The changes at City & Guilds that your article describes are concerning (City & Guilds to shrink UK workforce amid £22m cost-cutting drive, 14 December). For decades, City & Guilds has helped young people and adults get the skills they need to build their lives. That legacy now feels like it’s hanging by a thread due to the reported £22m cost-cutting drive.
What’s just as worrying is the apparent shift from a nonprofit mindset to a profit-driven one. If education becomes just another business, there’s always a risk that profit comes before impact. For many learners – especially those with few other options – vocational training is their path forward. If prices rise or support is cut, it will hit these people hardest.
Sending jobs overseas might look good on the books, but it erodes our capacity to train and assess skilled workers when the country needs them most. We need more local expertise, not less of it.
Let’s not forget City & Guilds was fined last year by the regulator, Ofqual, for regulatory breaches. That track record appears to show that we can’t just trust everything will be fine. If standards were shaky before, why should we believe they’ll get better now?
This isn’t just corporate reshuffling. It’s about the future of vocational education, people’s livelihoods and whether learners across the UK have real opportunities. I hope readers, policymakers and regulators pay attention not just to the bottom line but to the real impact that these changes will have on people.
Michael Robinson
Gosport, Hampshire
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