Multi £million skills school could be built near Gloucester Quays
According to the Government the UK needs 250,000 additional construction workers by 2028. Raikes has learned about plans to build a multi-million construction school in the heart of Gloucester.
Dear reader,
Welcome to Thursday’s edition of The Raikes Journal.
Today we continue what has become something of a theme for the last three stories - discussing the challenges around skills and what is being done here in Gloucestershire to overcome.
On Friday we took a look at how nuclear power could become a major catalyst for growth here in the county, and the demand that would then create in the construction and engineering sectors - admittedly, not bad challenges to have.
And on Monday, with the help of Gloucestershire College, CyNam, North Tower Consulting, CSA Cyber and Cyber First, we looked at the complex situation in the cyber sector - and how much incredible work was being done to give businesses confidence to embrace more entry-level opportunities. Something many think will be the game changer.
Today we’re looking at construction in particular, not by way of one of our usual analysis pieces, but with a more straighforward news story - one which shows how despite a difficult financial climate made more uncertain by the devolution of local Government, one organisation is close to officially unveiling a hugely ambitious multi-million pound plan to supercharge training here in the county.
A decision on how that proceeds takes place tonight (Thursday, 6 February 2025).
You might say that same organisation is the one that started the regeneration of Gloucester Quays - certainly it was the first major organisation to invest there, and it continues to forge strong and effective relationships with businesses, ones that inform its every move. We reveal all below.
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Multi £million skills school could be built near Gloucester Quays
According to the Government the UK needs 250,000 additional construction workers by 2028. Raikes has learned about plans to build a multi-million construction school in the heart of Gloucester.
By Andrew Merrell.
Just three months after a major new £5 million construction school was opened in Cheltenham at Gloucestershire College The Raikes Journal can reveal plans are afoot for to build another, not far from Gloucester Quays.
When the college opened its new school at its Princess Elizabeth Way campus in October 2024, to train the next generation in the trades, the Construction Industry Training Board was already predicting the sector would need an extra 251,500 more workers by 2028.
It was a backdrop acknowledged Matthew Burgess, principal of Gloucestershire College, when he officially opened the facility.
And one which helps explain the demand that has led to the until-now secret project to build another construction school in the county. We reveal who is behind it, the architect involved and where it is below.
“We have no shortage of demand for construction courses; the limiting factors are facilities and recruiting staff,” said Burgess, who was already presiding over considerable construction skills facilities at the campus, as well as its sites in Gloucester and Cinderford.
“Locally, there are some big projects happening, like the Golden Valley housing scheme, the M5 junction 10 upgrade, and the Gloucester Forum project.”
Explaining where the confidence was coming from that the bold investment made sense, he said: “Locally, there are some big projects happening, like the Golden Valley housing scheme, the M5 junction 10 upgrade, and the Gloucester Forum project.”
The Forum project being Gloucester City Council’s fast-emerging £100 million redevelopment of the King’s Quarter area between the railway station and King’s Square and the Golden Valley being the £1 billion cyber-focused tech business park and 1,000 homes planned for land beside GCHQ.
Since then, the very real possibility of Oldbury and Berkeley becoming a serious focus for the next generation of nuclear power has also made people think even harder about what impact that will have on the construction sector.
That is not just in terms of the workers it will require to build it, but how much skilled labour it will draw out of the market and what impact that will have on other developments.
All of which helps explain why, even in an era when no obvious investment is available and devolution could potentially disrupt future funding decisions on a local level for the foreseeable, the college remains ambitious.
It is the college behind the latest plans to expand its training facilities still further, and they will dwarf the Cheltenham site and double the foorprint of the city campus in one move.
Andy Bates, Gloucestershire College’s chief financial officer, revealed the plans exclusively to Raikes as we discussed skills and how the college was determined to listen to what business wanted and deliver.
“Construction (as a sector) remains massive. We obviously have our new centre in Cheltenham,” said Bates.
And all three of its campuses are already well-established key schools for electrical, plumbing, bricklaying and carpentry.
“But we are also progressing with plans for Gloucester to open a substantial addition to its construction school too.”
Where is the new school going to be?
The college owns the business park on which its Gloucester Campus sits and the five units directly in front of the college, currently taken up by private businesses, would form the skeleton of the new 3,000 square metre development.
How advanced is the project?
“Roberts Limbrick (the Gloucester-headquartered architect) has drawn up plans for us to extend. It will be two storeys and we would extend out the front so it looks like one building rather than five, and there is also room for a sixth unit too.”
That would be to the West of the site, close to the junction of Llanthony Road, that runs past the college from the Quays, with the A430 that runs from Hempsted to Alney Island.
“We will be taking that to the governors this Thursday (today) and asking them for £50,000 to get that to full planning.
“We have spoken to the city council and the objective would be to get full planning permission together and then we will look to see if we can fund it. We think it will be about a £6 million project.
“That’s how we built the Cheltenham school.”
It is understood the school would extend the college’s capacity by an extra 500 learners a year with a focus on the trades, plumbing (including heat pumps), bricklaying, carpentry (including modular building) and electrical (including solar panels and EV charging) and retrofit insulation.
It would also slot in neatly to a growing focus on what the college calls green skills.
“It is the right part of the city – there are good transport links, which helps the younger demographic who find it difficult to travel distances to train.
“The demographic of young people coming through will continue for the next few years. We think we have a good five years of solid growth and we have demand for industry. People are continuing to retire from the sector. It continues to need new staff.”
We mentioned devolution earlier - the pending reorganisation of local government.
Bates said it was unclear how that would impact the college’s independence going forward and its ability to make fleet-of-foot decisions.
In other areas that already have a Metro-mayor - an all-powerful mayor, of the kind Gloucestershire may end up with - it is unclear how independent its decision-making will remain and how much it will be dictated to by any new administration.
Read more: How Gloucestershire is solving the construction skills conundrum