Crawley at a glimpse

Growth and Gatwick Airport

Today

• the busiest single runway airport in the world
• the sixth busiest international airport in the world
• two terminals and 90 airlines to over 200 destinations
• over 25,000 airport employees plus approximately 14,000 related jobs elsewhere
• 32 million passengers a year, an increase of 10 million passengers since 1995
• 37,000m2 of retail space
• over 216,000 tonnes of air cargo per year
• recently unveiled Pier 6, a new 197metre long, 32 metre high passenger bridge, the largest in the world

Future

• £800 million of investment in Gatwick over the next 10 years
• employment expected to grow to 27,300 over next 10 years
• emphasis on quality of airport as well as capacity, redevelopments planned
• BAA target of 40 million passengers by 2010 with 280,000 aircraft movements
• target of ’15 minute drop-to-shop’, using new technologies for faster passenger processing from arrival at the airport to pre-flight shopping

Economic Diversification and the ‘Skills Gap’

Key Sectors in Crawley (based on employment and strategic importance)

• airport and related industries (BAA, Virgin, First Choice etc)
• advanced Manufacturing (Thales, Varian, Mitsui Babcock etc)
• hotels, retail and leisure
• business support, including finance and legal (KPMG, Thomas Eggar, ASB Law etc)

Crawley Employment Statistics

• over 73,000 jobs
• 62,200 residents of working age in Crawley
• over 30,000 people commute in to Crawley to work
• approximately 3,380 businesses
• bearly 50% of all Crawley employees work for one of the town’s 63 largest companies
• 80% of all Crawley employment is full-time
• economic activity is over 85%
• unemployment is low at just 1.5%
• over 55% of all vacancies in Crawley are in the business support sector
• average gross weekly and hourly pay rates are ahead of regional and national averages at over £540 and over £13 respectively
• average household income is high, estimated to be £28,254

Crawley Skills

• level of educational attainment is below average for the county
• 25% of 16-74 year olds have no qualifications
• just 14% of Crawley residents have attained a Level 4 qualification (degree or higher)
• Crawley is ranked 24th of 67 districts in the South East region for percentage of people with no qualifications
• Crawley is ranked 58th out of 67 districts in the South East region for percentage of people with higher qualifications
• very wide variation between wards; 37% of residents in Maidenbower have achieved A-Levels or higher; just 15.8% of residents in Bewbush have achieved A-Levels or higher
• up to 7% of the Crawley population have ‘low numeracy and/or literacy rates’
• the recent Sussex Enterprise Annual Business Survey found that 24.2% of businesses found workforce skills levels to be a problem - the largest single problem identified
• research suggests that there is a major shortage regarding retail skills in the town; new programmes are underway to tackle this issue
• over 33% of Crawley workers have had on-the-job training in the last year, above the regional average and an encouraging sign of skills progress

Social Deprivation

• Broadfield, Bewbush, Southgate and Tilgate each feature in the bottom 10% of national deprivation rankings in one, or more, area(s)
• Crawley is the 199th most deprived district, out of 354, in the country
• Crawley is less deprived than most counties but is the second most deprived district in West Sussex
• out of the 354 districts in the country (1 being the most deprived/354 being least deprived) Crawley is ranked 259th  for employment and 222nd for income
• Broadfield, Southgate and Tilgate wards are in the bottom 10% of England in terms of education - Pound Hill, on the other hand, featured in the top 10% in England
• Broadfield is the 4th most deprived area in West Sussex regarding child poverty
• Broadfield, Tilgate, Southgate and Bewbush come 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th respectively in the list of the most deprived areas in West Sussex relating to education
• overall, Broadfield is the 6th most deprived ward in West Sussex