Mr. Andrew Brownlee:

On behalf of SOLAS, I thank the Chair and the committee members for the opportunity to speak with them today and discuss how FET is supporting MMC and the Government’s Housing for All strategy. I am joined by Mr. Dalton, director of further education and training for the Laois and Offaly Education and Training Board, ETB, SOLAS, which has led the development of the national construction campus at Mount Lucas.

SOLAS has responsibility for funding, planning, and co-ordinating FET in Ireland. It also serves as the co-ordinating provider for craft apprenticeships and works with the Higher Education Authority, HEA, to jointly manage the National Apprenticeship Office to oversee the national apprenticeship system. Through the 16 ETBs, the FET system offers access to a wide range of learning opportunities and supports in every corner of the country, regardless of background or formal education level, and offers a learning pathway to take learners as far as they want to go. It currently serves a base of around 200,000 unique learners every year. More specifically, the FET sector has long played a key role in ensuring a skilled labour force for the construction sector through the delivery of targeted training programmes.

More specifically, the FET sector has long played a key role in ensuring a skilled labour force for the construction sector through the delivery of targeted training programmes annually. These programmes are provided through national apprenticeship programmes, upskilling and reskilling courses, shorter technical skills training through the construction and quarry skills certification schemes and safety awareness training through Safe Pass, including via a recently launched online renewal system. SOLAS currently co-ordinates 22,470 craft apprentices and it issued over 125,000 Safe Pass cards and 21,000 construction skills certification scheme or quality system certification scheme cards to individual construction workers in 2022.

As has been well flagged, the construction sector in Ireland and indeed across the world is currently experiencing a significant skills shortage. The skills I describe are a requirement not only for new entrants but also for workers upskilling in the newly emerging aspects of construction, such as retrofitting and modern methods of construction, MMC. In 2022, SOLAS commissioned research that provided an analysis of the skills required for residential construction and retrofitting up to 2030. The report provided key insights into the construction skills and the number of new construction workers required to deliver on the Government's Housing for All action plan. It estimated that 50,831 new entrants to the sector will be required over the period 2023 to 2030.

In response to this and the continuing need to build capacity in the construction sector, SOLAS has been investing in the expansion of education and training provision in this area. Working with the national construction campus at Mount Lucas, ETBs and a broad range of construction stakeholders, we are enhancing our construction training infrastructure and implementing new and comprehensive construction skills pathways around MMC, including construction assembly and installation operatives; nearly zero energy building, NZEB, including building energy rating assessors, certified passive house tradespersons and retrofit technicians; and digital construction skills, including building information modelling, BIM.

Part of the challenge is making construction careers more appealing to young people, taking advantage of the exciting opportunities and new ways of working provided by MMC. SOLAS has supported ETBs to deliver construction-related modules and taster courses as part of transition year offerings, and it has also made available over 800 free Safe Pass places for transition year students in ETB schools in 2023.

In support of the Government's retrofitting plan, SOLAS is establishing six centres of excellence for NZEB and retrofitting training. To date, three centres of excellence, in Waterford–Wexford, Mount Lucas and Limerick, are fully operational. The one in Cork will open fully on 22 May 2023, with those in Sligo and Dublin coming on stream at the end of 2023. In 2022, over 2,000 received training and certification in NZEB-related interventions, with over 5,000 targeted for 2023.

In a follow–up to action 23.9 of Housing for All and the decision from the construction industry capability group, Ireland's first MMC demonstration park will be developed in the National Construction Training Centre at Mount Lucas and managed by Laois and Offaly Education and Training Board.

MMC describes an approach to constructing buildings using methods such as off-site manufacturing, modular construction panels or light steel framing, structural insulated panels or cross-laminated timber. The modern methods of construction demonstration park offers industry a centralised location to collaborate and examine new building methodologies. It will also offer an opportunity for industry to share best practice and align to the development of those new construction skills pathways.

In summary, FET and apprenticeships have a significant contribution to make in supporting the growth of MMC, ensuring the future skills pipeline exists to expand housing construction in line with Housing for All and enabling the national retrofitting programme by upskilling workers. I thank the members for their time and look forward to discussing this in more detail.