Jane Gratton is British Chamber of Commerce’s Deputy Director of Public Policy, leading on employment and skills, and bringing employers and policy makers together on labour market issues. From schools and apprenticeships to lifelong learning, Jane is passionate about shaping an education and skills system that supports young people to develop skills for great careers and that helps employers train and develop their workforce. Jane joined the BCC in 2017 from the Staffordshire Chambers of Commerce where she was Deputy Chief Executive. During her career, Jane has led the delivery of business support programmes – including training, exporting, start-up and scale-up – helping thousands of firms of all sizes and sectors.
Boosting skills and capacity in the planning system, particularly at a local authority level, is crucial to business success and economic growth. Firms across the UK are keen to help local planning authorities (LPAs) access a pipeline of new and upskilled talent to deal with this hugely important work.
That’s why the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), is teaming up with businesses to donate money to a new Planning Skills Fund, with the RTPI as our delivery partner.
Supported by our Fund’s founding partner, Aviva, the BCC has established a five-year industry-led programme that aims to raise £3m in private sector donations. The fund will train more town planners to work in councils throughout the UK. It will add more skills and capacity to planning departments and help unlock infrastructure investment and delivery, boosting growth opportunities in our local communities.
We’re delighted to be working with the RTPI on harnessing this support and goodwill across industry. Together, we have developed a UK-wide student scholarship programme for planning. The programme will pay the university fees for students and look to provide mentoring and work experience opportunities. In return, at the end of their course of study, each recipient would be supported to work in a council planning role for at least two years.
Over the next three years, the Planning Skills Fund will support at least 100 scholarship recipients to undertake the one-year RTPI-accredited Masters, full-time. The RTPI will broker these scholarships through existing strong partnerships with its Accredited Planning Schools.
The following courses are eligible for a Scholarship in 2025, and the RTPI is working with each planning school to prepare for the first cohort in September.
Our aim is to make a difference – providing opportunities for individuals to begin a career in planning and, at the same time, boosting planning services capacity for local business communities.
Andrew Close, RTPI Director of Education & Profession has called this UK-wide, full-fee scholarship ‘a real game-changer' and it has great potential. Universities will administer the scheme and select candidates straightforwardly through existing trusted processes. The programme is about broadening access into the profession and is focused on those who could not otherwise afford to do it. Planning really matters to business and the economy, and we want our fund to demonstrate this, attracting more people to great careers in the profession.
The first cohort of BCC scholarship students, from a diverse range of backgrounds, will commence their studies in September 2025 and will be available to work in local authorities by the Autumn of 2026. We hope to double the numbers for the year after.
The BCC Planning Skills Fund complements investment also announced by government for bursary programmes, which are aimed at building capacity and skills for local planning authorities. Our scheme has the strength of planners hitting the workforce, with a Masters-level education, as quickly as possible.
We were pleased to see a commitment by the Treasury in last year’s Budget to build on the BCC private sector fund and to ensure councils have additional funding to employ our scholars on completion of the masters course. (p.47 – section 3.27):
Spring Budget 2024
We are looking to new minsters to re-confirm that commitment from 2026 to 2028. This funding from central government is essential to unlock job vacancies in local planning authorities. This approach will directly contribute to the government’s stated objective of creating at least 300 new planners. It will contribute to the Treasury’s growth agenda, and the sixth mission to deliver 1.5m homes over the course of this parliament. It will also deliver on the opportunity mission, and it will deliver on growth.
As well as bringing in a new pipeline of skills, we hope that Year Two of our Fund will support town planning staff already working in councils to develop and upskill. The aim is to boost specialist skills that support local economic growth and directly help the rollout of government planning reforms.
Boosting skills is at the top of the business agenda and we are keen to find innovative solutions and opportunities in our local economies. We are excited about this partnership, and to be working with you all.
If you’d like to partner with us on the fund, or to find out more information, please email [email protected]
