The St Martin’s Group has today (4th June 2025) published a new report calling for inclusive, employer-led skills reform. The report, Skills for All: Ten Key Insights from Employers, reveals that when addressing a skills gap, more than half of employers surveyed said that, in the event of a skills gaps, they typically prioritise developing existing staff over hiring externally and that a national skills policy that supports all ages and all levels would best benefit their organisation.

Based on polling carried out by Ipsos and The St Martin’s Group (SMG), and gathering evidence from more than 800 employers from two surveys across England, the report also finds that less than 10% of those surveyed selected creating more university places as the one initiative that the UK government should prioritise to help support organisations like theirs – instead, indicating a stronger preference for greater focus on vocational and technical training.

Key findings include:

• Over two-thirds (69%) of those surveyed by Ipsos declared they would support a new Growth and Skills Levy.
• A strong majority of those surveyed (62% Ipsos, 74% SMG) call for skills policy to be coordinated at both local and national levels. SMG believes this would allow flexibility and relevance across regions.
• Most employers surveyed (53% Ipsos, 70% SMG) chose flexibility over the content and structure of apprenticeship programmes.
• 55% of SMG and 49% of Ipsos respondents report finding it fairly or very difficult to recruit for positions requiring higher level skills.
• Only a third (33%) of SMG respondents find it easy to develop a young person’s soft skills compared with 58% who find it easy to develop their technical skills.