Executive summary

Demand for green jobs is exponentially outpacing the available workforce—creating a rapidly emerging deficit of more than 200,000 green-skilled workers in the energy sector¹. At a bare minimum, the green talent pool now needs to double to keep pace with the projected demand²; otherwise, Labour is at risk of not having the available workforce to achieve its mission of making Britain a clean energy superpower by 2030 and capture the Net Zero "growth opportunity of the 21st century."³

As Secretary of State for the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero, you have committed to developing "Mission Control," a roadmap for achieving clean power by 2030. With a promise of creating 650,000 high-quality, well-paying clean energy jobs, it is essential that this roadmap considers how to build the workforce needed to fill these jobs—which will deliver the policies and infrastructure required for this mission.

This memo outlines policy recommendations for DESNZ and suggests immediate actions for the new Office for Clean Energy Jobs to better understand these workforce challenges.

Key factors shaping this issue

The UK skills and employment systems were not designed for the scale or pace of a mission-driven government. While most of the focus is on job creation and how 650,000 new roles will be created for a clean energy transition, in reality, a fresh pipeline of approximately 200,000 highly-skilled green workers will be required⁴, with around 4 million workers—more than one-eighth of the UK workforce—also needing to be reskilled by 2030⁵. This new workforce will then need to work across sectors; relying on partnerships, risk-taking and investment from private, public, third-sector and civil society actors to complete clean energy projects effectively.

Frankly, the UK is a long way short of having the workforce required to meet these ambitions⁶, and there are five main challenges contributing to this issue.

1. An exclusionary green talent pipeline: Information and communication failures at key decision points for qualification pathways in the education system leave young people subject to a perceived 'lack of prestige' of essential apprenticeships and trade-based careers that make up the majority of the clean energy workforce⁷. This has led to a lack of awareness of the opportunities available, contributes to the widening green gender talent gap⁸, and fundamentally, creates a range of barriers for young people to access them–especially those from marginalised and underrepresented backgrounds⁸.
2. Decreasing investment into skills: An overly complex skills landscape, with a lack of support to navigate, is making it difficult for employers to identify and engage with appropriate training programmes, leading many to disengage from the skills development system entirely. This has resulted in UK employer training expenditure to reach its lowest level since 2011⁹ and means that fewer workers have access to learning essential green skills⁹.
3. Difficulties accessing talent: Inadequate integration and coordination of the services that connect employers with workers have made it more difficult than ever to access talent¹⁰. Instead, businesses rely on informal relationships with educational institutions or their social networks. Many do not even consider assisted employment pathways because of the negative perception of the skills and attitudes of the workers who use them.
4. Difficulties retaining talent: Green jobs typically require higher-skill qualifications, so they come at a premium for businesses¹¹. This means that in an economy with a growing deficit of highly-skilled green talent, many businesses can't afford to compensate workers competitively. This leaves smaller businesses in a position where they are either employing under-qualified workers—contributing to an already substantial skills mismatch in the UK economy¹²—or losing out and unable to effectively contribute to clean energy projects.
5. Inability for long-term workforce planning: Businesses' ability to engage in long-term workforce planning has been undermined by historically confusing and inconsistent policy messages and actions¹³. This has resulted in a lack of investment in the capabilities needed for green processes and requirements, such as "green procurement," that Labour is using to shape the clean energy market.

Criteria for delivering long-term sustainable success

Labour has set out strong criteria for this mission: (1) delivering energy security; (2) protecting billpayers; (3) providing good jobs; and (4) climate leadership. Future commitments to building the workforce that will deliver these should consider two additional criteria:

• Building a just green talent supply: The skills and employment systems are not organised to efficiently provide and employ highly-skilled green workers (equally). Initiatives are needed to better coordinate and deliver the infrastructure that will create and guide clean energy workers and employers for 2030 and beyond.

Options and policy recommendations for DESNZ to ensure the workforce is in place to deliver the Clean Energy Mission

Option one: Continue contributing to existing policies and initiatives (not recommended)

1. Expand the existing Apprenticeship Levy into a Growth and Skills Levy that enables businesses to use their contributions to fund apprenticeships and approved training programmes to incentive training spend and upskilling the workforce. (work for DFE/Skills England to identify approved-training programmes for green skills)

2. Contribute to a skills assessment in partnership with DFE and Skills England to ensure that the skills needed for clean energy careers are being assessed.

   Risks and uncertainties: giving employers access to more training, in an already complex landscape, without the support required to navigate it does not address the root cause(s) of declining training expenditure. Additionally, this option comes with no guarantee employers will use it for green skills.

Option two: Understand green skill gaps by executing an in-depth Net Zero skills assessment (recommended—in partnership)