Giving engineers a voice in government

I was recently chatting to a colleague, putting the world to rights, and naturally we got onto the shower who are at present resident in the Houses of Parliament.

Whatever your political leanings please do not feel the need to be defensive, we ultimately concluded that we held all sides in equal contempt. However the main thrust of the conversation was related to how the mother of parliaments is currently run by Lawyers and career politicians. Both groups have something to offer but how on Earth can they make decisions on matters such as the future of industry when they have no direct experience of it?

Of course one doesn’t necessarily have to be directly involved to have a valid opinion or a good idea about something but the main parties are being led by groups within which no-one has any idea of day to day real world problems. They live in a bubble of self-regarding ignorance.

One would expect though that they at least have experts or advisors in differing fields on hand to guide them. This may actually be the case but they need to take the opinions of these people on board. For example the recent sweeping reforms by “Pob” Gove seemed to be entirely formulated by him and didn’t find any favour in the education sector that I ever saw.

Then there is the lack of passion for specific visions – rather than the broad rhetoric from all sides that tries to cover everything to some depth and only ends up covering nothing in any depth. Surely to intimately know the area that you seek to take into the future, to inherently understand its strengths and weaknesses, is to have a personal investment that informs and ignites? Instead we just have drab automatons reading from carefully prepared scripts.

What can we do about it? For a start we can engage in the political process and get involved in the parties at grass roots level with a view to ultimately seeking office.

There must be any number of engineers reading this who feel so strongly about the future of our country that they are only a step away from getting involved anyway. We are problem solvers by nature and, although inherently no more or less worthy than others regarding attaining high office because of this, it surely gives us an advantage?

Someone has to snatch back the reins of power for the wider electorate, why shouldn’t it be us who starts the ball rolling? Let’s face it; whether of the right, left or centre we can’t make a worse job of it than the current mob. So let’s get out there and make our voice heard in the corridors of power and remember, when the time comes, vote Secret Engineer for Prime Minister!

A cheer for 'The Year of the Engineer'

‘We should recognise what brilliant engineers we have in this country’. Who said this recently? Probably most of us, but it was actually Secretary of State for Transport, Patrick McLoughlin, at the Conservative Party Conference. He went on to say ‘I am immensely proud of what they achieve. And so in 2018 – when Crossrail is complete – I want us to do something special. A year of the engineer - to excite a new generation of Brunels, Stephensons and Telfords.”

As we prepare for the second Tomorrow’s Engineers Week (3-7 November), which will celebrate everyday engineering heroes and bring together employers and young people in activities to inspire the next generation of engineering talent, I rather like his idea. While I’m inclined to use more recent examples to inspire young people, I would certainly welcome a year devoted to celebrating engineering achievement, highlighting innovation and promoting the opportunities within the industry. And who knows? By 2018, in addition to Crossrail, we may even have a plan for extra runway capacity in the south east, progress on HS2 and more.

While the talk of a year of engineering was unexpected it certainly wasn’t out of place given the status science and engineering had across the party conferences. The fringe programmes offered a number of interesting sessions covering science and engineering, though as a community we could be more co-ordinated to avoid programme clashes. One discussion around the financing of major engineering projects, particularly infrastructure projects, highlighted the impact of the decline of corporate pension funds. The trend towards individual pensions means that fewer projects can be funded from pension pots leading to investment being sought from outside the UK.

It was encouraging to hear Nicky Morgan, Secretary of State for Education, talk about the importance of careers advice. The assessment that accurate careers advice is a ‘vital part of our long-term economic plan’ chimes with my long-held view that careers advice has to reflect the reality of the industry today and be presented in a relevant and accessible way. I firmly believe that linking schools with employers is key to unlocking future potential, not least because it gives a real context to what young people are learning at school.

Good careers advice must also recognise and promote different routes into the industry, which, of course, includes apprenticeships. Apprenticeships featured strongly during conference season, almost competitively so. Ed Miliband wants as many young people leaving school to do an apprenticeship as go to university and the Conservatives want to create 3 million apprenticeship places. Labour are keen to establish a quid pro quo relationship with employers who want to bring in skills from outside the EU or who want a major government contract - they’ll need to provide apprenticeships.

There’s no doubt that the commitment to boost apprenticeship numbers is a good thing, but it can’t just be about making up the numbers. We need them in the right place and at the right level. A million lower level apprentices in fast food outlets are not going to drive economic growth or rebalance the economy. I’d much rather we saw 100,000 higher level apprentice engineers each year and shape the future of our industry that way. At the very least we need to double the number of engineering related apprentices.

There’s been a bit of a spotlight on the sector over the past few weeks and it’s been good that engineering has had a high status during this time. We need to build on this. I have every confidence that Tomorrow’s Engineers Week will help inspire future engineers but we need to do even more if we’re going to get the numbers of graduates and apprentices we need coming into the sector. In the run up to the general election next year, the engineering community has the opportunity to shape the policy of the future and contribute massively to economic prosperity. We mustn’t let that opportunity pass us by.