Judith Watson

Barriers to Skills Development in a Local Construction Labour Market

The literature on the construction industry suggests that the structure of labour markets in that industry sets up barriers to skills development. It is often suggested that ‘employer engagement’, leading to increased ‘buy-in’ into skills development, and investment by employers is the way to overcome these barriers. We present an example from a local labour market in South East England, with reference to an intervention in training (‘Constructing Futures’) that has brought private and public sector actors together. This example shows that employer engagement on its own is not sufficient to overcome the barriers created by the labour market structure. We suggest some essential measures to allow more workers to enter the industry and gain skills and reduce the skill shortages endemic to the industry in South East England.

The Social Effects of Travel to Learn Patterns – A Case Study of 16–19 Year Olds in London

Previous research into education and student geographies has usually focussed on either compulsory schooling or university education. This paper, using London as a case study, is an innovative attempt to understand the geographies of non-compulsory, non-university education (‘further education’, FE) which plays a crucial role in a world city labour market that requires a wide range of skills. Original analysis is provided using findings from a questionnaire, interviews with students and senior college managers and the analysis of individual student records, the Individualised Student Record (ISR) and Pupil-Level School Census (PLASC). The education geography of 16-19 year olds in FE involves selection by institutions alongside choice by learners resulting in complex patterns of social segregation and travel to learn. The division between post 16 colleges and sixth forms attached to schools is crucial with the latter, wherever they are located, taking a less deprived section of the cohort.

From Water to Land to Brownfield: The Land–People Relation in the Eastern Thames

The Thames River east of the City of London has been pivotal in the industrial and social development of England, yet it remains hidden from history. This hiding is by no means accidental but is part of a process of ‘‘othering’’ of both the area and its residents. Like other landscapes, the eastern Thames contains both human memories and an ecosystem that is functionally linked to the global ecosystem. It is in the Thames estuary that the earliest known human remains in Britain have been found. ‘‘Swanscombe Man’’ is the name given to the skeleton of a human who lived in the area during the Hoxnian interglacial of 250,000 to 200,000 years ago. By that time, the Thames had found its present course. The land bridge to the European continent disappeared at the end of the last glaciation. Quite independently of human activity, the coastline and estuaries of southern England are sinking. Today, the river is tidal from Teddington Lock above London. With the river descending eastwards, the estuary gradually opens out into the North Sea.

The Criss-Cross and the Very Cross

from the skiffle kids to inform the challenges humanity faces today? Against a twenty-first century backdrop of climate chaos, rising fascism and nuclear threats, a whole lot of rebellious creation of new cultural forms is urgently required. Bragg’s bookprovides awindow into thepower of creativity in the face of the division and domination established within official culture. Shouldn’t this inspire us to pool and use our full range of imaginative powers andDIY capacities to re-invent not only a revolutionary musical form, but a whole new revolutionary society, one that is in harmony with itself and with the planet?

Peace is an Ecosocialist Issue: Some Experiences from Local UK Politics and Suggestions for Global Action

It is difficult to comprehend why the world should be in a state of conflict more than 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and hard not to conclude that armed conflict is intrinsic to capitalism. There is a problem with the postwar settlement, forged at Potsdam and Yalta, yet it is the only settlement that we have. The United Nations is hardly succeeding, yet we cannot admit its failures without suggesting that we dissolve the community of nations and elect another one. It seems, as Noam Chomsky has long pointed out, that the USA in particular needs to have a bogeyman; if not communism then resurgent Islam. The ecosocialist implications of permanent warfare are almost too simple to state in an academic journal.

A Strong Book, but Under Stress

“Changing the earth’s climate in ways that will be chaotic and disastrous is easier to accept than the prospect of changing the fundamental, growth-based, profitseeking logic of capitalism,” writes Klein (89). The growth imperative and the coal, oil, and gas companies are the main culprits in this death-dealing logic. “The very thing we must do to avert catastrophe – stop digging – is the very thing these companies cannot contemplate without initiating their own demise” (148). And thus we continue headlong toward the wall. “We know where the current system, left unchecked, is headed. We also know how that system will deal with the reality of serial climate-related disasters: with profiteering, and escalating barbarism to segregate the losers from the winners” (450).