Two local business leaders shared an overview of some of the big issues facing employers at a meeting of the Brighton and Hove Fairness Commission.
Gavin Stewart, executive director, of the Brighton and Hove Economic Partnership, and Sarah Springford, director of the Brighton and Hove Chamber of Commerce, addressed the commission at Whitehawk Library.
Mr Stewart said this evening (Wednesday 20 January) that locally the public sector accounted for about 21 per cent of jobs.
But Brighton and Hove City Council, for example, was required to save about £68 million – or £46,000 a day – from its budget. The council is expecting to shed jobs as part of its efforts to save money.
Mr Stewart said that the financial services sector employed about 13,500 people – or almost 10 per cent of the workforce.
Tourism, which is worth £1 billion a year, was sometimes overlooked. He said that 11 million visitors came to Brighton and Hove last year, up from eight million just a few years ago. There were 110 hotels, with 5,000 rooms and 9,000 beds in the city.
The burgeoning creative, digital and information technology (CDIT) sector employed about 7,000 people, with the creative industries sector worth about £400 million a year.
He highlighted the health sector and environmental industries, including the Rampion wind farm, as significant sectors and where businesses were working with the two universities in Brighton.
And, he added, the retail and leisure sectors employed about 25 per cent of the local workforce.
On the home front, the draft City Plan identified a need to build 24,000 homes by 2026 but land had been identified for just 13,000 homes.
Also there was a need for 112,000 square metres of work space but the sites identified accounted for only 85 per cent of the demand.
Brighton and Hove needs good quality office stock, he said, but out of the existing 468 000 square metres but just 3 per cent was “grade A” – the best quality.
The two universities admitted 7,000 students a year and contributed towards Brighton and Hove having the fourth best qualified workforce in the country.
But the local skills gap was exemplified by graduates working in coffee shops, blocking what would otherwise be entry level jobs for the relatively unqualified.
This wasn’t helped by poor attainment levels – for example, five good GCSEs – with a local rate below the national average for eight years.
On a more positive note, the number of 16 to 18-year-olds “not in employment, education or training” – also known as Neets – had dropped to the lowest level for eight years.
