By Marek Zemanik, Senior Public Policy Adviser at the CIPD in Scotland
Nearly a year ago, the eyes of the world were on Glasgow as it hosted the UN Climate Change Conference (COP26). One year on, governments across the world are slowly starting to take meaningful steps to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, invest in new technology and support natural carbon sequestration. This blog looks at how businesses need to adapt – from a UK and Scottish context in particular – with a focus on skills for green jobs and the vital role of people professionals in this transition.
UK and Scottish government policy
The UN Paris Agreement of 2015 – and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 1.5C Special Report in particular – led to legislative targets being introduced or strengthened. The UK Government now has a commitment to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, which is underpinned by the Net Zero Strategy, published shortly before COP26.
The Scottish Government declared a Climate Emergency in April 2019 and increased legislative targets to meet net zero emissions by 2045, with an interim target of a 75% reduction by 2030. The Government’s policy steps have been set out in the 2018 Climate Change Plan (and its 2020 update) as well as a new Climate Emergency Skills Action Plan. A range of various funds and initiatives have also been announced, some of which are outlined later in this blog.
A role for all of us
The war in Ukraine has shone a light on issues like energy security and energy price-driven inflation has led to a cost of living crisis that’s likely to last a few years. This further accelerates the need for change – both for organisations and individuals. We all have a role to play in reducing energy demand, be it by changes in behaviours or investing in energy efficiency. We will need to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels for heating in particular. And we will need to change the way we travel – drive electric vehicles or indeed not drive at all.
But these transitions will also mean huge shifts in our economies and will require businesses to adapt rapidly. This does not just mean behaving in an environmentally sustainable way; it also means big changes in the kinds of employee skills that will be needed – from offshore wind turbines or air source heat pump installations, through retrofitting houses, to peatland restoration. Construction, manufacturing and energy sectors will need to adapt, while others – like oil and gas – will likely see job losses as well as brand new jobs as the industries slowly transition.
Workforce planning and skills development are the areas where people professionals – our CIPD members – should lead the way. This will be their crucial contribution to achieving net zero.
Skills for net zero
When discussing ‘green jobs’, and what the contribution of the skills system can be, it is important to be clear about what we mean – almost any job could be identified as green if the definition is broad enough. The Scottish Government’s Climate Emergency Skills Action Plan 2020–2025 structures its definition around three types of jobs:
- new and emerging jobs that relate directly to the transition to net zero (e.g. hydrogen cell technicians)
- jobs affected by the transition to net zero that will need enhanced skills or competencies (e.g. architects)
- existing jobs that will be needed in greater numbers as the result of the transition to net zero (e.g. insulation installers).
Keeping this in mind, we believe the skills development system will need to work better in three areas:
- Transferable skills: this can mean two different things in the context of green jobs – essential employability skills like problem-solving (which are already being embedded in all apprenticeship frameworks in Scotland) and cross-industry skills (like engineering skills in oil and gas that can be used in the deployment of green technologies).
- New and additional pathways: these are needed for brand new green jobs and those where demand is likely to increase, as well as the need for more flexible delivery. A good first step in Scotland has been the creation of a digital Green Jobs Workforce Academy that seeks to connect employees with skills development opportunities.
- Reskilling policy: considering the pace of change, we will not be able to meet green skills needs from new labour market entrants alone, and reskilling will need to be a considerable part of the solution. The oil price crash at the end of 2015 has led the Scottish Government to introduce dedicated reskilling help for the sector, which now continues to evolve (the National Transition Training Fund, Flexible Workforce Development Fund and Individual Training Accounts are all getting reviewed with a green lens).
Skills policy is virtually fully devolved, which means that Scotland’s two governments can learn from each other in their pursuit of net zero. In fact, for a very global issue, climate change has a strong local lens indeed.
Regional lessons for the UK
Scotland leads the way on many aspects of the transition to net zero. For one, it has an abundance of natural resources – a recent report estimated the potential of Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles alone to provide 50% of UK’s total energy needs (and that’s not just electricity!).
But Scotland also has unique challenges that it needs to overcome – a high concentration of oil and gas jobs in the North East in particular and a higher proportion of rural properties with poor energy efficiency. In the skills space, there are lessons that Scotland can teach the rest of the UK.
The regional concentration of oil and gas has already led to some targeted interventions. The downturn in 2014 (linked to a dramatic fall in oil prices) has seen an estimated 150,000 jobs across the UK lost in the sector. As part of their response, the Scottish Government introduced the Oil and Gas Transition Training Fund, which provided around 4,000 retraining opportunities. This was then expanded nationally into a National Transition Training Fund, only to be expanded even further with the announcement of a 10-year £500 million Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray.
On top of this, there is also a £14 million North East Economic Recovery and Skills Fund specifically aimed at retraining 3,000 oil and gas workers impacted by the pandemic. There is also the Green Jobs Fund, targeting business investment in green technology. And let’s not forget the Scottish Industrial Energy Transformation Fund for low carbon projects. In fact, there’s at least another five that are open for funding from Scottish Enterprise in this space.
Of course, just the provision of a plethora of funds and skills development infrastructure is not enough – there has to be employer demand and someone responsible for navigating the options available. This is where the people profession will be crucial and we are keen to explore their views so that this short blog can become a full report.
Over the coming months, we will be speaking to a broad range of CIPD members to get their views on the policy landscape, their preparedness for future transitions and insights around workforce planning in times of rapid change. If you would like to speak to us on this topic, please get in touch via marek.zemanik@cipd.co.uk
