who have had similar experiences in the last few years. This is a fundamental issue in our industry, and UK employers and politicians have done little to address the problem and a great deal to make it worse. Software is now bein used in almost everything, from cars to aircrafts to mobile phones and what not. There is also going to be openings coming up in the health care related areas. From drug-design to inducing efficiency into the hospital management systems, all require IT. Also with the baby boomers retiring and requiring more doctors and nurses to look after them in old age, would require people who can design, maintain, improve and work on health-care robotics. I myself work for a company that is into health economics. Rather than whining people should focus on what in IT would be IN in the next few years, given the demands of the economy, changing demographics and improving technology and get the required skills rather then getting the broader degrees such as Computer Science, which may or may not give the desired rewards. Page 8 shows the "Incidence of training by industry and Occupation in the UK 2001-2009" and for "IT & Telecoms professionals trained in the past 13 weeks" this has dropped from 35% in 2001 to 23% in 2009. Possibly there are no skills shortages and business has approprately cut training; or the business response to a shortage has been to cut training; or business is creating a shortage by cutting