Response to interpellation 2023/24:525 on the importance of labor market training for skills supply to shortage occupations
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
The debate concerns the importance of labor market training for skills supply. L prioritizes the university college and vocational adult education 1 and emphasizes that quality is more important than quantity. L believes that training should be dimensioned according to the labor market's needs 2, that the government should work more with instructions and follow-up 2 and that Arbetsförmedlingen should procure training based on demand 3. L argues that quality and increase must go hand in hand 3. S believes that labor market training is not seen as sufficiently important 4 and wants them to be a sharper tool for the green transition 5. S criticizes that the government cut training places 5 and questions whether the goals lead to actual jobs 4.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Arbetsmarknads- och integrationsministern Johan Pehrson (L)
Mr. Speaker! Gunilla Svantorp has asked me what I am doing to manage the shortage of personnel within the various parts of infrastructure, such as bus drivers, train drivers, excavator operators and other professional groups, using the tool of labor market training.
Well-functioning infrastructure is crucial for the entire country to thrive. The Government attaches great importance to a good supply of skills both within infrastructure and across the entire labor market.
At the same time as there are many unemployed, the shortage of labor is great in many industries. The lack of matching on the labor market is partly due to the fact that job seekers do not have the professional competence that is in demand. Education is an important part of addressing this.
The regular education system constitutes the backbone when it comes to the training of the workforce. The opportunity for education therefore needs to be strengthened to meet the continued large competence needs throughout Sweden. For that reason, the government prioritizes investments in more locations within both the university colleges and the vocational adult education so that access to such education is improved and more can quickly enter the workforce. In total, the government has allocated 1,747 million kronor for this year.
It is important that the needs of the labor market guide how education within upper secondary school and komvux is dimensioned. During 2023, necessary legislative changes were implemented to support that the planning and dimensioning of upper secondary education within upper secondary school and komvux is to a greater extent based on the labor market's needs.
Furthermore, Skolverket shall, according to its instruction, produce regional planning documents to support the planning, dimensioning, and provision of upper secondary education. The planning documents shall be a support for the principals in the work of facilitating the establishment of young people and adults in the labor market and in improving the skills supply for welfare and the business sector.
Labor market training is an important complement to regular education and one of many tools for Arbetsförmedlingen to meet employers' needs. More unemployed people need to educate themselves to obtain the skills that employers demand. Labor market training, as well as regular education, has an important role in this context.
The Government has, in Arbetsförmedlingen's regulatory letter for 2024, decided on new goals. Arbetsförmedlingen shall improve the matching and support the skills supply in the labor market, among other things by increasing the number of participants in labor market training. There is also an opportunity for the unemployed to study within the regular education system with activity support. The opportunity applies to studies at komvux, university or college, yrkeshögskola, and folkhögskola.
The government takes the competence challenge very seriously. I will continue to follow the developments on the labor market.
Gunilla Svantorp (S)
Mr. Speaker! Thank you very much for the answer, Minister!
I submitted the interpellation because, as the Social Democrats' person responsible for infrastructure issues, I travel around our country very much to visit different sectors that deal with exactly that—infrastructure. It can involve all our different types of transport. When I do this, there is one thing I am met with all the time, namely the shortage of staff.
We can also see that very many industries within this sector are creating their own training because there is a lack of training. This might be a question more for the Minister for Education than for the Minister for Employment. But if we go back quite a few years and look at the time when we thought it was important to have different parts of training in our society to offer, we can see that precisely the labor market training then was a very important tool to ensure that people who had something with them in their backpack could quickly transition. Today, it does not seem to be so.
The interpellations answer is to a very large extent about regular education, not about labor market training. It comes a little bit at the end, but almost everything in the answer is about regular education. I get the impression that labor market training is something that hangs to the side and is not seen as so important. I find that concerning, given that it is a tool that could really quickly get people into work.
The Minister for Employment says that the government in the new regulatory letter for 2024 has decided on new goals and that one of those goals is to increase the number of participants in labor market training. That is good, but the question is what kind of training it is. We have seen very many negative aspects of this with increasing various things. One can get a tick in the box if one has many participants in different places, but we must also consider what kind of quality is being offered. Are we to have participants who attend courses so that the companies offering the courses can tick them off and get their money? The unemployed may then have attended a course that has not brought them one step closer to the labor market. What kind of courses are they actually going to take? Will the training lead to jobs?
The matching today is terrible between those who are far from the labor market and what the labor market is asking for. Therefore, setting a goal to increase the number of participants says very little. It is very easy to achieve such a goal, but the question is whether the sectors in our country that have a need for labor will receive that labor with such a goal.
Arbetsmarknads- och integrationsministern Johan Pehrson (L)
Mr. Speaker! Gunilla Svantorp is very much right about that, I want to say. One should talk about quality and not about quantity. That is perhaps the reason why I mention the enormous success story that the Swedish vocational college is, Mr. Speaker, where 91 percent after some years work with what they have been educated for. That is a precision of world-class.
It is also correct that for the labor market trainings, which target a slightly different group and which Arbetsförmedlingen has as an important complement, the hit rate is at one-third. It is not as good as we would like it to be. Therefore, the government has said that these trainings need to increase but has not set any goals for how much they should increase. This shall occur with the accompanying message we have regarding increased efficiency, increased quality, and thus a better utilization of state funds.
I agree that it is difficult in many respects. Arbetsförmedlingen writes in its annual report that for many of those enrolled at Arbetsförmedlingen, there is an enormous gap when it comes to being able to take on or even show interest in the labor market trainings where there is demand.
When I now speak with Arbetsförmedlingen, I am however pleased to hear that a number of industrial technology courses have been started, a good deal of education in electrical engineering, a good deal of courses for professional traffic, specifically for both trucks and buses, and for machine operator assignments. Some of them have been completed. But in, for example, Linköping, Örebro, Umeå, Sundsvall and Västerås, people are entering to be able to take the jobs that exist.
Then the question is why we have this labor shortage. Why do we have a shortage of skilled people who can operate the machines? I usually say that regardless of whether we are to build solar parks, wind farms, or nuclear power plants, someone must excavate, Mr. Speaker. Someone must build the foundations. Someone must ensure that roads and connections are built to these. It is therefore absolutely necessary that we have these people whom Gunilla Svantorp and many within the industries and companies are demanding.
An increase in regular education within the university colleges is required, but also labor market training in the area must be offered. Arbetsförmedlingen now has a mandate to be much closer to the assessments that companies in a region make regarding what is required. That is the outcome when we have these labor market trainings for construction machinery operators, truck drivers, and bus drivers. These are important professions.
But the basis must be that more young people take this on. I said earlier that there are now better opportunities for the regions to govern. This was driven forward, not least by the Social Democrats, which was of course completely right, in order to give young people more opportunities to get jobs.
There will be amounts of forecasts about what will happen with the labor market in the future. But the only thing one knows for certain is that skilled people who can a trade of a classic nature will be needed for hundreds of years to come. Therefore, it is important that one does both. But labor market training must do its part.
Gunilla Svantorp (S)
Mr. Speaker! Thank you for the answer, Minister!
An important matter when it comes to education, whether it is regular education or labor market training, is the long-term perspective. People need to know that the education is in something that the government thinks it is important to invest in.
One of the first things we in the Social Democrats did when we took power in 2014 was to initiate a new knowledge lift. We truly showed that for us, education is priority one, two, three, four – however many times. The most important thing in life is that one receives an education that leads to a job, regardless of who you are and regardless of what you bring with you.
During our eight years, which in this chamber are often called eight lost years when I debate with the Minister's party comrades, we actually expanded by 160,000 educational places across all different sectors within the education system. It was a fantastic initiative.
What did the government do in its first budget item? You cut almost 30,000 education places across all sectors before 2023, because you wanted to lower the tax for high-income earners. It is important to remember that. Then you have put back a little bit for this year. But so far, it is not an investment. So far, you are taking back what you cut during 2023.
Where do you want to get to when it comes to long-term perspective? Do you want people to be able to build on their backpack? There are many who come to our country from other countries – they are not as many today as before – and who bring backpacks with them. They have acquired an education and done something in the country they come from. But when they come here, they often have to start over from the beginning, because what they have in their backpacks does not count. They have to start from zero. It is a waste of resources for both the state and the individual, especially for the individual, to have to redo what one once learned.
I mean that labor market training must be able to be a much sharper tool for those who carry a backpack, for those who come from other countries but also for those in our country whose work tasks disappear for one reason or another. Not least due to the green transition, some of the jobs that exist today will disappear. Then one needs to build on. But one perhaps does not need to build on with a three- or five-year university education. Perhaps a shorter education is sufficient.
Vocational higher education programs are, of course, a very sharp instrument there. But we must remember that many who take vocational higher education programs have already had a job. They were already in the labor market but needed to transition. Vocational higher education is fantastic. One can also see that we have invested in vocational higher education programs when we have governed the country.
However, one must compare apples with apples. Then one might think that it is those who are furthest from the labor market that we must invest in, not least for those shortage occupations that perhaps do not require three- and five-year higher education programs but somewhat shorter educations. It is regarding that which I want to know what the Minister for Employment intends to do.
Arbetsmarknads- och integrationsministern Johan Pehrson (L)
Mr. Speaker! It is clear that not everything the Social Democrats did during eight years was bad. I just said that it was good that they started the work that we have completed by dimensioning regular education, so that people are not deceived. One should not educate young people for professions where there are no jobs.
Quite a few forecasts are made, with or without AI, to try to see where the jobs of the future will be. We know, therefore, that the occupations and industries we are now discussing – machine operators, construction workers, and in transport – are jobs of the future and important ones for Sweden to be able to function. We cannot only have engineers and people who take us to new heights of technical productivity. We must also have people who do the work. Everyone is needed.
Gunilla Svantorp's point of entry was that Arbetsförmedlingen says that many of the hundreds of thousands of people who are registered there do not have sufficient competence to undergo a labor market training. Then one must work with that. It is about, to speak plainly, focusing on their Swedish language skills and their basic education - grundvux actually - so that they can then move forward.
Sometimes we, as mentioned, receive criticism from other Social Democrats because we do not have any high-level goals regarding labor market training. We say that it should increase. It did not do so last year. It actually decreased slightly. Then people point to the problems at Arbetsförmedlingen. They shall continue to do what they can to equip the persons registered at Arbetsförmedlingen to be able to attend these trainings. But there must also be a drive among the individuals to want to attend them. That is also pointed out.
The Swedish National Audit Office released a report in recent days, "Short-term trained job seekers' transition to regular education - mandate, operations and governance." It is a bit of a difficult read for both of us. Gunilla Svantorp's party held power for eight years, and my party has held power for just over a year. We must therefore share the responsibility for this.
But we must take the facts into account. For example, the government now argues that one should work more with instructions and follow up, and I do not believe the opposition is against that in any way. It must be explained that the person should ensure they read their basic education in order to then be able to attend a labor market training. It states in the report that there is poor follow-up on that, and many people do not do what is expected when we have provided the country they have come to.
We provide opportunities and set requirements, but they are not followed up. People do not do what is required without something else. Of course, it doesn't matter if they get another job or seek out an education on their own, but that is not what is happening; instead, they remain within the Arbetsförmedling's activities. It is a major problem.
This is not the only thing we do. The Liberals were involved in inventing the vocational college. The Social Democrats took it further, and now we are taking it to world-record heights. It is a very important accompaniment, Mr. Speaker, because we know that it provides bang for the buck. It produces results.
We also move forward with looking at the possibilities for upper secondary vocational orientation. In recent days, work began on taking in applications from pilot projects to use that model at a slightly lower level and reach the group of the long-term unemployed. They must get into jobs. It is important. When the economy takes off again, it will be even more important.
Gunilla Svantorp (S)
Mr. Speaker! I was pleased when the Minister spoke about education for future jobs. It is about time. We really need to do that. His predecessor may not have always done so. So, it is very pleasing.
This interpellation debate is about shortages within the infrastructure area. The more one learns about infrastructure, the more one realizes that almost everything is dependent on infrastructure. Whatever we are to do, however we are to move one day, we are dependent on infrastructure. The Minister was just touching on that. Whatever we are to build, it requires that some excavator operator, someone who belongs to the infrastructure area, has been there before us.
Regarding the national plan for the infrastructure area, 235,000 construction workers will be required. That is approximately 20,000 per year. It is an increase from the previous national plan of 15-20 percent. We know, thanks to the analyses that have been carried out, that there will be a shortage of 30,000-40,000 per year because the number of people retiring is greater than those entering the industry. The matching will be very important.
In conclusion, I want to highlight a systemic issue within Arbetsförmedlingen concerning procurement. If the skills shortage is an issue that arises when traveling around, the next issue concerns the procurement system that Arbetsförmedlingen deals with. They carry out huge procurements that do not fit everywhere. When does the Minister for Employment intend to change that system and divide the procurements into smaller pieces that fit, for example, Värmland, Småland, or Stockholm?
Arbetsmarknads- och integrationsministern Johan Pehrson (L)
Mr. Speaker! I will start at the end. The mission has been given to Arbetsförmedlingen to, in close cooperation and taking local conditions into account, ensure that they procure such training as there is demand for. They must not procure training for which there is no demand and which is subsequently discontinued. Then the citizens' tax money is thrown into the sea. That is not how we shall proceed. That waste is something we cannot afford. It is indecent, I think both Gunilla Svantorp and I.
One must know that a number of direct awards take place. Arbetsförmedlingen has a mandate to carry out procurements that result in more women being considered for shortage occupations, regardless of whether it concerns what we are talking about now, which concerns transport, construction, and machine operators, or something else. It is their mandate, but we also know that the procurement system is tangled. That is a mild description.
Let me conclude by saying that we live in a time of transition. It is green transition, digital transition, demographic transition and geographical transition.
You who are sitting in the stands – listen carefully now! Mr. Speaker, you are also welcome to listen. If you behave in school, do your homework and get an education, the future is yours. If you get a vocational education, the future is guaranteed to be even more yours. Will it be easy? No, but life is not about it being easy. Life is about educating yourself thoroughly and working hard. Then you get increased self-determination and greater freedom.
We will do what we can. I will do what I can as minister, and I am grateful that Gunilla Svantorp is here and pushing for more people to receive better quality in the labor market trainings. That only about 33 percent lead to employment is too poor an efficiency. That must be taken into account when saying that there should be more labor market trainings. Quality and increase must go hand in hand.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.