In the autumn of 2025, I had the pleasure of talking to broadcaster Anita Rani in College of North West London’s (CNWL) Refrigeration and Air Conditioning workshop as part of her investigation for BBC Panorama. She had spent that morning in full PPE, meeting the students and staff that populate our carpentry, plastering and refrigeration courses, reporting on something frequently debated by politicians and industry leaders alike: can Labour fulfil its pledge to build 1.5 million homes by 2030?
It’s an ambitious target, and the crutch of Labour’s success depends on Further Education institutions applying a fierce level of skills training to bolster the UK workforce against the swelling industry demand.
As CEO and Group Principal at United Colleges Group, I speak to many local businesses and employers, who all agree there is a serious skills shortage that is halting the country’s construction demands. This skills gap is not unique to the construction industry: according to Business LDN, a third of all small businesses in London cited “appropriately skilled staff” as the greatest perceived barrier to growth over 2024.
Further Education lecturers, including CNWL’s Rob, Terry and Kamaran, who feature in the Panorama episode, are on the front line bridging that gap for competitive employers to access the skilled workers they needed to fulfil Labour’s pledge. With £570 million now being injected into skills training provision, do we expect to deliver?
STUDENT DEMAND
It’s no question that new homes are needed across the UK but, to meet Labour’s goal, The Construction Industry Training Board estimates a huge 61,000 new workers each year will be required to build them.
The good news is that, anecdotally, we’ve noticed an increase in people turning to construction in Further Education courses across the UK. United Colleges Group is no different, enrolment figures for our Engineering, Construction and the Built Environment courses are higher than ever, having increased by 10% over the past three years.
What’s more, thanks to this rising demand, we’re able to hold open and productive conversations with local employers that enable us to develop and expand our construction offering to our learners. For example, in 2024, with funding from the Greater London Authority, we opened a new campus in partnership with Camden Council – Euston Skills Centre – where we’ve since delivered specialist courses to hundreds of learners and Camden residents in green skills, plumbing, electrical installations and carpentry.
However, expanding Further Education courses is not as easy as it sounds. Further Education trainers are hard to come by, and there are many reasons for this. For starters, working as an FE trainer is a trade off, if you excuse the pun. Teaching offers better stability and reliable working hours, but it’s hard to deny that people can make much more money in the field than they do in the classroom. Secondly, people working trades often don’t consider teaching as an option when they launch into their career. The UK government has noticed this, which is why, alongside the cash injection to Further Education skills training, the Department for Education has launched a campaign to encourage more people with industry experience to consider careers as Further Education trainers to fill vacant teaching positions. United Colleges Group helped out in this campaign, and you can check out the story of Pamela, one of our Nursing Lecturers that teaches from our Paddington Campus hospital wing, here.
LOOKING AHEAD
There is one factor that cannot be ignored as we consider the skills training environment in the shadow of the housing crisis: we are in the age of AI. This is, in fact, a positive force. Younger generations are switched on to how AI will impact the future of work and, according to Reuters, many are choosing more practical careers as a result. This is a huge positive for the construction industry. While robotics and AI is evolving rapidly and threatening traditional office work, trades like plumbing, carpentry and engineering are well positioned to withstand the AI wave and offer stable, practical careers for the future workforce.
Fixing the housing crisis is no mean feat, and United Colleges Group is committed to helping the UK Government succeed by nurturing the next generation of skilled workers. The financial support offered to help skills training within construction certainly helps to break down barriers to opportunity for our students as they navigate today’s economic climate and find career paths fit for the future.
Stephen Davis, CEO & Group Principal
Stephen is an established leader in further and higher education with over 30 years’ experience in the field. Stephen’s career spans the UK and USA, including City & Islington College where, as Deputy Principal, he showed a passion for improving the life chances of students and delivering for the College stakeholders. Now, as Chief Executive Officer & Group Principal for United Colleges Group, Stephen has worked extensively with government and employer representative bodies in the creation and implementation of skills development policy. Stephen has been an elected member of the AoC London Regional Committee for the past five years, and was recently appointed as a member of the Board of Skills Development Scotland.
United Colleges Group
United Colleges Group (UCG), rated as ‘Good’ in a 2025 evaluation by Ofsted, offers Further Education and training across five campuses at the City of Westminster College and College of North West London, in almost all vocational areas, at a variety of levels for learners of all ages. The group works with students, the community, government, partners and employers, across London and the UK, to support thousands of people in reaching their goals, whether that be starting a career, progressing onto further or higher education or developing new skills.
ucg.ac.uk
Image credit: United Colleges Group
