What to do about the NEET crisis

The UK has seen an unprecedented surge in the number of young people unable to find work but building engineering firms are crying out for more talent. BESA’s director of competence and compliance Jill Nicholls has a plan.

There were an estimated 957,000 aged between 16 and 24 not in education, employment or training (NEET) at the end of last year. This represents more than 12% of that age group.

Yet, employers across construction and building engineering services say that a shortage of suitable candidates for apprenticeships and other entry level positions is one of the biggest barriers to their growth and profitability.

If we need the NEETs, why aren’t we recruiting them?

The recent launch of the 2026 WorldSkills competition was a timely reminder of how our companies and industry bodies can celebrate and create more opportunities for emerging talent.

WorldSkills involves more than 80 countries and is a partnership between the education sector, businesses, and governments. It was set up over 60 years ago to help young people develop through competitions-based training, assessment, and benchmarking to support economic growth and create employment opportunities.

Technical talent
BESA is an organising partner of the WorldSkills UK competition that celebrates emerging and existing technical skills in the refrigeration, air conditioning and heat pump sectors. Talented engineers aged 16 and above are now being invited to put their skills to the test and could ultimately win a place on the UK team that will compete at the 2028 international Skills Olympics in Japan.

While this is an amazing opportunity for skilled workers in our industry to showcase their talent in an international competition, it is also a fantastic platform on which to raise the profile of sector, identify skills gaps in specific areas and help address those gaps because the competition has strong government links.

Politicians love a competition that shows off emerging talent, so this is another chance to urge them to support us and remind them that this is one of the most economically significant parts of the UK economy. Our industry accounts for 40%-60% of construction project value, up to 50% of ongoing maintenance costs, and employs half a million people.

However, there are thousands of NEETs who do not see our sector as a destination for them – they don’t see the opportunities and the rewards – and there are thousands of employers who are struggling to invest for the long-term in capturing their talent. We now have a chance to bring these two groups together.

Just before we launched WorldSkills 2026, BESA also contributed to the first industry-led comprehensive skills plan for our sector.

Working with our partners in the Engineering and Building Services Skills Alliance (EBSSA) we helped to produce a Strategic Skills Plan, which exposed the depth of our skills challenges with over 50% hard-to-fill vacancies and declining apprenticeship starts.

The Plan clearly identifies that, if these issues are not addressed, they threaten future capacity to deliver on the Government’s housing and infrastructure targets, as well as the transition to net zero.

One of our biggest achievements is being able to present a collective voice to government, regional authorities and local skills partnerships for employers right across the sector. This will be crucial to removing the barriers that prevent building services firms from training, upskilling and investing in a workforce of the future, worthy of our aspirations for a better, safer and more energy efficient built environment.

We have made precisely targeted recommendations to the government and to the industry which are listed below, but the over-arching message is that we need to sweep away the things that continue to work against deep-rooted investment by employers in recruitment and training.

It is expensive to employ and train people, but it is even more expensive if we don’t. Government can help, improved training provision can also help, but even more importantly there needs to be a change of focus by both employers and thousands of highly talented young people currently wasting their potential.

Together, we can sort this out.

The EBSSA Sector Skills Plan ten recommendations to Government and industry

1. Formally Recognise EBSSA: As the lead vehicle for convening E&BS input into skills policy design and workforce planning.
2. Use Sector-Led Labour Market Intelligence: Work with EBSSA and its members to maximise the benefits of sector-specific data and analysis.
3. Support SMEs: Boost financial incentives and practical support to help small businesses recruit, train, and retain workers.
4. Strengthen Skills Requirements in Contracts: Include effective skills and employment targets in public and private sector contracts.
5. Review Worker Status: Align employment rights reforms with tax and NI reform to reduce reliance on casual labour and encourage investment in training.
6. Protect and Expand Industry-Recognised Training Routes: Work with EBSSA to safeguard and grow industry-valued apprenticeships, NVQs, and experienced worker assessment routes.
7. Reprioritise Adult Upskilling: Improve funding and access to adult NVQ and experienced worker assessment routes.
8. Develop a National Installer Skills Matrix: Clarify and rationalise skills requirements for energy efficiency and low-carbon technologies.
9. Boost Tutor and Assessor Capacity: Recruit and retain more qualified staff to deliver high quality industry-recognised training.
10. Improve Progression Rates from Classroom-Based Courses: Prioritise learners moving from classroom courses into industry-recognised training.

For more information about the WorldSkills competition and to enter now visit BESA’s WorldSkills Competition page.