Mapping Heritage Craft The economic contribution of the Heritage Craft sector in England October 2012 Creative & Cultural Skills supports the skills and training needs of the UK’s creative and cultural industries. We deliver through our Skills Academy, a growing network of employers and training providers who are committed to the provision of high quality, industry-relevant creative education and training, apprenticeships and careers advice. We are licenced as a Sector Skills Council by the UK Commission for Employment and Skills. For further information, please visit www.ccskills.org.uk This research was sponsored by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, which supports sustained growth and higher skills across the economy. www.bis.gov.uk Creative & Cultural Skills Mapping Heritage Craft: the Economic Contribution of the Heritage Craft Sector in England CEO Prepared by TBR’s Creative & Cultural Team Pauline Tambling Catherine Large October 2012 To deliver this research, TBR worked in partnership with Qa Research Trustees and independent consultants Victoria Pirie and Sara Selwood. Paul Latham Ric Green Please address enquiries about this report to: Keith Arrowsmith Gillian Clipson Research Department Jane Glaister Creative & Cultural Skills Rosy Greenlees Lafone House Brian Kelly The Leathermarket Roisin McDonough Weston Street Jayne Mee London SE1 3HN Robin Millar Martin Penny Telephone: 020 7015 1800 Alison Wenham Email: [email protected] David Worthington www.ccskills.org.uk Table of Contents Foreword 02 Executive Summary 04 1 Introduction 14 1.1 Aims of Mapping Heritage Craft 17 1.2 Structure of the report 17 2 Defining Heritage Craft 18 2.1 Existing definitions 19 2.2 A new definition 20 3 Methodology 26 3.1 Mapping the size of the sector 28 3.2 Qualitative consultation 31 3.3 Mapping supply 31 4 Demand for Heritage Craft Skills and Knowledge 32 4.1 The size of the sector and its workforce 34 4.2 The nature of employment and the characteristics of the workforce 39 4.3 The economic value of the sector 49 5 Supply of Heritage Craft Skills and Knowledge 66 01 5.1 The sector’s training requirements and habits 68 5.2 New entrants to the sector 75 5.3 The training available to the sector 79 6 The Future of Heritage Craft 88 6.1 The size of the workforce in ten years 89 6.2 The sector’s view on growth prospects 90 6.3 Legacy and passing on skills and knowledge 105 7 Conclusion 108 8 Appendix 110 8.1 Detailed methodology 111 8.2 Detail on practices and techniques used by group 121 8.3 Learning opportunities provided by guilds and associations by group 124 8.4 In-depth interview discussion guides 132 8.5 ‘Best -fit’ SIC definition 134 9 Acknowledgements 139 Creative & Cultural Skills Mapping Heritage Craft Foreword We are delighted to present Mapping Heritage Craft, a major piece of economic research to define and measure the size and scope of work in the sector. It stems from ongoing dialogue with Heritage Craft practitioners who felt very strongly that the sector needed to be better understood. This is an often unclearly defined and sometimes hard-to-reach sector, made up of a proliferation of micro-businesses. We are extremely pleased that, through innovative work conducted with the sector itself, we are able to shed new light on this area of the economy. We are grateful to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), who were responsible for sponsoring the research and who will be keen to hear recommendations from its findings, which is our next stage of work. These recommendations will also build on the work conducted in 2009 to create the Craft Blueprint – Creative & Cultural Skills’ original workforce development strategy for the sector – which highlighted the need for further investigation into this area. The research provides evidence on the size, shape and nature of work in the Heritage Craft sector, which will engender a consistent approach to supporting its workforce in the future. Anecdotal and isolated evidence has led to a lack of awareness of the challenges facing the sector and its real size and scale. This new evidence base shows that over 169,000 people work within it, using traditional hand skills to provide products and services in response to growing public demand. The sector is set to grow in the future; we anticipate a 12% growth in employment in the period leading up to 2022. For the first time, the research also highlights the significant economic impact of Heritage Craft, with the sector as a whole contributing £4.4 billion in gross value added (GVA) to the UK economy. This is striking for a set of skills and jobs which are often considered hobbyist occupations or lifestyle choices. The work also uncovers major issues for the future of the sector which must be addressed. The sector is ageing; however, the vast majority of practitioners state that they are not passing on their skills and knowledge to a next generation. Young people will need entry routes and guidance into the sector if it is to be sustainable. Creative & Cultural Skills is committed to helping this happen through programmes such as the new Skills Academy for the Heritage sector, a new set of Craft Skills Awards, and new work to support apprenticeships in Heritage Craft. We believe that Mapping Heritage Craft has created a substantial body of evidence to inform future work to support the sector. We look forward to a period of direct action planning around Heritage Craft, involving as wide a network as possible. This report is now freely available and publicly accessible via www.creative-blueprint.co.uk, along with the rest of our research. We hope that it will be widely used by the sector and its representative associations to aid their case for support, and by policy makers and stakeholders in order to respond appropriately. Catherine Large and Pauline Tambling Joint CEO, Creative & Cultural Skills Creative & Cultural Skills Mapping Heritage Craft Those of us working in Heritage Crafts have been aware of a serious potential loss of skills for many years. In the UK, we still have world-class craftspeople and there is strong demand for their products, but many are approaching retirement without successors. The sector is characterised by large numbers of micro-businesses and sole traders, and devoting time to training or employing assistants is often difficult because of the need to prioritise craft work to make a living. Within the sector, we have been aware of this through anecdotal evidence, and, since it was founded, the Heritage Crafts Association has been calling for a survey to produce real data to confirm this. The quotations of working craftspeople in the report give the true voice of those involved in Heritage Crafts, and this is the first time that the anecdotal and qualitative evidence has been supported by hard facts and quantitative research. The overall figures are impressive. 83,490 firms in the sector employ 209,390 people in all, with a turnover of £10.8 billion contributing £4.4 billion in gross value added (GVA) to the economy. The sector is also predicted to grow, with employment rising by 12% over the period 2012-2022. These figures again support anecdotal evidence which suggests that there is strong demand for these skills, with the export market for heritage-branded luxury goods being particularly buoyant. The skilled workforce is ageing, with approximately 50% of the workforce aged between 40 and 60 02 years old. There are also more people working in the sector over the age of 60 than under the age of 25. 03 This verifies anecdotal evidence from craftspeople and highlights the lack of training opportunities and entry routes to the sector. Respondents in the survey regard workplace learning as crucial to their current skills, with 73% highlighting formal or informal apprenticeships, mentoring or on-the-job learning as being the most important. However, 63% of the workforce have a level 2 or lower as their highest qualification, which indicates that formal routes do not necessarily exist to train people. At a time of youth unemployment and when many people are looking for more meaningful work, it would be a significant loss to future generations if these businesses – almost all of which are viable and make a valuable contribution to the economy – and the Heritage Craft skills used by them were not passed on to the next generation. The Heritage Crafts Association looks forward to working with the government, Creative & Cultural Skills, appropriate agencies and with the sector to secure the future of Heritage Crafts. In particular, we want to enable the sector to pass on skills through apprenticeships and qualifications that are relevant for the sector, primarily involving bench-side learning. It is crucial to address the issues highlighted in this report and to create the conditions in which the best of British craftsmanship can flourish. Robin Wood Woodworker, Chair of the Heritage Crafts Association and research steering group member Creative & Cultural Skills Mapping Heritage Craft Execut ve Summ ary Mapping Heritage Craft Executive Summary 04 Execut ve 05 Summ ary Creative & Cultural Skills Mapping Heritage Craft Executive Summary Introduction This is the first comprehensive study to define, categorise and examine the size and shape of the Heritage Craft sector in England. To date, Heritage Craft has been a largely under-examined area of the economy. This has been driven by two main factors: the difficulty in identifying and measuring the proliferation of very small businesses that make up the sector; and the challenge of reaching a common definition around what constitutes Heritage Craft practice.