Responding to today’s announcement by the Prime Minister of plans to boost apprenticeships and transform training, Ben Willmott, Head of Public Policy at the CIPD (the professional body for HR and people development), comments:
“The CIPD welcomes the Government’s commitment to increasing the quantity and quality of apprenticeships. It’s important that the introduction of an apprenticeship levy is used to focus on increasing the quality of apprenticeships and not just the numbers, which means that this investment by large employers should largely be reserved for the creation of more Level 3 and above apprenticeships. The CIPD’s research on graduate over qualification published this week showed the high proportion of UK graduates in non-graduate jobs, emphasising the importance of developing more high quality vocational routes into the labour market - a high quality apprenticeship system is central to achieving this.
“The Government has also rightly highlighted its concern about falling investment in training over the last 20 years and while increased investment in apprenticeships is welcome, it is not a panacea in itself. We need to understand the broader factors that will boost training investment and productivity and ensure that people skills are utilised more effectively in the workplace, including crucially, investment by employers in their leadership and management capability.”