Select committee: Business, Innovation, Science and Trade Committee

Recommendation 6

Ninth Report - UK plc Published 24 Mar 2023 Paragraph 27 Addressed to Department for Business and Trade
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We note that there are numerous Ministers with responsibility for skills—from compulsory, further, and higher education to adult and in-work training. The Government previously coordinated a ‘Green Skills Taskforce’ between the then Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Department for Education. We call on the Government to consider reviving such a taskforce to grapple with the wider challenge of skills shortages in the labour market.

From: Business, Innovation, Science and Trade Committee, Ninth Report - UK plc (HC 1120), paragraph 27, 24 March 2023

Government response

The government responded to the whole report on 7 September 2023 (deadline 23 May 2023).

Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.

The Government's response to the UK plc report mostly sets out existing and planned policy on R&D reliefs, skills, regional productivity and regulation, and expressly agrees on engagement with business over regulation.

  • On R&D tax reliefs, the Government says the review is "ongoing" and it "has not yet taken a decision on whether to merge schemes", but "intends to keep open the option of doing so from 2024", with a decision at the next fiscal event.
  • On green skills, the Government points to the Green Jobs Delivery Group, established in 2022, and says Government and industry will create a Net Zero and Nature Workforce Action Plan "for publication in 2024".
  • On impact assessments, the Government is "committed" to publishing them "where appropriate" and says a reformed Better Regulation Framework will launch "later this summer". Partnerships between industry and Government on specific regulations "should be considered on a case-by-case basis".
  • Asked whether it has an industrial strategy, the Government does not directly answer, but says delivering growth in key sectors is a priority and names five growth sectors identified by the Chancellor.

Read the government's response ↗ Report an error