On 16 October 2025, City and Guilds of London Institute (CGLI) announced the sale of its commercial awarding organisation and skills training activities to PeopleCert
cityandguildsfoundation.org/.../
To many people the C&G certification is a bench mark standard. What is next will they be selling off Cambridge or Oxford University?
As always please be polite and respectful in this purely academic debate.
Come on everybody let’s help inspire the future
I really couldn’t give a rats **** who owns City and Guilds. My interest lies in what is best for the electrical installation industry. ‘The Guilds’ was held in the highest esteem. Their name on electrical qualifications really mattered. I sincerely hope that continues. It is crucial that their electrical installation qualification portfolio remains strong and develops to embrace new technologies without ignoring the old. However, as someone who has tutored on most of the courses on their suite of electrical installation qualifications for the best part of 35 years, there is always much improvement to be made.
C&G were the long standing awards qualification body. Any trades person would always be asked for their C&G certification to prove their trade for many years. These days an electrician could be C&G or EAL. However some people will argue that C&G being primarily a certification/awards examination body should NOT be allowed to enter the training space but this is what they done when they purchased Trades Skill 4 U. People may say this is a conflict of interest even more so now as they become a commercial entity looking for financial gain.
When the operating part of the organization was sold off by the charity was the Royal Warrant also sold off?
No, and I do not think that it could have been.
Being pedantic, it is a Royal Charter rather than a Royal Warrant. AFAIK, CGLI continues in existence and presumably, continues to hold its Royal Charter.
We may not be a representative sample, but those of us who have C&G qualifications seem to be uneasy about the new arrangements.
From my experience of doing training with private companies, if you are paying for the training and then paying for the exam, then so long as you were awake, you expect to get the certificate at the end of it.
The idea of people doing the training and then failing the exam will have to stop pretty quickly.
Or you could go and spend 3 years* on the edge of the Fens and take an exam with the same institution, which is independent of government, etc. Most folk pass. Is that fair?
*More like 18 months 'cos the terms are only about 8½ weeks.
Or you could go and spend 3 years* on the edge of the Fens and take an exam with the same institution, which is independent of government, etc. Most folk pass. Is that fair?
*More like 18 months 'cos the terms are only about 8½ weeks.
It may be your comment is tongue-in-cheek, but for those who are not sure...
I'm not too sure about the place in the Fens, but being one who studied at "the other" University, I can say with confidence it drops out about 10% of its students at the end of the first year from the engineering and science subjects as they fail the moderation exams the university sets at the end of one year.
This ensures that the weaker undergraduates, the colleges they attend, and the University that sets the exams, are not wasting their time and effort. This also means no one should be slogging to the end, to then not, as you put it, 'pass'. And actually what is called a pass degree is considered pretty poor minimum effort stuff.
The terms and lectures do follow an 8 week term cycle, but the expectation is that students make themselves available for tutorials and exams in weeks zero, sometimes even week "minus one", and often into weeks nine and ten, and there is plenty to be read up on between the terms. The expectation is that students are spending time in the library, labs and other facilities and increasingly these days, on-line as well, to find stuff out for themselves, and learn, not simply be spoon fed "taught", The tutorial sessions for successful students then can be as much a discussion and asking questions as answering them.
Other places do not have the same separation of colleges and university, but the two ideas of gated progress and providing a facility for self study, are broadly the same - my son, a student at Southampton, had exams to pass at the end of the first term to proceed further, for example.
There is an important difference between training and education, and it needs to be recognised because they are solutions to slightly different ends.
Mike.
It may be your comment is tongue-in-cheek, but for those who are not sure...
Oh dear! I was a bit - my apologies. I could have mentioned that we were up in time to be on the river by 07:00 (rowing, not punting), Saturdays were working days with lectures and lab work (at least in the mornings), bank holidays did not exist (too modern!), and some supervisions (tutorials) were after dinner. Sundays were for prayers.
My point really was that there is nothing wrong or new about the notion of an independent institution which not only facilitates learning, but makes its own assessment as to whether students have reached the desired standard.
The good ship "education and training is best provided by private organisations" set sail 45 years ago...
Around the time that I graduated. :-)
And, for the avoidance of doubt, personally I do think all certified education and training should be in public rather than private ownership
Not sure that I agree on that one.
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