Coastal youth find green‑job apprenticeships scarce
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- Jake Snell – after completing a 14‑person extended engineering diploma, only two cohort members secured apprenticeships and just one was in engineering; he now works on the economic development team of his local council in east Suffolk.
- Ed Miliband – pledged to train an extra 400,000 people for green jobs by 2030, targeting wind, nuclear and electricity‑network roles and promising salaries above the UK average.
- East England – hosts 44 % of the UK’s offshore wind farms, with Lowestoft’s Ness Point turbine “Gulliver” and Great Yarmouth’s £4 bn pre‑assembly site for an offshore wind farm serving as local symbols of the sector.
- Rachel Wilde – warns that “green jobs” is a vague term, that most advertised high‑pay roles such as wind technicians are oversubscribed, and that there is little concrete evidence of the jobs actually available for locals.
- Avril Keating – highlights that many green‑energy positions could be low‑skill support roles (canteen staff, porters, security guards) that are currently overlooked in policy and recruitment.
- Department for Energy – reports having created thousands of carbon‑capture and offshore‑wind jobs in Teesside, East Sussex and north Wales, with average salaries for wind, nuclear and electricity‑network jobs exceeding £50,000.
Why it matters: Coastal communities lose the economic boost promised by the green‑energy agenda because apprenticeships are scarce and oversubscribed, while the government and industry claim high‑pay roles exist; the mismatch leaves skilled youth unemployed and undermines the policy goal of revitalising deprived post‑industrial towns.
