I Think the main reason for the lack of evening courses or night school is that successive governments have decided that the likes of hair dressing Etc was far more important than any form of engineering and so the Tec collage's have been closed / sold off for housing or just teach some arty farty class that would not teach you how to run a bath let alone anything useful

Nick

The sad fact is that you cant source hair cuts overseas to get a cheaper 'deal' as you can with most manufactured goods, so there is still a demand for hair dressers.

Tony

Almost right apart from the last sentence! Historically most British Governments supported Industry, for example by funding Technical Colleges, but in my youth it was bleeding obvious that far too many lame ducks were being propped up by the taxpayer. Customers liked British quality but all too frequently walked away when they saw the asking price! In some cases, like cars, items were more expensive than better made foreign equivalents.

Poor management, failure to invest, bad labour relations, low productivity, and a tendency for everyone involved to be overpaid. Didn't help that raw materials like coal and iron ore were running low, and were cheaper elsewhere in the world. Something had to break.

Unfortunately far too much British Manufacturing eventually became unprofitable, and in the 60s the politicians gradually decided it was better to dump financial basket-cases in favour of anything bringing in a few bob. All too often the baby got dumped with the bathwater, but overall they were right. Switching British talent to the service sector worked. Just as well : if my pension depended on traditional British manufacturing I'd be poor.

British Industry is as profitable today as it was during the 1950's boom. The survivors are in good shape. But they don't employ people as they used too. It's high-tech, not requiring much in the way of man-power. Ideally people freed from unproductive industries quickly find better jobs in the service sector or anywhere else making a profit. Unfortunately forcing individuals to change job is often brutal, whether it happens in the North of England, Detroit, or China. Lest engineers feel particularly hard done by, the same forces hit office workers too. My first job was in an office complex employing about 2000 people. Most of them were doing clerical jobs that could be computerised. It's a housing estate now. Very unpleasant to find yourself, your job, your mates, and a lifetime's experiences unwanted.

Big picture is it doesn't matter to the country what your job is provided it's useful. Nothing wrong with Hairdressers and Model Engineering Editors! What's essential is delivering something – anything – that other people want to pay for. If they don't buy your product, you have got to change, not them. Bad mistake to sit back and play the blame game; we are all part of the problem and we are all part of the solution.

I doubt Phillip's Open Access Course is intended to provide career training for 20th Century machine operators as did the old Technical Colleges! None the less most welcome – I wish such a thing was available in my area.

Dave

Thanks for drawing attention to this course Philip.

Curious how mentioning a course largely generates complaints there aren't any…

Neil