As the quote above suggests, the education and training (E&T) system and skills policies are perceived as the means of delivering an extensive social and economic policy agenda. Two beliefs are central to current expectations about the catalytic power of E&T. First, social justice is seen as being sustained by long-term economic success and that this is best achieved through skills policy. Second, policymakers’ understandings of the functioning and future shape of the labour market often spring from optimistic readings, wherein demand for skills is rising across the board and where everyone either is, or is about to become, a ‘knowledge worker’. This Issues Paper argues that these assumptions may be either partially or wholly flawed, and that as a result attempts by policy makers to depict skills as a magic bullet, and assign E&T policy the role of a ‘get-out-of-jail-free card’, are liable to lead to disappointment. Skill often cannot support the transformatory expectations being heaped upon it.
