Good Employer Guide Live 2026: Skills England must work ‘hand in glove’ with migration advisory committee, says Lib Dem deputy leader

The deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats told a room full of industry members that Skills England should work collaboratively with the migration advisory committee (MAC) to address the UK’s skills shortage.

Speaking at the Good Employer Guide Live event yesterday, hosted by Building and its sister title Housing Today, Daisy Cooper, MP for St Albans, said: “While we welcome the fact that the government has introduced a skills strategy, it simply does not go far enough.

“We have been calling for the government’s new skills agency to be a stand-alone body, independent from the Department for Education, with employers and industry right at its heart. And for that skills agency to have an explicit remit to work hand in glove with the migration advisory committee, so that local recruitment and talent and overseas recruitment and talent can go hand-in-hand.”

Skills England was established in June 2025 and currently operates as an executive agency for the Department for Education. It was created to oversee apprenticeships and technical education, including use of the apprenticeship levy, and to identify and respond to skills shortages.

MAC is a non-departmental public body operating independently to advise the government on migration issues. It is sponsored by the Home Office.

Cooper described net immigration as “swinging like a mad pendulum, [which] provides instability to our economy.” She added that immigration is “now so low that construction and other vital industries cannot find the people or the skills that they need”.

During her Good Employer Guide lecture, the Liberal Democrats’ deputy leader also called for a UK-EU customs union to remedy the “lasting damage of Brexit” she argued is increasing labour and materials costs and disrupting supply chains.

She also criticised the government’s planning and infrastructure bill as a “missed opportunity” to support small-scale and self-build projects.

Building and Housing Today’s Good Employer Guide 2026 showcased initiatives across wellbeing, hybrid working, training and diversity that aim to improve talent attraction and retention within the construction and housing sectors.