CITB’s Local Training Groups Weren’t a Luxury — They Were the Skills Safety Net

The Government is committed to economic renewal – building new homes, renewed infrastructure, and regenerated communities. But being able to deliver this national renewal depends on having the people with the skills to get on with the job.

Since 1964, the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) has existed to make sure that training is available. Funded by a levy on construction firms, the board’s purpose is to ensure a safe, professional, and fully qualified construction industry. In a sector made up of thousands of specialist trades — from bricklayers and scaffolders to carpenters, plumbers and electricians — the levy model spreads the burden of training fairly and ensures skills are transferable across the supply chain.

The national CITB’s recent decision to withdraw funding from all local training groups across the country risks undermining that work at precisely the moment we need them the most, and when the construction sector is facing deepening skills shortages.

For years, local training groups have been the practical bridge between CITB’s national strategy and the day‑to‑day reality of small and micro businesses in the construction sector. These groups have helped companies identify training needs, navigate funding rules, source affordable courses, and build networks across trades. Crucially, they were staffed by Group Training Officers — people with deep local knowledge and long-standing relationships — who could respond quickly to urgent or unexpected needs.

Training groups also worked directly with schools and colleges, promoting apprenticeships and helping young people understand the real opportunities the sector offers. In my constituency, Exeter College is set to become one of the biggest providers of apprenticeships in the country after being granted Technical College status by the Government.

I have always been proud of Exeter’s thriving business community, with many exciting start-ups and scale-ups who rely on skilled professionals to support their work in one way or another. And it is an ambitious city, an economic centre, with so much talent and potential ready to be developed.

The groups were not simply an add‑on to CITB’s national work. They were the people who delivered on the Board’s goals.

The withdrawal of the £35,000 annual grant that supported each group may seem small at national scale, but its absence will have significant knock-on effects. Without that funding, many groups will close entirely, taking with them the relationships, local knowledge, and logistical support that helped employers keep training going, even when finances were tight.

For companies like scaffolding firms, the new system creates immediate and practical challenges. A single Construction Industry Scaffolders Record Scheme (CISRS) course can cost at least £1,500 upfront, before paying wages for the weeks spent off-site and absorbing the loss of productivity. Previously, the CITB grant was paid upfront, helping ease cashflow. Under the new arrangements, firms may only be reimbursed once every stage — course, portfolio, skills assessment — is completed. For smaller companies, that delay is not a minor inconvenience. It is a direct barrier to training staff at all.

This is how skills shortages deepen, not in dramatic collapses, but in slow, preventable declines.

CITB’s new Employer Networks may work well for larger companies with formal training teams and predictable cycles. But the feedback from SMEs is consistent: Employer Networks feel more remote, slower to organise training, and less personal than the local groups they are replacing.

The truth is that both systems have operated side by side for several years. That alone suggests there was value in a hybrid approach — one model for bigger employers, another tailored to smaller firms with very different needs. Removing the latter narrows the system and risks leaving behind the businesses least able to navigate time-consuming bureaucracy.

Training groups are not just structures; they are people. Many Group Training Officers have spent years building expertise and trust with local businesses. Once groups shut down, that knowledge disperses. If a future government or CITB leadership wishes to revive local support, it will take years to rebuild what has been lost.

The resignation of a member of the CITB Funding Committee in protest underlines the seriousness of the issue. When industry leaders believe the changes will increase the skills gap rather than close it, the prudent response is to pause and think again.

If improvements were needed, there were alternatives: a phased transition, a hybrid model, clearer accountability measures, or support to help groups evolve rather than close. Reform does not have to mean removal.

The levy model only works when levy-payers can see its value. For many small firms, training groups were that value — tangible, accessible, and tailored to the realities of working life. Removing them risks weakening the very system designed to strengthen the sector.

Britain cannot build its future without the skilled people who physically construct it. We can only succeed in building for the future when workers, trade unions, and businesses – backed by government and with effective sector organisation – all work together to close the skills gaps once and for all.