GLASGOW—March 31, 2008

Every school leaver in Glasgow who applies for a modern apprenticeship next year will be offered one as part of an unprecedented £30m plan to prepare for the city’s 2014 Commonwealth Games.

Up to 5,000 Glasgow youngsters leaving school in 2009 will be given the opportunity to apply for the apprenticeships in order to assist in the completion of new arenas and infrastructure ahead of the Games.

It is expected that the initiative will affect around half of the entire school leaving population in Glasgow next year, with the rest moving into further education. A total of 2,000 construction apprenticeships will be offered, most with private construction company City Building, who are owned by Glasgow City Council. City Building last year received over 2,500 applications for just 77 apprentice positions.

Successful applicants will learn electrical, plumbing, roofing, joinery and bricklaying skills, with those requiring assistance in literacy, numeracy and social skills offered help to progress. Glasgow City Council will pay £30m towards the apprentices’ wages with the remainder paid by private sector training providers.

Glasgow City Council Leader Steven Purcell said: “We have an opportunity over the next few years, with the Commonwealth Games coming, to secure apprenticeships for all school-leavers who want them.”

“We will give our young people the same start in life, the same opportunity that our fathers and grandfathers received when the shipyards, the steelworks, the pits and the mills were at their height and employing hundreds of thousands of people.”

Willie Docherty, Managing Director of City Building, who himself trained as an apprentice said: “There are tremendous skills shortages, not just in construction but in the utility and infrastructure industries. I believe this is the most radical scheme ever in terms of training, in terms of jobs, that I have heard of anywhere.”

“This is going to, if you like, blow people’s minds. It is going to say to every single pupil ‘you have got a future in Glasgow’ and I don’t think any other authority can say that.”

Media Enquiries
Please contact Mel Brookes, City Building’s Marketing Manager in the first instance on +44 (0)141 1287 1956, +44 (0)7734 597296 or e-mail melanie.brookes@citybuildingglasgow.co.uk

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