Because of this, I was excited to see there was a Education and Skills Bill in the Queen's Speech today. 

I have just read the Number 10 PDF about the new Bill and I have to say I am disappointed that it doesn't mention general workplace training or any measures to stimulate staff development. Training kids is important, but it will take 20 years before that has a significant impact.

Just to give you an example of what I feel the problem is:

I am pretty handy with standard MS Office software and know what sort of productivity improvements can be achieved from having more than the most basic of IT skills. However, in my experience most staff in most companies only have rudimentary knowledge of programs such as Excel and the last time they were trained was when the software was introduced years ago.

I believe the Government has a duty to stimulate the development of the UK workforce. One idea I have got is making (part of) the cost of training deductible from corporation tax. This happens in a number of other countries where the staff development culture is much stronger than in the UK.