic Partnership.

Minutes:

The Committee considered the joint report of the Corporate Directors of Resources and Adult and Health Services which provided members with an overview of the activities undertaken by the Business, Enterprise and Skills Working Group of the County Durham Economic Partnership (for copy see file of Minutes).

 

Sue Parkinson, Chair of the Business Enterprise and Skills (BES) Working Group and Vice-Chair of the County Durham Economic Partnership (CDEP) Board was in attendance and gave a presentation to members which highlighted the following:

 

·        Skills levels in County Durham, and comparison regionally and nationally

·        Economic activity and inactivity

·        Employment and unemployment rates

·        Employment by Industry

·        Adult Participation in Learning

·        Apprenticeships

·        Government Priorities

·        Challenges

·        Opportunities

 

Sue Parkinson discussed with Members the CDEP’s approach to Resources and future funding opportunities, and how external funding would be maximised.  

 

Members were informed of skills support for the workforce and the unemployed which was funded by the European Social Fund, and funding available for the regeneration of town centres. 

 

Following a question from Councillor Scott, Sue Parkinson explained that a focus of the Partnership was to encourage involvement of the private sector in relation to skills development/training, show them the benefit to their workforce of employing young people and providing relevant training and gave the example of the DurhamWorks Programme that supports young people who are not in education, employment or training.

 

Councillor Tucker stated that to close the skills gap, closer working between education and training providers and employers was required to remove the barriers facing employees who wanted to up-skill. Sue Parkinson explained that the Skills Support for the Workforce Programme should address this by making funds available to employees to pay for their own training. However there also needed to be a cultural change so that employers became learning organisations and provided the time to employees for training. This was being facilitated by the Partnership.

 

Councillor Adam noted that the majority of employers in the County were small to medium sized businesses and asked how they would be encouraged to be involved. Sue Parkinson agreed that businesses in the County were pre-dominantly micro-businesses, some having only one or two employees, and therefore recruiting staff with the rights skills was very important. The DurhamWorks Programme aimed to facilitate this.

 

Mrs Morris asked about the potential implications of a no deal Brexit on funding for the North East. Sue Parkinson responded that the Government had committed to a ‘Levelling up Agenda’, and that she was also a member of the Government’s National European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIF) Evaluation Sub-Committee which looked at European Funding.

 

Councillor Atkinson asked how Durham County Council would access the town centre funding. Graham Wood, Economic Development Manager explained that the Council was facilitating the funding opportunities available for local businesses as part of the Stronger Towns Fund for Bishop Auckland, and an Investment Plan would be developed for presentation to the Stronger Towns Investment Board. This would be reported to Scrutiny at a future meeting.

 

Resolved:

 

 That the report and presentation be noted.

Supporting documents: