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This chapter focuses on the vocational education and training (VET) sector. Its main objective is to offer a preliminary analysis of the roles played by the state and other social partners in different areas of VET within a number of different national systems. The chapter begins with a brief overview of vocational education and training in England and Wales and then discusses some of the policy developments within the VET sector. The author describes the different phases in training policy, from the 1960s through to the return to voluntarism of the 1980s and early 1990s, and then examines the current Labor policy towards VET, and the lack of collaboration between the social partners in British training. The latter part of the chapter addresses the state and the social partners in other European systems, focusing on Germany, and emphasises the importance of the social partnership model.