You’re hired! Apprentice reforms rolled out

EMPLOYERS are to receive a grant of almost €3,000 to take on more apprentices under new proposals from Further and Higher Education Minister Simon Harris which aim to double the amount of apprenticeships available.

In a new development, €2,666 per apprentice will be available for firms who attempt to balance excesses of one gender above another.

This aims to rebalance trades like hairdressing where more than 80% of apprentices are female and introduce more women to male-dominated jobs such as plumbing and mechanics. In general, most apprenticeships in Ireland are still mostly dominated by men.

Minister Harris’s 63-part Action Plan aims to increase the number of apprenticeships from 5,000 to 10,000 in just four years’ time.

To improve social inclusion, the plan will also contain a bursary programme for a maximum of 100 apprentices per annum who experience socio-economic disadvantage, including lone parents, disabled people and Travellers.

This will be paid at a rate of €5,000 per annum and goes to the apprentice. Commenting on the proposals, Mr Harris said: ‘Apprenticeships represent one of the surest roads out of inequality via work and opportunity.’

Mr Harris noted that as part of the process to encourage employers to take on apprenticeships outside of the original €3,000 grant: ‘There will be additional supports if you employ a female, lone parent, person with a disability, someone from direct provision.’

Mr Harris also plans to ‘broaden the range of apprenticeships’ to include a new healthcare assistant apprenticeship and apprenticeships in green skills and farming.