A new multi-million pound Public Health England science hub is to be built in Harlow, with an estimated completion date of 2024.

Costing around £400 million pounds, the complex will bring more than 2700 jobs to the town and is another boost to the M11 corridor between London and Cambridge, which already employs 20% of the country’s digital and life science workers.

To be constructed on the empty GlaxoSmithKline site, the hub will need trained staff to undertake groundbreaking scientific research, and Harlow College, with its proximity to the site and steady stream of highly motivated and well trained students, will be at the forefront to provide the workforce of the future.

Will Allanson, Executive Director of Business Development at the College, spoke about how well placed the College will be to provide those workers: “We’ve got lots of young people who come to the College looking for a science career, and lots of people we talk to in schools say their pupils are interested in science. What better opportunity than for an organisation like Public Health England coming to Harlow to provide that career.”

Karen Spencer, Principal of Harlow College, said: “We are delighted that Public Health England has decided to make Harlow its new home. As a College we are very excited by the prospects this creates for both young people and adults to work in the Health Sciences Industry. We took a group of our 6th form students to visit the PHE exhibition last week and talk to PHE staff - they were impressed with the range of career opportunities that would be available to them from Science, to Business, to Construction and Communications. At Harlow College we provide more than just courses, we provide careers and look forward to educating the next generation of young people to work at PHE.”

Robert Halfon, MP for Harlow, said of the new project: “Harlow will become, in terms of public health, the science capital of the world. We will be a magnet for technology, for business and for jobs.”

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