The Cabinet Office and the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade have awarded more than £800,000 to four training providers in Barnsley to teach practical AI skills to care staff, construction workers, small business owners and women returning to employment. The funding was announced on Tuesday 3 November under the AI Upskilling Challenge Fund.
Who gets what
Barnsley College will run mobile AI training units at hospitals, social care settings and in the wider community, offering taster sessions aimed at building confidence and supporting career progression.
Atheni will work with six manufacturing, engineering and construction firms in Barnsley, training 140 people, most of them aged 40 or over, to use AI tailored to each company’s own documents for tasks such as quotes, tenders and safety paperwork.
Fossu, trading as Ignite AI, will partner with Barnsley YMCA, Postnatal Minds and Barnsley & Rotherham Chamber of Commerce to run challenge led programmes and “buildathons” for 100 residents, with a focus on helping women returning to work and young people apply AI to problems facing local businesses.
Optimise Cyber Solutions, working with Abbeydale Training, will support twenty small businesses to adopt AI safely and effectively, moving them from basic awareness to practical use in the workplace, with an additional focus on developing female AI leaders.
What it means
The scheme is a pilot under the government’s Barnsley Tech Town initiative, which the Cabinet Office describes as a test of how central and local government can jointly design AI skills training around a local area’s specific economic needs. For workers in Barnsley, it means free, hands-on access to AI tools shaped around their own trade or workplace rather than generic digital skills courses. For the small businesses involved, it offers direct support to start using AI for everyday tasks such as tender writing or safety documentation.
AI Minister Kanishka Narayan said the government did not want people to “navigate this new era alone” and that the Barnsley projects should “set the standard” for equipping workers with AI skills. Minister for the Future of Work Kate Dearden said successful AI adoption depends on workers having the confidence and skills to take part, citing care workers, builders and small business owners specifically.
What to watch next
The government has framed Barnsley as a pilot that could produce a “national blueprint” for AI skills training across Britain. The next milestone to watch is whether the Cabinet Office publishes results or lessons from the four Barnsley projects, and whether any of the approaches, such as sector-specific AI tools for construction firms or mobile training units for NHS and care staff, are rolled out to other UK towns under the wider Tech Town programme.