During 2005-2006 the FBHVC undertook a survey of traders associated with, and working to support, the UK’s historic vehicle movement which is worth £3.2 billion to the UK economy. The results showed that almost 30,000 people were employed by 2,500 businesses, but the majority of these companies did have difficulty finding new staff with the right skills and knowledge.
We have now identified around 4,000 UK companies who are, in one way or another, involved with supporting the ownership, restoration, maintenance and use of historic vehicles.
At the Federation’s AGM in 2007 Tony Davies was elected as a new director with responsibility for trade and skills. Since then the Federation has been expanding on the initial work by classifying companies according to specialist services and also offering a variety of member benefits to those companies who have joined us as trade supporters.
To reinforce our influence within the UK’s political arena (that is essential to uphold the freedom to use our vehicles into the future) we will use the results of our research to prove how valuable this sector is to the UK economy. We will continue to lobby for the encouragement of training in specialist skills for future generations; it is vital to ensure the continuation and availability of such services in the future.
In October 2009 the Federation’s conference topic was ‘Trade and Skills’ which helped to demonstrate how important our trade supporters are in ensuring the ability and right of owners and users of historic vehicles to use yesterday’s vehicles on tomorrow’s road.
Trade and Skills Survey Update
The ticking time-bomb
During 2011 we concentrated our trade and skills efforts on operating a new web-based limited audience pilot scheme questionnaire. This initiative was aimed at seeking your and other European Federations’ opinions on the availability of traditional skills (bodywork and painting; trimming and upholstery; mechanical and hydraulics; electrical and unspecified ‘other’) associated with the restoration and maintenance of historic vehicles.
Initially the period set for responses was to end circa May 2011 but this was extended to the end of August when problems with some translations of the web-based questionnaire for the other European Federations were highlighted.
The initial analysis of the responses indicated that, amongst the very limited audience, there do not appear be any significant concerns about the current availability of historic vehicle restoration skills. Nevertheless, there are signs that some difficulties already exist in some areas.
Also, early in the response period, it became clear that clubs per se do not undertake much restoration or maintenance work.
So in 2012 we want to open up the web-based questionnaire to all members of all of our clubs to seek their opinions. If we can get just a 10% response then that will provide us with approximately 20,000 opinions.
I believe FBHVC’s work in this arena is still of vital importance to our historic vehicle movement. Therefore all clubs need to ask their individual members to participate in this work during 2012. We need such information if we are to ensure the continued availability of historic vehicle restoration skills in the future.
Also I believe it is essential that we engage with some of our professional traders and practitioners during the coming year to seek their views on the same subject. With their experience over a number of years and work on probably a large number of historic vehicles their opinions will be extremely valuable. A hard-copy questionnaire will be produced by January 2012 to enable us to seek the opinions of our trade professionals.
So for 2012 our strategy will have the following key objectives:
Objectives
- To seek individual owners and enthusiasts’ opinions as to where there are endangered skills, procedures (processes and documentation), parts and tools/tooling; what they are and to what extent they are endangered.
- For each club to encourage each of your members to respond to the 2012 web-based questionnaire
- To seek responses from some of our trade professionals via one to one interviews with some (about 25) of them.
Outline Plan and Timescales
- FBHVC/FIVA to provide a questionnaire for website application to solicit views from the individual members of all of our clubs by the end of the first quarter of 2102.
- FBHVC/FIVA to provide a hard-copy questionnaire for us to use to solicit views from our professionals/traders by end January 2012.
- For us to engage with our professional traders and service providers to seek their opinions by the end of the second quarter of 2012.
- Clubs to encourage individual members to respond to the web-based questionnaire during the second and third quarters of 2012.
- Automatic analyses to be provided as part of website questionnaire package.
- Key milestone – early analysis of members’ and professionals’ responses to be available for our AGM in October 2012
I understand that our trade and skills work is not easy but we must persevere and get greater commitment and hence understanding of the potential problems in the future. If we don’t succeed then our ability to own and use historic vehicles of all types in the future could be in jeopardy.
As I pointed out at the top, I believe we have a ticking time-bomb on our hands!
Tony Davies
FBHVC Director – Trade Liaison
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