We submitted a formal response. Not because we had to, but because this is exactly why NoCodeLab.ai exists.
The tech sector has a representation problem that isn't going to fix itself. The data is stark: only 9% of people from disadvantaged backgrounds break into tech, compared to 29% for finance and 23% for law. Just 29% of UK tech employees are women or non-binary, and that drops to 21% in senior roles. Only 6% of tech employees are disabled, against 23% of the wider UK workforce.
These aren't abstract statistics. They represent real people who have been locked out of one of the most economically powerful sectors in the country, and a sector that is changing faster than at any point in history.
Why AI changes everything, and why the window is now
The arrival of practical, accessible AI tools has done something remarkable: it has lowered the technical floor to entering tech. You no longer need a computer science degree to build products, analyse data, or lead digital transformation. You need curiosity, communication skills, the ability to think critically, and the willingness to learn.
These are qualities that women and people from non-traditional professionally technical backgrounds have in abundance.
The decisions made in the next two to three years about who is trained, who is hired, and who shapes AI will determine the make-up of the tech sector for a generation. We have a window. We must use it.
But here's the risk: if the training ecosystem, the employers, and the government don't act deliberately, the old gatekeeping will simply reassert itself in new forms. AI won't automatically make tech more inclusive. It will only do so if we make conscious choices to design it that way.
AI is not just a tech sector issue
One of the most important points we made in our submission is that AI capability is no longer a specialism. It is a core business skill. Every woman in business, regardless of her role, needs access to AI literacy. The HR professional, the marketing manager, the operations lead, the finance director. All of them will work alongside AI-powered systems. All of them deserve to understand those systems, use them confidently, and influence how they are deployed.
We also raised something that does not get enough attention. As AI-powered systems become ubiquitous in client and service interfaces, in recruitment, credit, healthcare, customer service, and public sector decision-making, the consequences of bias embedded in those systems will be felt disproportionately by women, particularly women from under-represented groups. This is not a future risk. It is already present. Diversity in the rooms where AI is built is not a nice-to-have. It is a safeguard.
The five things we called for:
Our response covered all questions in the call for evidence. But five themes ran through everything we wrote.
First, prioritise mid-career women, not just girls in STEM. The pipeline focus on young women is valuable but misses the biggest near-term opportunity: women in their 30s, 40s and 50s with deep professional experience who could move into AI-enabled tech roles quickly with the right support.
Second, recognise alternative credentials formally. Bootcamps, accelerators, and AI literacy certifications are producing capable, work-ready practitioners. Without government and employer recognition of these credentials, particularly in public sector hiring, the impact is severely limited. NoCodeLab.ai holds CPD Group Approved Provider status and is registered with the UK Register of Learning Providers. We sought these accreditations deliberately, because the people we train need credentials that open real doors.
Women should be careful getting AI training from non-qualified providers
"We spend around 20 hours a week researching and stress-testing what actually works. A lot of what is out there is just teaching what is trending. Women who are investing their time and money in AI training deserve to know the difference, and they deserve better."
Sara Simeone, Co-Founder, NoCodeLab.ai
This approach is already resonating at the highest levels. NoCodeLab.ai has been invited by some of the world's leading female executives to offer one-to-one AI and automation co-build guidance. These are women who understand that building together creates genuine capability, not just awareness. It is the step that prepares them to lead AI and automation strategy within their own enterprises with confidence. That is what good AI training looks like in practice.
Third, fund multipliers, not just direct delivery. Train-the-trainer models and community-led programmes create far greater reach per pound spent. Our own Certified Trainer Programme is evidence of this. We are also working with universities including Salford and Manchester Metropolitan, where existing institutional funding enables people to learn for free on certain programmes. The funding infrastructure already exists in parts of the system. What is needed is the policy framework to join it up and scale it.
Fourth, stop measuring activity and start measuring outcomes. Participation rates and completion numbers tell us very little. We need longitudinal data: are women entering tech roles after training? Are they staying? Are they progressing? Without this, we cannot know what is actually working.
What we know from the ground
We didn't just cite research in our submission. We spoke from experience. Every week at NoCodeLab.ai we work with women who were told, explicitly or implicitly, that tech wasn't for them. Career returners who took a break to raise children and came back to find the sector had moved on without them. Professionals in HR, marketing, and operations who had never considered themselves tech people until they discovered they could build genuinely useful things with the tools now available.
Our cohorts are mixed in their motivations. Many participants are setting up their own businesses and need practical AI capability to do so. Others are building personal skills and improving their employability. Both are valid. Both represent routes into the tech economy that the sector has historically ignored.
What unlocks these people isn't a coding course. It's a shift in identity. The moment someone realises they already have what it takes, and that the tools have finally caught up with them.
Cohort-based learning matters. Seeing people like you succeed matters. Practical skills that create immediate, visible results matter. These aren't nice-to-haves. They are the mechanism.
NoCodeLab.ai is a CPD Group Approved Provider and a UK Register of Learning Providers member. Our programmes are independently accredited because we believe the people we train deserve credentials that are recognised and trusted. That is exactly the point we made to the Taskforce: alternative pathways into tech only work if the qualifications they produce are taken seriously. We hold ourselves to that standard too.
CPD Group : Approved Provider number 788587
UKRLP : UKPRN 10099811