MINISTER for the North-west Beverley Hughes is leading a drive to unlock the talents of the workforce in the region to meet the economic challenges of the future.

The Minister said that it was vital the North-west had a highly-skilled workforce to prevent jobs being lost abroad.

She was speaking at the North-west debate on the “Talent Challenge”, convened by Business in the Community, part of a series of events being held across the country to speed up the pace of change to ensure the country is ready to face competition from the emerging global economies.

The debate in Manchester brought together key players from education, business, community and government to look at how the North-west can gear up to ensure it has a trained workforce to meet employers’ needs.

Beverley Hughes said: “The challenge we face is that within the next decade, large numbers of unskilled jobs will be replaced by high-skilled ones. We must ensure that the North-west workforce is not left behind.”