A NEW £2 million fund to help skills development and training for businesses in Warrington and Cheshire has been launched.
The funding package was launched at Cheshire and Warrington Economic Alliance’s (CWEA) annual Stakeholder Forum.
It will assist businesses in accessing skills development and training for which there is no existing public funding. It will be administered by CWEA on behalf of Cheshire Employer and Skills Development Ltd (CESD).
Martin Lee, chief executive of CWEA, said “We want businesses and others to come to us with exciting, creative, innovative and different ideas which will have a major positive impact on the economy of Cheshire and Warrington, and improve the skills and employment base.
“Activities which will increase and improve the sharing of good practice on skills development, and ideas which will stimulate the demand for skills in Cheshire and Warrington, will be especially welcomed.”
Enterprise, sustainable economic development and skills were the themes at the forum.
More than 130 business leaders met representatives from the area’s businesses, local authority leaders and councillors, business support organisations, the community and voluntary sector.
Speakers and delegates acknowledged that the “credit crunch” would have an impact on the area, and that in the long term developing skills and retraining staff was important.
It was reported that previously in the area downturns had started later than the rest of the UK, but the region recovered slower because it lost skilled people to London and the south-east.
Pop impresario and engineering skills champion Pete Waterman took part in a panel debate on skills. He talked about the need to educate youngsters, the rewarding careers in engineering and the work he has been doing with CWEA to develop a national railway engineering skills academy in Crewe.
Other speakers included Steven Broomhead, of the North West Development Agency, entrepreneur Andrew Donaldson, of Big Storage, Robert Davis, of EA Technology and the Energy Innovation Centre, Christine Gaskell, of Bentley Motors, and Simon Mann, of Chester Zoo.
Picture: Martin Lee, chief executive of CWEA with speakers Pete Waterman and Andrew Donaldson, and Mark Edwardson of the BBC who presented the event for CWEA.
