Agenda item

10.1

Members received a presentation from the Director of Skills, South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) on their Employment and Skills Strategy, due to be agreed in March 2024, detailing the three key mission areas. The importance of the interface between the MCA strategy and the local strategy was emphasised and members highlighted that the issue of inequality needed to feature more strongly in the strategy.

10.2

The committee agreed to note the update, thanked the Director of Skills for their time and requested a further update be brought back to the committee next year.

10.1.1

Members received a presentation from the Director of Skills, South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority (SYMCA) on their Employment and Skills Strategy, due to be agreed in March 2024, detailing the three key mission areas. The importance of the interface between the MCA strategy and the local strategy was emphasised and members highlighted that the issue of inequality needed to feature more strongly in the strategy.

10.1.2

A discussion took place around the key challenges that the strategy faced and the Director identified the need for all stakeholders to work together to ensure that residents could access the support they needed. Members also asked questions on the following areas;

·       The involvement of trade unions to ensure the needs of employees as well as employers were met and it was noted that a webinar would take place in January to reach out to as many people as possible.

·       The impact of the closure of the Peaks Campus of Sheffield College on 16 to 24 year olds and it was acknowledged that there were some cold spots and it was important to get the careers provision right for all young people.

·       The skills gap in green technologies and ensuring that we have the skills we need to achieve net zero targets

10.1.3

It was agreed that inequality was not addressed strongly enough within the strategy and although engagement had been carried out with the third sector this needed to be evidenced further. It was also acknowledged that not everyone can access conventional training programmes and therefore a range of different models was required.

10.1.4

It was highlighted that the interface between the MCA’s strategy and the local strategies were important to deliver some of the local work and it was confirmed that the MCA would be commissioning local learning, so grant funding would be available to local authorities.

10.2

The committee agreed to note the update, thanked the Director of Skills for their time and requested a further update be brought back to the committee next year.