WIREDGOV

Responding to recent articles in the national press suggesting that Lifelong Learning UK is to be included in a crackdown on 'quangos', Chief Executive David Hunter said:

"Lifelong Learning UK is a registered charity, not a quango, but judged against the quango yardstick, we pass David Cameron's test in terms of what makes a quango viable. We have specialist technical knowledge that ministers and civil servants could not be expected to have, we do not set policy and we are robustly accountable.

We are very mindful of the need for any government, regardless of its political complexion, to scrutinise the public sector and ensure that it is cost effective, efficient and relevant. But if we are to deliver government skills ambitions, and regain our competitive footing in the global economy, we must invest in developing the UK workforce to meet the employment challenges of the post-recession landscape.

Successive attempts over many years to support employers' training needs resulted in sector skills councils emerging as the best mechanism, and while there is always room for improvement there is also substantial evidence that through the SSCs, employers, rightly, are leading the skills agenda.

Lifelong Learning UK is the only employer-led skills body for the 'knowledge infrastructure' across the four UK nations, and we are closest to the skills needs of those employers. Our task is to help them deliver the skills that will underpin economic recovery, and at our forthcoming annual conference on 8 December we will demonstrate our commitment to that task. Lifelong learning, and therefore the work of my organisation, is indispensible to every sector of the economy and, potentially, to every citizen, regardless of location or background."