Debate contribution: Skills Gaps between Young People and Businesses
Debate contribution by Ms Diana Armstrong on .
- MLA
- Ms Diana Armstrong
- Party at the time
- Ulster Unionist Party
- Date
- 30 September 2025
- Type
- Debate contribution
- Business
- Private Members' Business
- Heading
- Skills Gaps between Young People and Businesses
- Assembly identifier
- Official Report component 5142940
Read the official Assembly record
Text
The Ulster Unionist Party wants to see a prosperous Northern Ireland where the economy works for everyone by providing access to good jobs, fair wages and opportunities that are extended to all. Skills development is key. It is a natural conduit between potential and opportunity. When skills match business needs, everyone benefits: the individual, the employer and Northern Ireland as a whole.
It is right to acknowledge the success of Invest NI, which has made significant progress in the past year. Invest NI has invested £631 million in our economy across over 2,000 projects, exceeding its targets by 20%. Those projects are expected to create 3,020 new high-quality jobs across Northern Ireland. In 2024-25, 73% of those jobs paid above the Northern Ireland private-sector median wage. Yes, many of the jobs stem from existing linkages between further and higher education and industry, but that is tangible evidence of the valuable collaborative work that is being done between our education institutions and the business sector. According to the UK employer skills survey 2024, however, about 33,400 employees in Northern Ireland have skills gaps. Employers have told me that graduates often lack sufficient practical skills for the roles that they enter and therefore require significant induction training. That suggests a clear gap in identifying and developing on-the-job aptitudes, even among our graduates. We have also heard that 25,000 young people, which is equivalent to 12·4% of all 16- to 24-year-olds in Northern Ireland, are not in education, employment or training. We want to see that potential developed. The Ulster Unionist Party can see merit in the motion, but we cannot support the amendment, because what it proposes would add yet another layer of unnecessary bureaucracy. Are we not in danger of diverting scarce resources in order to create yet more agencies that would replace local enterprise partnerships and the labour market partnerships that were established under the previous Minister's subregional economic plan? Any new learning or initiatives to support skills development in Northern Ireland should feed into those established local partnerships and build on local knowledge and collaboration. We already have the Northern Ireland Skills Council (NISC) in further education and the Hospitality and Tourism Skills (HATS) initiative in tourism. We call for collaboration between the Department for the Economy and the Department of Education to develop the careers portal and take that work forward. A quick search of the Shared Prosperity Fund for Northern Ireland reveals that at least 18 agencies or programmes across the Province support skills development for the economically inactive: 16- to 24-year-olds from disadvantaged backgrounds; women; the over-50s; and those with disabilities or health conditions. The programmes offer flexible upskilling and training. That is not to say that we cannot learn from the outworkings of Skillnet Ireland, which supports over 18,000 businesses in the Republic, but why deviate from our largest jobs market, which is the United Kingdom? We must support those who are disconnected from work or education. We cannot accept persistent skills gaps when employers are crying out for talent. We must use the resources that are already in place and build a skills ecosystem that is rooted in local engagement and that targets those most in need.
533 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.
Assessment
Jev’s structured answers met the documented threshold for “not flagged”.
- Overall probability that the activity is being used to promote, exploit or escalate an identity-based controversy: 0.03 (flagging needs at least 0.70; at or below 0.30 is not flagged).
- None of the five culture-war criteria was met (each was below 0.60).
- Assessed as legitimate policy scrutiny (0.95).
- No identity-based framing was identified (1.00).
- Subject area: Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups.
- The overall probability was at or below the not-flagging threshold.
This is an AI-generated assessment of the text, made against published criteria. It is not a finding of fact about the MLA or their intentions. The Assembly record itself is the fact.
Jev’s structured answers
| Question | Probability | Met? |
|---|---|---|
| Identity framing | 0.03 | No |
| Sectarian or communal antagonism | 0.02 | No |
| Cultural grievance politics | 0.01 | No |
| Dog-whistle messaging | 0.03 | No |
| Controversy escalation | 0.02 | No |
| Legitimate policy scrutiny | 0.95 | Yes |
| Overall judgement | 0.03 | At or below not-flagging threshold |
| Option | Probability |
|---|---|
| No identity-based framing (chosen) | 1.00 |
| Reports or questions it | 0.00 |
| Criticises or condemns it | 0.00 |
| Adopts it | 0.00 |
| Subject | Probability |
|---|---|
| Sexism, misogyny, ageism and other equality groups | 0.50 |
| No identity-related subject | 0.30 |
| Disability (including neurodivergence and mental health), disabled people and disability or sickness benefits | 0.15 |
| Gender, sexuality, abortion and related social issues | 0.02 |
| Constitutional question, Brexit, the Windsor Framework and sovereignty | 0.01 |
Assessed 21 October 2026 at 13:16 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.
Disagree with this assessment?
Classifications can be challenged. A person reads every challenge, and any change is recorded publicly above with its reason.