UK unemployment is constantly hitting the headlines as it hovers around the 2 million mark. It’s no one’s idea of good news and with companies laying off more staff, it seems that the idea of hiring is far from anyone’s mind. Yet faced with the pressure and competition, ensuring you have the best staff available is essential. Gordon Brown has recently pledged his commitment to creating an additional 35,000 apprenticeships across the UK, which could help your business thrive through the downturn. In this live WebTV show you can find out just how an apprenticeship scheme can work for you and your company.

Research by the Learning & Skills Council shows that UK businesses agree that apprentices are crucial during the economic crisis. As well as generating greater productivity, apprenticeships boost employee motivation and job satisfaction. Typically taking between one and four years to complete, apprenticeships could be the key to building your business through the recession.

When we think of apprenticeships we tend to think of the male dominated trade industry roles, such as plumbers and electricians. While these still exist, there is far more on offer. Apprenticeships can be in a lot of different industries from engineering and boat building to nursing and accountancy – with equal opportunities for men and women and with 180 types of apprenticeship available, you may just discover that your company can hire, grow and develop all with ease.

So if your business needs a boost, or you’re unsure of what help is available to you, then this webTV show could provide some vital answers. Skills Minister Lord Tony Young, Simon Waugh of the National Apprenticeship Service and Dave Walsh, BT’s Head of Apprenticeships, will tell you everything you need to know about the kind of training schemes available to you and how your business can gain from it. They will also be answering your questions live online.

Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Skills and Apprenticeships ( Skills Minister) Lord Tony Young, Simon Waugh of the National Apprenticeship Service and Dave Walsh, BT’s Head of Apprenticeships join us live online to discuss Apprenticeships.

For more information visit www.apprenticeships.org.uk

H: Lis Speight
Y: Lord Young, Skills Minister
D: Dave Walsh, BTs Head of Apprenticeships
S: Simon Waugh, National Apprenticeship Service

H: Hello and welcome to the Business Show, I’m Lis Speight. Now then with UK unemployment hitting the headlines as it hovers around the 2 million mark, it’s hardly good news is it? With many companies laying off staff, the idea of hiring is probably far from the agenda. However in the face of an increasingly competitive marketplace, ensuring that you have the best in-house talent is vital in order to ride out tougher economic conditions. Well joining me to discuss the current employment market and in particular to look at the subject of apprenticeships, I’m delighted to be joined by the government Skills Minister Lord Young, welcome along, lovely to see you. Also BT’s Head of Apprenticeships Dave Walsh, and Simon Waugh from the National Apprenticeship Service. Welcome along all of you, it’s great to see you today. Now of course we are live so if you want to get your questions answered about apprenticeships then please type them into the box on the screen, click send and it’ll come through to us here in the studio and we’ll try to get through as many as we can. Before we start on your questions, let me start by asking Lord Young a little bit about the government’s stance on apprenticeships – government’s very keen on getting more apprenticeships up and running. Explain to me why this is?

Y: Well it’s a – first of all it’s a great success story. When we – I’ve likened apprenticeships to – if they were a patient when we inherited them in 1997 they were in intensive care. There were 65,000 of them and that’s all nationally, and only about a quarter of them, just over a quarter completed their apprenticeships

H: Oh right. That’s not very good is it?

Y: So wind the clock forward to last year, quarter of a million apprenticeships

H: Wow

Y: Two thirds of them actually completing their apprenticeships, so that’s the platform we’re building on, that’s the kind of commitment and enthusiasm. Why are we doing this? Well we had a report on skills, Lord Leach did a report and it showed there was a real skill deficit, so if we want to make UK plc a successful country, we need to improve our skill base, and apprenticeships are a key part of that process. So when I say we’re building on it, well we announced recently another 35,000 apprenticeship places. This week we said 21,000 of those are going to be in the public sector, 5000 in health, 7500 in local government, and about 4000 – excuse me – in teaching. Now these are real jobs, real career opportunities, and I always say about apprenticeships two things – one they’re a little beacon of hope to either a young person, or an adult, there’s a real career there for – real training and real transferable skills, and to an employer they’re an investment in your skill base, and they’ve proven their worth. If we look at all the independent surveys – don’t take my word for it – research from Warwick shows they improve your performance, productivity, improve staff retention, improve innovation within a firm. So if you want to successfully, if you like, ride out the downturn, and ensure that you’ve got skilled people working for you when the upturn comes, invest in apprenticeship

H: So apprenticeships is the way to go and it sounds like you’re making a cracking good start on it

Y: Yes

H: And at the moment the economic climate, the way it is, sounds like it’s the way to go. Simon, research by Learning and Skills council shows that UK businesses agree that apprenticeships are crucial during these economic times. Tell us a little bit about that research

S: Well I think one of the most important things, what Lord Young has just said is about the number of apprenticeships, the apprenticeship places – now it may be quarter of a million. But I think the other side of that is on the supply side there are 130,000 businesses and organisations that provide those places, and that phenomenal growth shows very clearly the success of it because I think the question for those employers that aren’t currently offering apprenticeship places, you know they may just not realise the incredible value and over 80% of the companies through this research that you mentioned is, they very clearly say that apprenticeships are adding enormous value to their business, that again you know nearly 80% say that it’s added productivity, productivity – again Lord Young’s reference to the Warwickshire research, but that actually took a whole range of employers across a whole different group of sectors, because the other myth about apprenticeships is it’s really about plumbing and –

H: Well that’s right, so what sort of – we’ll come to you in a minute, BT is obviously a big company, but what sort of apprenticeships can you get then?

S: Well it would take me about an hour to list the –

H: Just a quick taste

S: To do 180, but there’s only – hairdressing, IT skills – as I said there are 180 different apprenticeship opportunities

H: Pretty much any job you can think of would have an apprenticeship –

S: Yes obviously, absolutely

Y: It’s extraordinary. If I could add to that, things like information technology, business administration, financial services, health and social care you name it and you can find –

H: You can just go on

Y: An apprenticeship framework, and we’re looking to create more

H: Yes. Sorry had you finished?

S: No just finally the last thing I would say is that 100,000 employers would not be investing their people in this way if it didn’t really add value to the company. They’re not doing it because of corporate social responsibility –

H: No

S: Or –

H: It’s not a charity is it at the end of the day?

S: No, it’s really good business reason why they’re doing this, and the apprenticeships, the apprentices that come out at the end of their program, and the quality is improving all the time, are really valuable people in that business, and that’s proven through research and actually through case studies from employers. Not from us, but actually from employers that make it very clear these are vital people to the future growth of their company

H: Yes. Now Dave, you’re a man who knows – you have apprenticeships schemes at BT

D: Yes we do

H: Tell us a little bit about how that works and why BT is involved in it?

D: Ok, well BT’s been involved in the apprenticeships scheme this time around since 1996

H: Right

D: And the scheme has developed in terms of the number of different roles, so we started off with telecoms, we’re now a customer service business admin, we have IT, we have telecoms obviously at different levels as well, and we have more multi-vehicle technicians, or mechanics, so we’ve a wide range of different roles, and different levels in terms of the academic qualifications that we get through the apprenticeships, which are the BTEC or indeed a foundation degree

H: And how long does it normally take for your apprenticeship?

D: Well the average is 3 years

H: Right

D: The longest we’ve got is the vehicle mechanic, they take 3 ½ and we’ve – there’s some down at two years, so 3 years is probably a good average. But some can finish earlier than that if they complete the scheme quicker than expected, but three years is the norm

H: And so you come out with a qualification, because some people might think oh I need to go to university or to go to do my A levels, get my qualifications, but you actually get a qualification through your apprenticeship do you?

D: Yes, if you come in as a level 3 apprenticeship, an advanced apprenticeship, then you would get a BTEC certificate. If you come in as a higher apprenticeship you will get a foundation degree, along with your NVQ and key skills and all the other requirements of the framework, so you don’t just get an academic qualification, you get an academic qualification and a lot of work-based learning that goes with the NVQ course qualification as well

S: And I think it – sorry to interrupt but I think it’s that, that combination of two obviously employers can just train their own people

H: Yes

S: To do that particular job –

H: Exactly yes

S: Or even go to college and do a sort of fairly academic process or activity. The combination of the two, the employer who’s designed the framework

Y: That’s right

S: Actually designed the apprenticeship for themselves

D: That’s right

S: With the college, giving that extra level of technical support and expertise, and I’m sorry it’s a tripe, but I can’t resist saying it is one and one makes three

H: Yes

S: I mean it really is and that’s why apprenticeships are undoubtedly one of the most powerful ways of training and skilling your people for the future

H: Yes exactly, just train them how you want them and then they’ll go on to go with the company and stay with the company I suppose

D: Absolutely, our retention rate and completion rates are well over 90% so above the national average which is also increasing, so that tells us that we’ve got the scheme sort of right and the people in the scheme appreciate that. We have a lot of extra stuff going on to get feedback from apprentices about what they’d like it to evolve into, and other activities so we’ve got a lot of stuff going on additional to the basic framework requirements

H: Ok well look, let’s move on to some of your questions now, because we’ve got quite a few coming in. Andrew Merryl who is editor of westbusiness.co.uk, he says “encouraging companies to open up apprenticeships and providing funding to help prospective apprentices is one thing, but does the panel agree there is a considerable battle to be done to bring schools on board to convince students that aspiring to an apprenticeship and acquiring a trade is as valuable or more so than attending university.” Lord Young what would you say to that?

Y: Absolutely. By the way I am an ex-BT apprentice myself

H: Oh well there we are

Y: One or two years ago. It was called the GPO when I joined it. But seriously there is a job to be done, yes on – and Simon will come onto this – what we call information, advice and guidance. But the message I want to put over is this – a lot of families, understandably think I want my Janet or John to go to university. Well it’s an understandable aspiration, they’re often the first children in their family to have been to university

H: That’s right, especially these days so many more are going aren’t they?

Y: Yes that’s right, and for many young people that’s the right choice. But what we’re saying to them is look, first of all it’s not an either / or choice. It isn’t – if, you know if I want to get a degree I must go to university as Dave has already said, you can still go, find yourself getting a degree through an apprenticeship route, but we’re trying to say to people is it’s an “and” choice. You know you can look at them and for some young people university isn’t the right place for them

H: Yes

Y: They might be slower developers or whatever, or it’s not what they want. They want a bit more hands on – so they ought to look at what’s on offer at apprenticeship, wide range of apprenticeships are on offer for young people and it’s got two good great things going for it – you can earn while you learn

H: Well that’s right

Y: And that is a cracker, and the other thing as Dave will tell you, you understand the world of work, you’ve been there, with all due respect to the graduate, when they come out of university they’ve got to learn about the world of –

H: So you’re a bit more mature and you –

Y: You are

H: And you face up to your –

Y: It’s a great -

H: Responsibilities

Y: Look at the success stories there are of young apprentices who’ve gone on to eventually head up the company

H: Yes

Y: So it really – it’s whether you want to develop a skill and stay in a hands-on role or whether you want to go through the managerial route, it’s well worth looking at. But we’ve got to get over that, there is a bit of prejudice there, or – prejudice may not be the right word –

H: People don’t know maybe, it’s -

Y: Maybe they don’t know enough, so we’ve got to address that parental desire to think that university’s the only option. We’ve also – teachers I’m afraid are part of that story as well

H: Yes. Got to get the word out in schools

Y: They tend to think yes well you know university – it’s changing but we’ve got to – and this is where Simon comes in I think his service is going to come in, some of his people I think will be going to schools, I’ll leave that bit to Simon

H: Yes. But we’ve had a question in on it actually about salaries. Dave sent one in, he says “what sort of salary can an apprentice hope to earn?” BT, what – is it kind of lowly salary when you start or is it -

D: If you came in with transferable skills into BT to be a telecoms engineer for instance, you would start at 80% of the grade maximum for that role

H: Right

D: As an apprentice you start at 50% of grade maximum

H: Right

D: Every year it goes up 10% so after your 3 year apprenticeship you’re back to your 80% where you will be if you came in with transferable skills. So for instance even an electrician, and you apply to BT telecoms engineer, one of those skills is transferable, we will pay 80% and then will move up to a grade maximum over a period of time

H: And you don’t come out of university with having all these debts

D: No

H: I mean you come out now, you’ve got huge debt, you’ve got to work the first few years to get all that paid off haven’t you?

D: That’s right

H: And so you haven’t got that to worry about

D: Not at all

H: And you’ve made such a big start into the world of work haven’t you?

D: Absolutely and the type of apprentices we recruit in the main are capable of a higher education, and many of them actually go on to achieve a higher education, and the point to make is I think the apprenticeship role is the start of the career, it’s not the end of the career

Y: Absolutely

D: So if you start as a telecoms engineer you could finish as a CEO. It’s – there is no glass ceiling

H: It’s a way into the company

D: It’s a way into the company and you know the reason we recruit apprentices is not to replace people that have left in job roles, it’s to enable them to start a career from the bottom up if you like

H: Ok. Now people tend to think of apprentices as being younger people don’t they? We’ve had a question in from Charlotte Bowen on this. She said “with many people looking to take new career directions in the current climate, should one consider employing older people in apprenticeship roles?” What would you say to that?

S: Yes absolutely, I think you know apprenticeships are not just for 16-18 year olds or

H: No

S: 16-20 year olds, actually you can start perhaps dealing with part of the early question, around schools, the government have launched something called Diplomas which is the opportunity for 14-16 year olds to have some experience of the working world, and we also have Young apprenticeships in schools

H: Right

S: Which are 14-16 which is actually – obviously you are still at school very much, but you have the taste of work, so that’s a feeder into that younger group. But we have apprenticeships of people literally in their 50s

H: Really?

S: Yes I used to be a director of British Gas and I opened one of our apprenticeships training centres, met some of the apprenticeships, there were 3 guys there in their 40s who worked on the trawlers out of the north east of England, and because of quotas and so on, fishing was a bit more difficult

H: Yes

S: And they were retraining to be gas engineers and so on, so for them it was an absolute lifeline, you know into a whole new career, and –

H: To be paid to do your training – I mean it’s amazing isn’t it?

S: Oh absolutely. I mean absolutely. They were just so proud to have that opportunity, and you know they were – I mean immense characters. So apprenticeships for everybody, I mean very clearly what we want to do is offer different options for younger people, so you know historically I guess people were sort of pushed through the academic route, and for a large number of people that’s great, but there are a whole group of people that learn better using their hands, practically, you know in terms of the sort of practical expertise, and vocational training, and the work that’s been done over the last 10 years to really grow apprenticeships has really opened up a whole new option and route for young people so

H: It’s not an old-fashioned idea any more – you do tend to think it’s an old-fashioned idea, don’t you, apprenticeships, but obviously it’s not Lord Young is it?

Y: 27,000 over 25 last year.

H: Oh right

Y: 50% increase on the previous year

H: Goodness me

Y: You know it’s – I mean in fact it’s growing literally exponentially. It really is huge. My actual concern is, I don’t have to worry about that end of it, what we’ve got to do is maintain the 16-18s, you know they’re very, very precious obviously because it’s young people, giving them, and if they’re in an apprenticeship they’re not going to be on the streets, you know getting up to mischief. We know that it’s a really good option for young people, so I’m really pleased to offer the adult apprenticeships because you know what Simon outlined is a classic example of why we need to do it, but at the other end we’ve got to keep that 16-18 –

H: Keep the youngsters coming up through

Y: Going as well

H: So how do people get involved then, if – we heard about BT which obviously is a big business, and you’ve got a lot of people coming through. If you’re a small business, I don’t know say you run a garage or a hairdressers or what have you, how do you go about getting involved in the apprenticeships scheme?

S: Can I answer that?

D: Simon yes please

H: Simon will answer that one

S: We’ve just launched, as part of the National apprenticeship Service, something called a vacancy matching service

H: Right

S: And it’s very simply, it’s very similar to a dating game

H: Right

S: so –

H: I like the sound of this

S: So it works nationally but also at a very local level

Y: We’re not running the two together though!

S: No. We may make more money out of it – but the whole point of it is employers that have an apprenticeship vacancy can go on there, put their details on, it’s very easy, and if you go into apprenticeships and do a search on that, it brings you into the apprenticeship site, website, and you can click straight through into the vacancy match service. In the same way, applicants – people that are very interested in apprenticeships, becoming an apprentice, can also put their details on and what we’re obviously trying to do is you know electronically -

H: Match them up

S: Match the needs –

H: Isn’t the internet fantastic, to be able to do that? Which hopefully answers Steve’s question actually which is “where can I advertise to attract potential candidates for joining my business?” So that’s the place to go then isn’t it?

S: Steve go there now, please, yes we need all the employers. And he’s missing out if he’s not doing it so great

Y: I’d just like to – we’ve got – I mean there’s no doubt that we’re talking about a very wide range of employers here, you know we’re talking about, I mean if you look at you know from the BTs of this world to the British Gas, Eccentricas, Sainsburys, the Tescos, they’re all carrying on – McDonalds, Carphone Warehouse, Phones 4 U, they’re all success stories who are continuing to recruit apprentices, it’s really vital that they do it. Now we’re looking at the SME, and again if you look within SME, this huge range of different companies, so one of the concepts that we’ve got are what we call group training associations. They’re a really great idea, it’s a sort of generic type, so they take different forms, but basically you’ve got this sort of hub which is going to deal with a lot of the training, the administration and bureaucracy, and they’ll be you know going into that hub will be these companies, you know taking apprenticeship placements and giving them that work experience, and then at the end of the apprenticeship they’ll say ok, well I know those, I know that Janet, I know that John, yes I’m going to have those as apprenticeships. So we’re trying to encourage that, there’s a lot of them going, some of them very successfully. We’re trying to expand existing ones, create new ones, and there are various different models. So if we’re talking about the smaller companies who that could be the answer to their problems, in addition to what Simon’s just said about the vacancy matching service

H: Interesting. We’re nearly out of time actually, but just before we go, last word from Dave then. If there are companies out there thinking about taking on an apprenticeship, apprentices and they’re a little bit worried about it, what advice would you have? It obviously works for BT doesn’t it?

D: It works for BT not just on a purely financial basis, discarding general profitability around productivity and you the general business case, but also if you ask somebody to share what they know with a new person in a company, that’s quite an honour really to be asked to share what you know, and it creates a culture in an organisation where people want to share information, want to share ideas, and new people have different ways of using technology, than people of my generation, but my generation I think can teach the younger generation

H: Yes

D: And the whole thing gels, I think, very very well. So it’s important for us as a business to keep that, that churn of people coming through the organisation to create that sharing of ideas and that innovation and that –

H: It’s an old idea but it still works really, really well

D: It works very very well. Very well

H: It’s been updated. Well we are out of time actually so Dave Walsh, Lord Tony Young and Simon Waugh thanks very, very much for joining us, it’s been really interesting. And if you’re thinking about taking on apprentices or if you’re thinking of taking on an apprenticeship, you can visit the website for more information which is www.apprenticeships.org.uk. Go on, give it a go – you never know until you have a try. Thanks very much for joining us and we’ll see you next time on the Business Show. Bye bye for now

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