Experts respond to apprenticeships reforms announcement
Posted by: electime 19th March 2024
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is promising to create up to 20,000 more apprenticeships with a series of reforms including fully funding training for young people and cutting red tape for small businesses.
Following the announcement Beatrice Barleon, Head of Policy & Public Affairs at EngineeringUK, comments:
“We welcome the Government’s commitment to offer more support for apprenticeships, particularly recognising the need to support small to medium sized enterprises (SMEs) with taking on more apprentices.
“We are particularly pleased to see the focus for the support is on young people aged 21 or under. Refocusing some of the apprenticeship budget money for young people is something we have called for in our recent ‘Fit for the future’ report with Lord Willetts and Lord Knight.
“While these measures are certainly a step in the right direction, more still needs to be done to ensure our apprenticeships system is a success. Government needs to consider the recommendations put to them as to how to better support SMEs with the processes surrounding apprenticeships and how to better help young people to be able to access the opportunities available and be ready for work.
“It’s clear there is still an apparent, and growing, mismatch between levy intake and the apprenticeship budget. In light of apprenticeship numbers needing to grow to meet demand in the engineering and technology sector, we would like to see greater transparency as to how this additional money is currently being spent.”
Kelly Becker, President of Schneider Electric, UK&I:
“I welcome the Government’s pledge to create 20,000 more apprenticeships. Some of the best people I’ve worked with have scaled the ranks by starting out as apprentices. Apprenticeships offer a dynamic and fulfilling career path, fostering both technical and interpersonal skills that will set talent up for success throughout their careers.
“Crucially, these also play a key role in equipping people with skills that are vital in the burgeoning green economy. More green apprenticeships will help businesses innovate at every level, supporting the UK’s push to electrify our homes, vehicles and businesses and move away from fossil fuels.
“Greater investment in apprenticeships means greater opportunity for alternative career paths to nurture the next generation of industry workers. This will also create robust talent pipelines for key green industrial hubs up and down the country, helping to plug regional skills gaps and future proof workforces for years to come.”
ECA Chief Operating Officer Andrew Eldred said:
“99.8 per cent of electrical contracting firms are SMEs. ECA has been calling on government for some time to offer better targeted support, especially to small and micro businesses, to help reduce the various bureaucratic and financial disincentives currently discouraging them from employing more apprentices.
“We have consistently made the point directly to parliamentarians and through representative bodies such as the CBI and FSB, that SMEs need a range of support to encourage more to recruit and train . ”
For the last several quarters, survey data for the engineering services sector, which includes electrical contracting, has shown that shortages of qualified staff are the top commercial issue of concern to business owners, holding back growth.
Andrew Eldred added: “Properly addressing the UK’s long-running shortage of qualified electricians necessitates looking at extra incentives for employers to take on not just recent school-leavers, but also career changers , women returning to work, and other older individuals who have not yet completed their qualifications.
“Experienced Worker Assessments and NVQs for adult learners are the among the fastest way to increase the skilled workforce, yet in England these courses almost invariably have to be paid for by individuals or their employers. This is a missed opportunity to boost the size and diversity of the workforce . With the rapidly growing electrification of the UK, we are in a race against time.”
ECA Director of Legal and Business Rob Driscoll said:
“It’s brilliant to see the comeback of the Help to Grow Scheme which was just coming into its own as a real support to start-ups and small businesses when it was formerly withdrawn. It’s also refreshing to see the investment in apprentices as a way of allowing the next generation of talent to learn technical excellence in a live working environment as well as the investment in female-led start-ups.
“However, the increase of headcount from 250 to 500 employees for the definition of SME at a time when digital transformation reduces the need for headcount seems counter-intuitive to ensuring large firms take compliance seriously. This will move many large firms out of a raft of compliance requirements and into the category of SME compliance, when an organisation of 500 employees is, in reality, quite substantial.”
