Bad news for the comrades, Tories have finally realised that the solution to youth unemployment and the ‘skills crisis’ isn’t to ensure every youngster leaves education with a degree, but that an apprenticeship is the answer to finding worthwhile employment.

In related news, Morrisons (9000) and Costa (6000) seem to be providing the majority of the 16000 new roles announced.

The government’s small business ambassador Karen Brady said

apprenticeships ‘transformed’ people’s lives and were now more respected than in the past.

😆

Thats a lot of tv.

What sort of “apprenticeships” are the likes of Morrisons and Costa going to provide? Nothing along the lines of City and Guilds I suspect.

apprentice shelf stacker, means they can get around minimum wage restrictions as the general public subsidize the supermarket to help them make more money.

Got to look after your donors.

Very few of these 6 month apprentice schemes result in a job, as its ‘better’ to get a new one in to maximise profits.

Google ‘apprentice’ and your home town. Some of the ‘apprenticeships’ on offer are truely shocking

At £2.73 or £21.84 a day its a pretty shocking con tbh.

https://www.gov.uk/national-minimum-wage-rates

It’s all about the stats.

Aye, that’s what I figured.

Take it easy.
Dave Cameron says

‘We want apprenticeships to be level-pegging with a university degree, giving millions more people the dignity of work and a regular pay packet.
‘We’ve already created 2.2million apprenticeships since 2010, but a future Conservative government is committed to opening up 3million more high quality apprenticeships – to help strengthen our economy and communities and give millions more people financial security.’

I didn’t particularly rate my engineering degree but it was far far better than anything a supermarket or coffee shop could offer.

FFS!

some rubbish on here – Morrisons apprenticeships are not in shelf stacking or trolley collecting, they are NVQs across the entire business, including the manufacturing business (2nd biggest food manufacturing company in the UK) and in stores (trained butchers / bakers / fishmongers – not an untrained employee with a different apron)

They’ve done it every 12 – 18 months for the last 6 years and its callmedave and mrsbrady jumping on the bandwagon to claim it for the tories

Bad news for the comrades, Tories have finally realised that the solution to youth unemployment and the ‘skills crisis’ isn’t to ensure every youngster leaves education with a degree,

I’m pretty sure it was your glorious leader Tony Blair who started the University education for everyone bandwagon.

At £2.73 or £21.84 a day its a pretty shocking con tbh.

Dunno – better than paying out £9k a year + living expenses on a degree course that may not suit a young person and they have no heart for.

It’s easy to pick on the shelf-stacker apprenticeships – but what about the ones the likes of Rolls Royce, Toyota and JCB offer.

I’ve just taken 2 guys on as apprentice Help Desk Operators. It’s a 12 month apprenticeship with an NVQ on the job and day release at college.
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For the benefit of the cynics on here I will not be discarding them after a year, rather I hope to steer them onto a career path that best suits them. In fact as soon as the 12 months is up I have already planned the next stage of their training.

Yes the money is embarrassing and if I can do anything about that after 6 months then I will.

Sorry if that doesn’t fit the stereotype but there you have it.

pretty sure it was your glorious leader Tony Blair who started the University education for everyone bandwagon.

Just as much your leader as mine.

It’s easy to pick on the shelf-stacker apprenticeships – but what about the ones the likes of Rolls Royce, Toyota and JCB offer.

I think you’ve missed my point.

What is wrong with shelf stacking? It’s that kind of employment snobbery at the low end of the jobs market which results in kids with inflated expectations on ridiculously pointless degree courses left with nothing but massive debt and wondering why nobody is falling over themselves to pay them £25k+ on day one.

The message is get out and get stuck in, doesn’t matter what it is and what it pays. Work hard have the right attitude and you will get noticed, the rewards will come, and these kinds of apprenticeships provide those opportunities.

Surely the whole point in apprenticeships is that you need several years to learn and practice the skills of a tradesman? All these other kids of “apprenticeships” are just cheap labour.

Sorry, but this is not an apprenticeship.

I’ve just taken 2 guys on as apprentice Help Desk Operators. It’s a 12 month apprenticeship with an NVQ on the job and day release at college.

Sorry, but this is not an apprenticeship.

I’ve just taken 2 guys on as apprentice Help Desk Operators. It’s a 12 month apprenticeship with an NVQ on the job and day release at college.

If that company needs trained help desk operators, how is proper training for the job not relevant?

The world has changed quite a bit since the apprenticeships of the 60s – we don’t need armies of young men trained as fitters or mechanics.

If that company needs trained help desk operators, how is proper training for the job not relevant?

Woah there tiger. Nobody said that proper training for a job wasn’t relevant. There have always been jobs where you need extensive training to do them, but to call that training an apprenticeship for non tradesman jobs is absurd.

I did an apprenticeship when I left school. It was 4 years. I got a load of qualifications, including a HNC in chemistry, during my regular 6 week block releases at college (when they were ‘Poly’s’, not ‘The University of …….’)

Some of the ‘apprenticeships’ being offered now involve as little as a weeks training.

The word is now so devalued, it is effectively meaningless!

Is there anyone on here that did an old school apprenticeship? The ones that lasted for four plus years and you finished with a proper skill.

Surely the whole point in apprenticeships is that you need several years to learn and practice the skills of a tradesman? All these other kids of “apprenticeships” are just cheap labour.

The word is now so devalued, it is effectively meaningless

All totally true , the word has been prosioituted to other uses, and theyre unsavoury, cheap labour employing people who should be paid a proper wage with proper training to do a worthwhile constructive job.

Is there anyone on here that did an old school apprenticeship? The ones that lasted for four plus years and you finished with a proper skill.

Puts hand up into the air and waves madly, did a 4 year apprenticeship, many months away from home at a specialist college, sadly closed down by the tories, skills and equipment thrown on the scrap heap, then 2 years working as a tradesman, working to close tolerances and in victorioan buildinds using mostly hand tools, we learnt metal work, foundrywork, woodwork, health and safety, and many more skills which are used every day.

Just wait until somebody figures out they can offer apprenticeships in learning how to become an apprentice.

A former employer started taking 16 year old apprentices in preference to (non-scheme) graduates about 12 years ago – all the ones I worked with there were hard working and bright, determined to do well despite not wanting to go to university.

12 years on we have a graduate in our team – bone idle, surgically attached to his smart phone and no concept of urgency or professionalism.

Apprentices were clearly better under Labour!

Don’t like him, but Blair’s plan was 50% of school leavers not everyone. He’s a potential war criminal, but at least he didn’t undermine higher education like the current lot have.

Both hands in air four year apprenticeship 1977-1981 still in engineering done everything still on tools and love it, very amusing listening to all desk driving engineers when it comes down to the basics!

50% target at uni was a pre Blair Tory idea, iirc

Is there anyone on here that did an old school apprenticeship? The ones that lasted for four plus years and you finished with a proper skill.

Three and a half year MNTB cadetship which netted me my Third Engineers ticket for motor ships of unlimited tonnage, SVQ in Marine Engineering Operations and HND in Mechanical Engineering. The maintenance grant was pretty respectable as well, about £4k or so a year IIRC.

My present employer also runs a legit apprentice scheme.

Surely the whole point in apprenticeships is that you need several years to learn and practice the skills of a tradesman? All these other kids of “apprenticeships” are just cheap labour.

This in spades. I have 4 appentices all doing various levels of NVQ and HNC one day a week. I don’t think the qualifications are at all relevant to what the lads are doing. In fact they all want to know what their next career step is. Having to explain to them that unless they leave that’s it, we don’t have positions in which they can use their new knowledge. I do have a major problem with what we pay them for the 4 days they are in work, they do the same work as the 50 year olds they work alongside.

I know it’s a cliche but I think most younger people need training in the basics of going to work, regular attendance, turning up on time, working a full shift etc. They’re all so full of high expectations about the work place that they’ve been fed but they really aren’t equipped for the tedium of your average job. Disillusionment kicks in fairly quickly and as most are forced to live with their parents through economic necessity it’s all too easy to quit.

Apprenticeships don’t resolve the fact that we don’t have enough well paid interesting jobs for everyone in the same way degrees didn’t.

The word is now so devalued, it is effectively meaningless!

University, apprenticeship or both?

Politicians will inevitably screw it up, but more apprenticeships makes much more sense that pointless degrees. I guess one of the modern versions is the internship. I normally hire one intern a year, so they work both ways.

There are opportunities for individuals to progress from Intermediate Level, to Advanced Level up to Higher Level (degree equivalent). As for duration they can vary from 12 months up to 4 years (usually more technical roles). Pay is an issue, I’ve worked in training for 10 years and always advised employers to pay more and it is up to them what they pay – some do pay the bear minimum but then some do pay a lot more. My nephew is 16 and has just started an Electrical Apprenticeship (with a well known multinational food manufacturer) starting salary £16,000 – not bad for a 16 year old.

I did a three year apprenticeship, did one week in four at a residential college for two years and learnt on the job too. Got NVQ’s, City & Guilds, a BTEC and an HNC in business.

I work outside in a hands on job, but also get to cover higher grade roles in the office, 4 day compressed week, and I earn over the average (with overtime/allowances) and on the whole I enjoy it. I’ll be honest and say the same job can be done by a normal recruit with a couple of months training before being thrown in the deep end, but they don’t have the qualifications and perhaps not as much knowledge beyond what is needed just to get the job done.

My three younger brothers all went to Uni and are now just starting their careers and I have no regrets that I pissed off my Dad by refusing to go any further than A Levels 🙂

For the benefit of the cynics on here I will not be discarding them after a year, rather I hope to steer them onto a career path that best suits them. In fact as soon as the 12 months is up I have already planned the next stage of their training.

Call Me Dave will be very disappointed to hear that. Could you not reconsider throwing then out after a year and hiring someone cheaper?

Apprenticeships have always covered more than just trades.

If I had my time again I’d do an advanced apprenticeship rather than uni, I never even knew they existed when I left school. I have met quite a few people with higher level apprenticeship and they have all been pretty darn good and smart and have had the opportunity to gain some excellent experience. I tend to have a higher lever knowledge or the more very technical kind but companies never want this high level knowledge. It is wasted. Better off having greater experience to get the job done quicker and more efficiently.

Despite not liking my degree experience the country still need lots of graduates but in science and engineering. Unfortunately its people doing these degrees that are having to go into debt because there are so many people doing shit degrees like management boosting the university numbers resulting in the need for high fees.

Surely the whole point in apprenticeships is that you need several years to learn and practice the skills of a tradesman? All these other kids of “apprenticeships” are just cheap labour.

Sorry, but this is not an apprenticeship.

Hopefully after 12 months I’ll have two guys who will be on a career path that they don’t have now. What did you do today?

Call Me Dave will be very disappointed to hear that. Could you not reconsider throwing then out after a year and hiring someone cheaper?

Most certainly not. Plan is to train these two up and then on completion of the apprenticeship help them decide whether a career in service management or a more technical role is what they want and help them move towards that. I am then hoping to start at least two more. It’s not ideal but done properly it can benefit both the business and the apprentice. Yes, there will always be those who will see this as an opportunity for cheap, renewable labour. I can’t do anything about them but I can try and make sure that the ones I take on get the best possible chances.

Again, sorry for not conforming to stereotype.

Apprenticeships have always covered more than just trades.

This plus many. The work required to achieve a level 4 NVQ is staggering and it’s a similar thing again for level 5. Level 2 is just a starting point.

We run apprenticeships mostly on the patient transport side, they last only 6 months. Yes they get paid very little but it’s allowed dozens of young people to understand how the ambulance service works. Many of then applkt and gain a position on the Emergency Care vehicles due to their experience with us. No need for years of being an appretince, as said the 60s is over. No wonder people think everyone had a job then if you spent 4 years making tea

No need for years of being an appretince, as said the 60s is over. No wonder people think everyone had a job then if you spent 4 years making tea

Never made tea in my 4 years, not allowed to do tha\t as it was seen as demeaning by the foreman,

Just remind me how long a uni degree is in some subject with absolutely no guarantee of a job or work experience along with copious amounts of alchol intake, costing the Nhs many millions in wasted resouses taxiing them around.

Tories have finally realised that the solution to youth unemployment and the ‘skills crisis’ isn’t to ensure every youngster leaves education with a degree, but that an apprenticeship is the answer to finding worthwhile employment.

In the vast majority of cases, they are absolutely correct (if they mean proper apprenticeships).

pirahna – Member
Is there anyone on here that did an old school apprenticeship? The ones that lasted for four plus years and you finished with a proper skill.

I did four years in my trade and then another year when I joined my current employer.

Never made tea in my 4 years, not allowed to do tha\t as it was seen as demeaning by the foreman,

Ah I see. You were the pie shop boy, sent everyday to fetch the lads’ lunch.