§ Mr. McLeishTo ask the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will give details of reports commissioned by his Department on (i) skill shortages and (ii) skill shortages and the anticipated impact of 1992 on sections of Scottish industry.
§ Mr. Lang[holding answer 19 May 1989]: My Department is associated with a study commissioned by the SDA which will identify the commercial opportunities and challenges for firms in Scotland arising from the 1992 proposals.
As regards skill shortages, the Department does keep the labour market situation under review. Although no specific studies of skill shortages have been commissioned recently, a report was published last year (December 1988) on new entrants to the labour market in Scotland in the 1990s. In addition the Training Agency in Scotland conducts regular surveys of Scottish industry as part of the routine process of local labour market information gathering which collect, among other things, information on skill shortages. More specifically the Training Agency in Scotland in conjunction with the SDA has recently completed a report (April 1989) on skill shortages on the engineering and oil industries in Tayside.