Vocational Training and British Economic Performance: A Further Instalment of the `British Labour Problem'?

Abstract

This paper compares two influential `explanations' of Britain's economic problems - one, the British Labour Problem, points to the attitudes of British workers and their unions as the cause of poor productivity, the other, the British Training Problem, points to the low level and poor quality of vocational training in the UK as the source of economic ills. The paper argues that, despite apparent differences, the two discourses are very similar, so much so that it is valid to see arguments about the relation of vocational training and economic performance as a new instalment of the British Labour Problem. Just as the labour problem was a bogus characterization of the causes of Britain's problems in the 1980s and led to unhelpful policies, so the current preoccupation with training promises to play an analogous role in the 1990s. The comparative research of the National Institute for Economic and Social Research, which has been important in spreading the notion of the British Training Problem, is critically scrutinized in a way which complements Nichols earlier examination of the endemic faults in the social scientific material which underpinned the British Labour Problem `explanation'. The paper ends by suggesting why urging an increase in vocational training has become such a popular policy in the 1990s