Mr. Brian Nolan:

Again, this is an area where we would be recognised as the apprentices' union. We are tagged that way. I do not say that loosely. We have offered free membership of the Connect trade union for a long time, since our previous incarnation as the Technical Engineering and Electrical Union. We see the value in apprenticeships, not just in society and industry but in the union as well. We are a craft union. We do, therefore, absolutely support apprentices. We have structures internally to meet and hear from our apprentices. We also take into account that apprentices have a view and a snapshot of a world within four years. A second-year apprentice could have different opinions from those in first year and from those in the third and fourth years as well. We also speak to people who come out of the programme and ask them what their experience was like and how it has impacted them. We have a representative on the National Apprenticeship Alliance. There are two representatives from ICTU.

There has been resistance from some of the consortium-led apprenticeships to having union representation. For as long as the apprenticeship system has been in place here, the worker-learner representative has always come from the trade union. That has always been the case and it is because we represent the workers and those people. I am not just referring to the apprentices but to the people who have to teach 80% of the apprenticeship in the workplace. We sometimes have to remind people that as much as there might be an ETB or third level institute, we are relying on craft workers in the workplace to share their skills to create the next world-class craft workers. We need their buy-in and we need them to support the whole concept of an apprenticeship. That is very important.

In terms of some of the deterrents, to be quite honest, I think there are some very easy fixes. We have sought the abolition of the apprentice student charge. I think it would make a huge difference if that was gone. Having the minimum wage as the minimum rate of pay would also make a big difference. What happens in the case of a lot of apprentices, and this is an experience that has not been shared yet, is that under the rules of an apprenticeship, somebody employed as an apprentice should be registered within two weeks. We consistently get reports from individuals eight months, nine months and ten months after they have started that they are still on sub-minimum wages. These people have been abused in that instance. There need to be sanctions for those employers because they have not adhered to the apprenticeship rules.

They should be either removed from it or dealt some sort of blow so it does not happen again.

There is one other of those simple issues. The training allowances that are paid for craft apprenticeships are directly related to the craft rates. They are directly linked to the ones we negotiate either through a sectoral employment order or national collective agreement for construction, electrical or mechanical so they relate. There is one cohort in there, an engineering group, that are supposed to be averaged about all that but for some reason known only to the Minister, that has not been applied it. That one has been dropped and has not been raised in over ten years. There is a whole bunch of apprentices in there who feel their pay has gone stagnant, and it has. We were very keen and wrote to the Minister in May. We got a reply back asking for a full agenda, which we provided. We are still waiting for that meeting. It is something I need to follow up on. It is disappointing that little things like that are allowed to fester. If they are dealt with, the attraction to apprenticeships becomes a whole lot different. There is a lot of good work being done on advertising apprenticeships. I cannot knock SOLAS, the national apprenticeship office or even the Minister and the Department. The world skills is a great showcase for all that can be done in apprenticeships. We let ourselves down by the simplest of measures here, doing the right thing, hitting the minimum wage target, abolishing the apprentice student charge and getting those rates up that should be lifted with time.

Another issue is accommodation for people who have to travel, as was rightly pointed out, if they are sent from Cork to Donegal, for example. The reality is that it will have to happen because we have limited facilities to deliver apprenticeships. People may not like that idea but others actually love it. The accommodation allowance has not moved in 22 years, despite the fact that we have highlighted it. There was a mechanism for raising it. It was the CPI and it has never been acknowledged. They are simple fixes that we could get over the line. I just do not understand. I know it all costs money and adds up. In light of the week that is in it, when it comes to budgets, us putting a hand out for more is always going to be seen as a problem. The simplest answer to nearly every question that has come up here is to fix the small things and the apprenticeship will retain its world-class status.