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To counter the lack of suitably skilled people in the UK, Leicestershire-based contract electronics manufacturer Datalink Electronics has recruited two new members of staff from Poland.
Ian Wilson, Datalink Director, said: 'Datalink has had problems recruiting skilled staff from this country'.
'The telecomms industry made many workers redundant in the 1990s so many skilled technicians either retrained or settled abroad, leaving a skills gap in the UK and the Midlands in particular'.
'Our two new starters have a very specialised set of skills and we just couldn't find qualified people from the UK'.
'We have been looking for surface mount machine operators for some time and when we approached a recruitment agency to help us they suggested we look abroad'.
Datalink had 20 candidates apply for the positions and the firm travelled to Poland to interview three of them.
The lack of properly trained electronics engineers in the area led Datalink to take on two students from Loughborough College under the Modern Apprenticeship scheme.
The college funds their academic studies, but the firm has to provide specialist training to create the technicians they need.  

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