During a straw poll held at last week’s BIFIS Conference, attendees voted unanimously that the government is still not doing enough to support industry apprenticeships, with CEO Damian Walters insisting a solution must be found soon.
The data was collected from around 50 industry stakeholders, which included manufacturers, installers, national and independent retailers, training providers and the media, every one of which voted “no” when asked: “Is the government doing enough to support the industry to adopt apprenticeships?”.
When asked why she voted “no”, Hannah Hockley, the managing director of The Apprenticeship Partner, answered: “I think it’s become really cost prohibitive now, and there’s so much news that puts people off because they don’t necessarily understand what all of these recent changes mean. It’s become a bit of a race to the bottom, I think.
She continued: “Training providers aren’t widely promoted enough, and they also aren’t supported enough, so you can end up with training providers that bring poor training delivery. Businesses don’t know that, and they can end up with a really bad experience. I think, as well, when you look at trade apprenticeships compared with apprenticeships in other industries, there’s more financial risks when you take someone on in a trade role, and there’s more initial outlay as well. Essentially, there’s a lot more cost to someone taking on an installers than taking someone on for an admin position – and there’s no difference in the support that’s provided to those employers.”
When asked what she would do if she was in the government’s position, Hockley answered: “I’d make the process simpler. I’d make levy funding for employers more accessible, and have that money go towards wages, because that is the biggest hurdle. The government focuses a lot on giving incentives, but it’s wages that are the issue at the moment, not the training – that’s mostly covered.”
Addressing the attendees, Walters explained: “If you’re not aware about the levy, there are huge pots of money that are just sat there at the moment that people can get access to, but it’s not necessarily an easy process to follow. And I think that’s something that needs to change. The government did make some changes around access, so it is possible, but it’s certainly not easy.
“The problem with the government agenda is that there’s always something going on. We’ve had far too many years of instability in terms of government, whether that’s leadership, an economic crisis or even a health crisis. There’s been far too long a period of instability, and that can distract the government from making key choices on things like this.”
Walters concluded: “There’s lots of moving parts, but that’s the reality of apprenticeships. And it’s definitely not the single solution to all of the problems we face. But it is a big part of the jigsaw puzzle and one that we think is really important because we’ve got people at the end of their career who are leaving the industry, but we’re not backfilling, and we really struggle to do that. So whatever it is, we have to find the solution.”
In related news, Hannah Hockley recently spoke to kbbreview to explain what the major changes to installation apprenticeships really mean for the industry.
Also at last week’s BIFIS Conference, CEO Damian Walters claimed the fitted interiors sector is “closer than ever” to mandatory licensing for tradespeople, and warned the industry it must prepare for a future in which competence is formally regulated.