Conservative Apprenticeship Pledge

A Conservative government would pay firms £2,000 for each apprentice and create 100,000 more apprenticeship places according to new plans outlined this week by David Willets , the Shadow Skill Secretary.

Under the plans, small and medium-sized firms would be offered the cash bonus for each apprentice that completes his or her scheme.Willetts said: "Our recommendations are aimed at improving social mobility. Many of our social problems stem from the disengagement of young people and we want to provide more opportunities, particularly to young men, to get them off the streets and on their way in life."

The Federation of Master Builders said the proposals would help improve the training record of an industry with 185,000 companies but only 8,500 apprentices.

Brian Berry, the FMB’s director of external affairs, said: “It is pleasing to see the Conservative Party is waking up to the skills shortage facing the industry. Their pledge to offer employers a £2,000 bonus for taking on and training apprentices is just the encouragement needed to start....Quite simply the UK is failing to deliver enough labour as evidenced by the fact that the UK was 11th in the International Skills Competition at the World Skills Summit in 2007. Britain is failing on two fronts: first, failing to meet demand and secondly, failing to train enough people with the right skills to the right levels. However, the failure to address the skills shortage is as much about too few interested employers as it is about too few interested school leavers. For example, in 2007, 30,000 young people applied for an apprentice position but only 8,500 were accepted. This is within a sector in which there are approximately 185,000 construction companies within the UK but only 4 per cent of which employ an apprentice. Clearly, the construction sector needs to be better motivated to reverse this situation if Britain is to maintain its long term competiveness."