Skills, Training Employment and Digital

Our world-renowned engineering heritage has provided the legacy of a highly skilled workforce - not only in advanced manufacturing but across many other sectors.

South Ribble consistently has unemployment levels well below the county and national rates. This is due in part to the mobility and flexibility of our labour force. Over half the working population living in South Ribble travels to work elsewhere - mainly in Preston and Chorley. Similarly, around 45% of the people working in South Ribble live outside the borough a providing access to a large, mobile workforce.

Advanced Manufacturing Skills at Leyland Trucks

Educational standards are high; GCSE and equivalent results come in well above the regional and national averages, as do A level results. According the government’s official A level performance data, Runshaw College is one of the highest performing colleges - nationally.

Within 35 miles are the universities of Manchester, Liverpool, Lancaster, Central Lancashire and Edge Hill providing an abundant supply of graduates. The Knowledge Transfer Programmes and specialist sector support available from the University of Central Lancashire and other local higher education helps ensure that our businesses have access to all their current and future skills needs. The Academy for Skills & Knowledge at Samlesbury Enterprise Zone is a £15.6m investment to ensure our people have the skills ready to continue engineering and manufacturing the military aircraft of the future.

Apprentice Factory

South Ribble Borough Council Apprentice Factory www.apprenticefactory.com provides impartial, specialist support to businesses, people considering a career change and students planning their future careers, by providing a comprehensive and complete range of skills and training advice and guidance in a one-stop-shop. The Apprentice Factory offers your business impartial advice and support in finding the best solutions for skills and workforce development needs. We can help with recruitment support, local labour market information and guidance on affordable training options for your workforce. Let us save you time by connecting you directly with the right provider.

Please contact: apprenticefactory@southribble.gov.uk

Lancashire Skills Swap

Launched by the Lancashire Skills and Employment Hub to support the local business community.

The service is dedicated to helping businesses who are looking for staff or volunteers, want to train their staff or want to offer people with knowledge and expertise to work for another business.

Businesses can access by visiting the Lancashire Skills Swap page - bit.ly/skillswaps - and registering their details.

Opportunities are posted on the Skills Swap Noticeboard so you can see what is needed and what is on offer.

Skills for Work

Lancashire Skills and Employment Hub have brought together information about support that can help you get a job, and if you are employed there is help for you to learn new skills. Over 50 organisations across the whole of Lancashire are working together to make it easy for you to find work and training.

There are 100's of offers across Lancashire here to help you learn new skills or to support your health & wellbeing.

https://www.skillsforwork.info/southribble

Skills Support for Redundancy:

The Skills Support for Redundancy programme is available in Lancashire as part of Skills Support for the Workforce. The programme provides a fully funded tailored service for employers, and can support employees at risk of redundancy or who have been made redundant within the last 3 months. Support includes employability skills, CV developing, IT skills and interview skills.

For more information please email: info@businessinsouthribble.com

Preston’s College offers a wide range of job-related courses from BTECs and NVQs through to Apprenticeships, with courses tailored around the needs of employers. Preston's College is working with Lancashire LEP to offer support under the Government's Skills Support Initiative. Please call 01772 225577 for details.

Since spring 2017 the government changed the way that the government funds apprenticeships. Some employers will be required to contribute to a new apprenticeship levy, and there will be changes to the funding for apprenticeship training for all employers. The apprenticeship levy requires all employers operating in the UK, with a pay bill over £3 million each year, to make an investment in apprenticeships. You can benefit from this investment by training apprentices.

Boost Business Lancashire https://www.boostbusinesslancashire.co.uk/support/ offers a Growth Mentoring programme for ambitious Lancashire businesses. Growth Mentoring is a fully funded programme, which is delivered by Orvia and Community and Business Partners, for Lancashire business-to-business focused companies (SMEs). Support is offered from a successful business person to address the challenges that any growing business must overcome including business planning and human resource management. To check if you would be eligible and for further information please contact: 01772 429290 or email: mentoring@orvia.co.uk http://www.boostbusinesslancashire.co.uk/how-we-can-help/growth-mentoring-and-coaching.aspx

You can access Government funding to cover some of the cost of training and assessing an apprentice https://www.gov.uk/take-on-an-apprentice if you have a business in England: https://www.gov.uk/take-on-an-apprentice/get-funding

Our local colleges and training providers can offer all the support you need and the National Apprenticeship Service can guide you to the right choice through their website https://findapprenticeshiptraining.apprenticeships.education.gov.uk or by calling: 0800 015 0600

Further help still is provided by the The Lancashire Work-Based Learning Executive Forum (LWBLEF) training portal. The portal helps to make it easy for you to find your ideal training provider from the high quality work-based learning opportunities available to young people and adults within the workforce in Lancashire.