Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Mayfield Community School, Cork, has teamed up with John Sisk & Son to offer apprenticeships to young people who are leaving school, which is a great initiative. The Minister should perhaps consider engaging with secondary schools and other builders to deliver more types of these apprenticeships.

The Minister has a targeted figure of 10,000 apprenticeships per year. Is there a breakdown of how many of them will be in the building trades? I talk to builders and people in the construction industry. I just came from a meeting of the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage before which industry representatives are appearing at the moment. There is a huge shortfall in apprenticeships. I speak to young people who tell me about the terms and conditions for young apprentices to go in. There is actually an opportunity now for young people to do different jobs. If we want to get young people into apprenticeships, we must improve the terms and conditions, especially in the building trade. If we are going to build the houses we need to build, we need the apprentices to build them.

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