Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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193. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills his views on the areas that have been highlighted as having skills shortages by the skills and labour market research unit, such as business administration and management, the green economy, financial services, information technology, manufacturing, engineering, sales, marketing and transport; his plans to tackle these skills shortages; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2996/17]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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The Action Plan for Education 2016 – 2019 provides a key statement on the reform agenda across the education and training system. The Plan contains a range of actions to be implemented with particular focus on disadvantage, skills needs, and continuous improvement within the education service.

A key objective of this Plan is to address the identified skills needs across key priority sectors of the economy identified by the SLMRU. These sectors include Financial Services, Manufacturing and ICT, Biopharma, Medtech and others.  

Launched in 2016 the National Skills Strategy has over 120 Actions involving over 50 stakeholders, the purpose of the National Skills Strategy 2025 is to provide a framework for skills development that will help drive Ireland’s growth both economically and societally over the next decade. Included in the actions in the Strategy is the creation of a new National Skills Council. The Council, when established shortly, will oversee research and advise on prioritisation and delivery of identified skills needs. Skills information from the EGFSN, the SLMRU and the recently established Regional Skills Fora will feed into the work of the Council.

Within the Further Education and Training (FET) sector, significant improvements have been made in the planning and funding of provision since the publication of the FET Strategy in 2014.  Education and Training Boards engage in a service planning process annually against a range of detailed parameters set by SOLAS. This process has been refined and improved each year and includes the use of strengthened labour market data provided by the SLMRU to ensure that the skill needs of learners and enterprise are met.