The Aims of the Union Learning Fund

The Government's aim in creating the Union Learning Fund in 1998 was to promote activity by trade unions in support of the objective of creating a learning society and this remains a key objective of unionlearn.

unionlearn's purpose is to help unions open up a wide range of learning opportunities for their members and the Union Learning Fund will assist unions both promote learning to match learners' starting points and current needs and aspirations, but linked to personal progression. It will work closely with unions to ensure that ULF projects help to mainstream and sustain learning activity in the long term. It will raise the profile of unions and be linked to union growth in order to strengthen workplace organisation.

Key goals of ULF are to:

• build union capacity to sustain and embed work on learning and skills so that this becomes a core activity for all trade unions, in particular by integrating ULRs into workplace union organisation and by demonstrating the clear links between the learning and organising agendas for unions
• develop the key role of ULRs in raising demand for learning, especially amongst workers with low skill levels and those from disadvantaged groups
• help unions and ULRs develop a framework to provide high quality information, advice and guidance to stimulate the take up of learning and promote progression
• help unions to form active partnerships with employers and make learning agreements to tackle both organisational and individual skill needs and also address wider lifelong learning
• help unions form active partnerships with learning providers to ensure that learning opportunities are customised, relevant and delivered appropriately and that appropriate support is provided to learners
• develop union capacity to engage in effective partnership working with organisations such as LSCs, Sector Skills Councils (SSCs), Regional Skills Partnerships (RSPs)/Regional Development Agencies (RDAs), voluntary and community sector (VCS) organisations and employers
• Maximising the union contribution to the Skills Strategy and contributing to some of the actions set out in 'World Class Skills: Implementation of the Leitch Report', particularly in securing union involvement in encouraging employers to take up the Skills Pledge to invest in the learning needs of their staff up to and beyond Level 2.