Research in the Centre for the Study of the Production of the Built Environment (ProBE) highlights the central role workers and unions have to play in transitioning to green economies and has informed policy across the UK, Europe, and Canada.
The green transition is inevitable – but decarbonising our economy should create employment, not destroy it.
As research by the ProBE team - Professor Clarke, Dr Sahin-Dikmen, Dr Duran-Palma and the late Professor Gleeson - makes clear, the key to making the green transition a just transition, lies in how we train and upskill our workers.
VET4LEC: Vocational Education and Training (VET) for Low Energy Construction (LEC)
Unions sometimes see climate change initiatives as a threat to fossil fuel industry jobs.
As ProBE’s research shows, new industries like Low Energy Construction (LEC) would actually create thousands of jobs, but huge leaps in global Vocational Education and Training (VET) are needed to make this happen.
ProBE’s research in this field led the European Commission’s Construction VET Social Dialogue (which promotes social partnership between European unions and employers) to appoint Clarke’s team as “special experts”.
In this role, the team, together with Professor Christopher Winch of Kings College London, has worked on the €358,680 VET4LEC project to compare VET and qualifications for LEC in ten EU Member States and establish equivalence between vocational qualifications across Europe.
Clarke’s team uncovered two conflicting approaches to VET for LEC – one relied on short, one-off courses to bridge immediate skills’ gaps, the other involved broader social partnerships, occupational profiles and curricula that embraced climate literacy.
ProBE recommended taking a holistic, interdisciplinary approach to construction VET, considering how this would work within the construction industry as a whole.
Developing Just Transition policy in Europe
The European Federation of Building and Woodworkers (EFBWW), representing 76 construction trade unions in 31 countries and a total of two million members, was directly engaged in ProBE’s VET4LEC project.
The research carried out by Professor Clarke and her team has been invaluable to the EFBWW in our policy-formation and in our lobbying towards the European Commission.
The former General Secretary of the EFBWW
A commitment to aiding in a Just Transition is now one of their six key policy positions and the VET4LEC report appears on the EFBWW website.
The VET4LEC report - which can also be viewed on the FIEC website - was shared with all members of the European Construction Industry Federation (FIEC), which represents 33 construction employers in 29 countries, and directly influenced its new policy framework.
This framework addresses the future skills gap identified in the VET4LEC report, with the Director General of FIEC highlighting the need for continued education and for “a holistic approach towards EU level policymaking in this area”.
Major construction industry associations sent 40 representatives to Brussels, in February 2020, to translate these FIEC proposals into practical ideas, such as work programmes and roadmaps to promote the initiative’s uptake and visibility.
Adapting Canadian Work and Workplaces to Respond to Climate Change (ACW)
Clarke is the Associate Director of Canada’s award-winning, international, ACW project on Climate Change and Work.
56 researchers and 25 partner organisations across North America and Europe are involved in this project, which is led by Professor Lipsig-Mummé at York University, Ontario.
Lee Loftus, the award-winning Chair of SkillPlan and an active member of Canada’s Building Trade Unions (CBTU) attests to the impact Clarke and ProBE had on these organisations.
Unions traditionally see climate change initiatives “as an employment threat”, Loftus says, but ProBE’s work “elevated the need for conversation on Climate Literacy in workplaces and trade unions” through a focus on “social aspects” like training, employment and working conditions.
This inspired the CBTU to make changes to their BC Insulators apprenticeship programme, and to research “expected energy use, new energy source and related employment outlook”.
This led to Jobs for Tomorrow – a “landmark” study commissioned by CBTU and BC Building Trades, that has been key in directing work towards a just transition in Canada.
The study found that “meeting Canada’s climate goals by 2050 could generate 3.3m construction jobs”.
As a result, CBTU has been awarded a major four-year project to embed climate literacy into the building trades, which began in 2021 and involves Professor Clarke and Dr Sahin-Dikmen.
For more information on the project, go to the ACW website.
Educating unions in the UK
Clarke and ProBE have worked directly with a range of UK organisations, including Unite the Union, the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS), and the Greener Jobs Alliance (GJA), to promote the just transition of British workforces.
The VET4LEC project has been “of particular importance in recent years”, according to Unite’s Assistant General Secretary, and has influenced the union’s own research and publications on women in construction, apprenticeships, and green skills.
In respect to strategy, the National Policy Officer of PCS – the UK’s largest Civil Service union – says ProBE “undoubtedly helped us to understand the interlinkages across energy transition and the built environment and to think about transition plans in a more holistic way”.
A member of the steering group that sets agenda and strategy for the GJA, Clarke has also contributed significantly to “a number of online modules where the expertise of ProBE has been a vital source of information” regarding the Just Transition.
According to the Secretary of GJA, 3700 participants had undertaken this online training within its first year.
Watch a video on YouTube showing Linda Clarke's presentation on retrofitting to Edinburgh Trades Union Council.
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