First. IT is a big place. Don't bet the farm on there not being shortages now because there appears to be sufficient network support people currently employed in the UK. There are major social/economic factors that are holding down both training and hiring. And the largest markets for IT are currently in deep recession or at least stagnated/anemic growth cycles. The UK may have its fill of tech talent. Good for them. But how long will no skills trainning work for them? Anyone heard of the cloud, metro, apps, all of which were just theories when we went into this recessive phase.

And unfortunately, at the higher levels of IT, it takes awhile to get good enough to affect the bottom line routinely. Though it does seem pretty easy to be bad enough to do so. You get what you pay for, in trainning, in loyalty, in longevity. If you want the best, invest in the best.