We can't afford to ignore skills

Education, education, education.

Tony Blair's electioneering statement of days gone by has become something of a clich‚, but it remains as relevant as ever - and especially to the technology sector.

Claims of skills shortages and skills gaps have filled many a page in Computing for years, and there's a difficult balance to strike between pressing home a vital issue, and avoiding a repetition that just makes people think: ' here we go again.'

But an increasing chorus of concern is leading many experts to believe that education is likely to be THE problem the IT industry must solve to secure its future.

The head of IBM's global innovation strategy tells Computing this week (page 18) that his greatest fear is a lack of talent that could prevent businesses fully exploiting the benefits of technology over the next decade.

Our Agenda Setters programme identified education as one of the recurring themes underlying the issues that IT directors are trying to tackle.

And e-skills UK, the IT sector skills council, has now concluded an extensive research project that shows prompt action is needed to avoid a potential crisis in the future that would undermine not just UK IT but the competitiveness of a UK economy that is dependent on technology.

IT employment is growing, but the number of IT students at GCSE, A Level and degree standards is dropping. The wider workforce is ageing, but more than 80 per cent of IT professionals are under 45. There is a continuing focus on women in IT, but the numbers employed have almost halved since 1999.

There are many conundrums such as these, and there are no easy answers and no quick fixes. At least now, with e-skills UK, there is a central, government-backed focus to work through. But everybody that teaches, learns, uses, implements - and writes about - IT has equal responsibility to place education and skills development at the top of their priorities.