Dee Ryan (Fianna Fail)

I welcome everyone. I acknowledge and congratulate all the witnesses on the huge work that has been done by each of the organisations to increase the level of apprenticeship uptake we have seen. Undoubtedly, significant funding has been provided by the Government, but it is the witnesses' work on the ground in implementing and executing the policy direction that has resulted in what we are seeing. Well done. They have our continued support for the further work they need to do. We are on track to achieve 12,000 apprenticeships by 2030, but we look forward to the development of the next iteration of the action plan, taking lessons from the experience we are going through now with many more people at work in apprenticeships and the much greater experience we have of how it is working.

The witnesses will excuse me for going to an item that concerned me when I heard about it earlier this week. I was delighted I would have an opportunity to meet them to ask for their thoughts on it. They might be aware that the apprenticeship scheme for training chefs came under fire on Monday on national radio and I think there was an article in The Irish Times. Essentially, feedback from employers was articulated that despite there being a huge need for chefs in the sector, employers cite difficulty in funding it. I understand that one of the differences between the consortia-led approach and the craft or traditional approach is that in the craft approach the off-the-job section of training is funded by the Department, while the approach we take in the consortium-led apprenticeships is that we ask employers to fund the apprentices year-round and we provide them with a €2,000 grant to subsidise that cost.

The point made by the gentleman I listened to on Radio One, whose name escapes me, was that the sector is so competitive for staff that very few people employed in the kitchens are on minimum wage. They have to pay above minimum wage. They employ apprentices at minimum wage, but the cost of doing so and only having them in the kitchen three or four days a week - I think it averages at three days per week when holidays and so forth are taken into consideration - was prohibitive. He made the point that as a consequence, very few employers have signed up. I had a look at the apprenticeship website before we came in this afternoon. Only five employers are registered for commis chef level 6, which is concerning when we know that we issued 2,000 work permits for overseas workers to come here to fill those roles last year. We have been doing so at that level for a number of years. I was glad to hear Dr. Patterson reference the list for critical skills visas. It is important we align the skills gaps with that section in the Department of enterprise because we need to reduce our reliance on overseas workers and meet that skills need internally where possible.

Can I throw that open? I appreciate it is not a positive issue to highlight. However, it is an issue we need to consider. I would like to get the thoughts of the witnesses on that difference in funding.