One of Transport for London’s procurement managers has outlined how the organisation is closing the engineering skills gap in the UK by using purchasing.

Transport for London’s supplier skills project manager, Tim Rudin, spoke at the LUPC & SUPC Conference about how they included employment requirements and skills into contracts.

He said that Transport for London puts these requirement into its contracts to ensure that their suppliers create employment outcomes and skills as part of business dealings with them.

TfL said that dependant on a contract’s value, it provides suppliers with a range of desirable ‘strategic labour needs and training’ (SLNT) outcomes to pick from.

Mr Rudin said that suppliers can choose from school engagement, work less job starts, apprenticeships, taster days and placement positions.

He added that TfL requires its suppliers to create one SLNT output for every £1 million of contract spend in the consultancy or services type contract, or for every £3 million spend in infrastructure and construction.

Outcomes for employment are also linked to other TfL social targets, such as London’s youth unemployment and lack of representation with regard to genders and diversity. Rudin believes that TfL is therefore trying to ‘kill two birds with one stone’.

The organisation claims that of the 4,500 jobs created by Crossrail (the new line that will run from the east to the west of London), 21% of those were filled by people who were previously not in employment. Meanwhile, TfL also stated that the project created more than 500 apprenticeships.

Mr Rudin said that the entire concept is based on the fact that when suppliers secure a contract with TfL, they have some funds that they did not have previously.

Therefore, he continued, the money paid to them by TfL will result in the hiring of new staff and subsequently leads to fresh job opportunities for people.