My information is that FÁS will not take on any apprentices in September unless they are sponsored by the private sector. This will pose major difficulties for many young people who want to become apprenticed. Indeed one of the biggest problems facing thousands of young people is the lack of access to apprenticeship training. In many cases this will be the career they wish to pursue. They encounter several stumbling blocks, the greatest being that they cannot find employers who will sponsor them.
This is ironic in the context of the recommendations of the Culliton report which is crying out for more technical and vocational training. The young people have the educational background, the ability and the aptitude but they simply cannot find a willing employer to sponsor them. The State must step in immediately and provide a full scale apprenticeship system in co-operation with the private sector. This could be linked to existing FÁS centres, regional technical colleges and the secondary sector, which will be facing dwindling numbers and thus have excess capacity in the not too distant future.
Young people and their parents have to trawl employers beseeching them to take on a young person as an apprentice. It is absolutely unfair that young people who have the ability and aptitude are barred from pursuing the trade of their choice when their peers can become apprentices simply because their families know employers who will sponsor them. It is fair to say that it is now easier to get a place in any university faculty or any third level institution than to get an apprenticeship. This is most unfair and must be changed immediately.