CITB annual priorities letter 2019 to 2020

Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Children and Families, Michelle Donelan, writes to the chair of the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) confirming the government’s priorities for 2019 to 2020.

Government has seven priorities for CITB in England for the next 12 months

1. Help the industry develop the skills required to meet the Government’s ambition to build 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s
2. Support the modernisation of the industry
3. Help the industry adapt to changes in the supply of labour and skills needs resulting from the UK’s exit from the EU
4. Support the introduction of the Government’s technical educational reforms in the construction industry.
5. Work with officials to consider how existing onsite training approaches, including the Construction Skills Fund pilot, can be used to identify alternative pathways into and progression routes within the construction sector.
6. Plan and deliver a communications programme that captures and clearly showcases the results industry Levy has achieved to improve skills and the retention of skills for the benefit of the Industry.
7. Implement the remainder of the CITB’s reform programme so that CITB is strategic, efficient and focused on future skills needs.

Aspire comment

Importantly, the letter also refers to considering actions for future years, including a review of the scope of CITB’s Levy.

It has always been a confusing point that the scope of the CITB and the scope of the Construction Industry Scheme (‘CIS’) are not the same. This has led to many companies, wholly or mainly in construction, believing that they should be on the CITB register and paying the annual levy, when in fact, the majority of their work is inside the scope of CIS, but not necessarily the CITB.

Secondly, it is bizarre that a recruitment agency’s business could be made up of;

• 51% supply of construction labour within the scope of the CITB
• 49% supply of out of scope labour, such as nurses or IT professionals etc,

yet their CITB Levy bill will be calculated on the whole supply, including 0.35% of the nurses or IT professionals being paid via PAYE.

We would welcome a CITB review of the scope of the Levy. However, as it isn’t listed as one of the seven points above, I imagine it isn’t high on the CITB’s priority list.

Currently, if a sector wants to come out of scope, representations must be made and will only be considered if there has been a significant change to the nature of that sector. Equally, sectors can request to be in scope.

For example, electrical and plumbing activities made successful representations and this exclusion was included from the 1990 Scope Order meaning such activities were in-scope prior to 1990.

Have you had a letter from the CITB? Are you paying the CITB Levy and are interested in reviewing whether you are correct to be on the CITB register? Get in touch with Aspire!

See the full letter here.