Government withdrawal of learning funding

The announcement by the Government to end workplace learning is a devastating blow for working people who, over the last 20 years, have had the opportunity to improve their life skills, benefiting both employers and employees. Unionlearn have been helping and supporting around 200,000 people a year across the whole of England, and deserve to be saved. Over the last ten years, the BFAWU alone has enabled over 30,000 people in England to achieve, or work towards achieving, a formal qualification.

The Government are not just taking some of the funding: they are taking all of it. They are completely shutting it down, putting over 100 people across England out of work and bringing to an abrupt end the UK’s aim of removing barriers to learning.  The UK drive to improve literacy, numeracy and ICT skills will now become a thing of the past, resulting in the inability for us to have a direct impact on employability in the country. This action will take away the potential for people to achieve and up-skill. It will also throw many dedicated people onto the dole at a time when the UK is expected to see rocketing unemployment.

What does this mean? It means:

• No more free courses
• No more redundancy support
• No more help for the Union Learning Representatives
• No more support for the working people of this country
• No more Project Workers on their sites

What can you do?

The link below will take you to an online petition. If you have already filled this in, then thank you; if you have not, please complete it. Please also share it with everyone you know, encouraging them to also sign it, to show your support for Unionlearn:

https://www.megaphone.org.uk/petitions/uk-gov-don-t-cut-union-learning

We cannot let this vital source of educational support be withdrawn without a fight!