The Engineering Council is pleased to announce that for the first time since 2001, the total number of individuals on the national register of Engineering Technicians (EngTech), Incorporated Engineers (IEng), Chartered Engineers (CEng) and ICT Technicians (ICTTech) has increased.  The Annual Registration Statistics 2013 report, issued in February, shows that the downward trend in the total number of professionally registered engineers and technicians has reversed and begun to climb in an upward facing direction. 

“This is a welcome outcome for UK engineering,” says Jon Prichard CEng FICE FInstRE, CEO of the Engineering Council.  “Maintaining high professional standards is key to the delivery of value to the economy.  With almost 40% of professionally registered engineers and technicians currently listed on the register now over 60 years of age, and another 13% falling into the 55-59 year age bracket, it is vital that we ensure a strong pipeline of highly skilled men and women to replace these registrants as they reach retirement.” 

This breakthrough comes as a result of the year on year increase in the number of new registrants experienced over the past six years, coupled with the number of those no longer holding professionally registered status having decreased over the past two years. Comparing the 2013 figures to those of 2007, the number of individuals achieving professional registration has risen by 93%. 

Jon Prichard adds: “Now we have reached this important milestone in terms of stemming the net outflow of skilled professionals, it is vital that we continue to focus attention on raising awareness of the value of professional registration for engineers and technicians.  We are, therefore, working closely with the professional engineering institutions to address this, in particular for technicians where we have highlighted the greatest skills gap to be filled, and I hope to be able to report further good news this time next year.” 

Other relevant statistics in the report show that registrants based outside the UK still represent 18% of the total. 

Meanwhile, the number of females becoming professionally registered continues to rise gradually, with a healthy increase of 28% in new female registrations compared to 2012 numbers.  However, females still only represent 4% of the total and it is clear that there is still a lot to be done to attract more women into the profession.