Construction union UCATT have described the report into Apprenticeships by the Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committee as a “mixed bag”.

UCATT welcomed the report's recommendation that Central and Local Government and other publicly funded bodies should use procurement rules to ensure that apprentices are trained on public sector projects on the basis that for every £1million spent one apprentice is trained.

Steve Murphy, General Secretary of UCATT, said: "The link between public sector procurement rules and apprenticeship training is essential in industries such as construction where employers have continually failed to train apprentices. If employers won’t train apprentices they should be barred from public contracts."

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UCATT also welcomed the committee's call for a clear definition of an apprenticeship, especially the demand that apprenticeships must include full-time employment and that both work based learning and off the job training is independently accredited.

Mr Murphy added: "These recommendations are important. We need to finally end the policies which created classroom based apprenticeships and self-employed apprentices. Young people who sign up on this basis never receive proper training and are left disillusioned after they find that their apprenticeship is virtually worthless."

However UCATT are highly disappointed with the Select Committee's support for Group Training Associations and Apprenticeship Training Agencies. GTAs are where a group of employers work together to train apprentices and an ATA is a private company which recruits apprentices and then acts as an employment agency to find them placements.

UCATT believe that both models are profoundly flawed as the link between the employer and the apprentice is broken. This reduces the quality and level of training the apprentice receives and also has implications for the apprentice’s health and safety. As the apprentice does not have a direct employer, it is far less likely that they will find full-time employment with the company they trained with once they have completed their apprenticeship.

(CD/GK)