Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

They are. That is what I have just acknowledged. I acknowledge this in the House because is not enough to identify problems in this place; we must also look at how best to fix them. I have asked my own Department to continue its consultation with the stakeholders. I have met the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and others in relation to this in order to examine the implications for recruiting and retaining apprentices, particularly in light of the scale of demand for key craft workers in the construction sector. This analysis will carefully consider the current pay landscape and any implications and avoid any unintended consequences. I hope this work can be done over the summer so we can try to advance this and have an informed conversation on the best way to proceed in time for the budget.

I also acknowledge what has been known as the apprenticeship Covid-19 backlog. I will be clear on this because it is a real issue for people. We have seen record numbers of people seeking to become apprentices but we have also seen a global pandemic that shut down education and training for a significant period of time. I thank SOLAS and particularly individual trainers and ETBs, and people who have gone above and beyond in working with us to provide additional capacity to work through that backlog. That Covid-19 backlog peaked at approximately 11,000 people. It is now down to just over 5,000 and SOLAS has told me it has a plan in place to seek to eradicate that backlog during the remainder of this year. Along with the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, I am keeping in very close contact with SOLAS on that.

I want to highlight some significant developments in further education and training, FET. My commitment to further education and training could not be greater. I believe passionately in it. When I was appointed to this Department for 24 hours it was called the Department of higher education, research and innovation or something like that. We changed the title because the idea that we would further silo away a part of our tertiary education system should run contrary to what we all want to achieve in this House. We need to develop, strength and grow further education and training. This is pivotal to the goal of ensuring everyone, regardless of their background, age, gender, ability, address and what their parents did before them, can reach their full potential. It is a major priority for me personally against the backdrop of the establishment of my Department. I acknowledge the very ambitious and effective strategy put in place by SOLAS, Future FET: Transforming Learning, which shapes and guides our work. This year we are investing just over €1 billion through the Exchequer and the National Training Fund to progress the vision of the strategy.

Increasingly, further education and training is more broadly recognised as the high-quality, dynamic and learner-centric sector it really is. It is a sector that can provide a great launching pad for learners, both those commencing their career journey and those already embarked on it. Under the FET strategy, priorities are set out across three core pillars; namely, building skills, creating pathways and fostering inclusion. Very substantial progress has been made in delivering objectives and this is reflected in the fact that our 16 ETBs now have strategic performance agreements with SOLAS to help to advance the strategy at a regional level. Information on FET along with apprenticeship options is now provided on the CAO website. There used to be this bonkers idea that when young people who were seeking information on what to do post school logged on to cao.ieto apply and the only thing we were telling them about was how to go to university.

It is terribly important and it works for many people, but it was like we were talking about FET and apprenticeships in hushed tones. It was utterly unacceptable. I believe it led to an increase in mental health, well-being and anxiety challenges among young people. One can see the pressure of the points race etched on their faces. FET is on the CAO website now. Crucially, people can apply to FET colleges through the CAO website. That helps with awareness, with parity of esteem and with supporting our guidance counsellors, teachers and parents in providing all the information to students. I thank the CAO and others who have worked with us. We must continue to enhance the visibility of FET. It is not acceptable that every year we see league tables showing how many students went to university but not how many went on to do an apprenticeship or a FET course. That is not the fault of the media that compile the tables, but we need to look at a way of recognising schools that excel and place a value on FET and apprenticeships as well. I am actively considering how best to do this.

I am conscious there is incredible work under way in FET, but I am embarrassed about the infrastructure some people are working in. When we travel around FET colleges, we meet people working in buildings - perhaps former secondary schools that are deemed to no longer be appropriate for such a school - that now house the local college of further education. I have met many of the Deputies present in their constituencies in these scenarios. I am pleased we now have a substantial level of capital funding to invest in FET capital infrastructure, for the first time in the living memory of anyone I can find who has worked in FET. The FET college of the future programme has selected ten locations around the country in which to develop major new FET centres. The next phase is for all of them to submit business cases by September and then we can get on with this programme. ETBs that were successful at the first stage are currently developing their proposals and it is expected these proposals will be submitted to SOLAS for evaluation by the end of September. We also have the strategic infrastructure upgrade fund, which is providing significant investment that will modernise and upgrade FET infrastructure. Looking around the Chamber, I can think of many constituencies that have benefited from a new FET college of the future. There will be one in Galway, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle, and I can advise Deputy O’Reilly there is one going to Swords as well. It is an area that badly needs this capacity. This is a key aspect of not just saying FET is important, but actually trying to support it.

We have put in place a fund for educational disadvantage. This arose during Covid and worked so well that we decided to embed it as a core part of what we were doing. For the fourth year we have an annual allocation under the Reach fund, with over €5 million available in 2023 to support educationally disadvantaged learners in community education with transport or education costs, access to technology, community Internet access and so on. Community education providers tell me the fund has been vital in providing access to education at community level and has been part of a wider strategy to invest in community education.

FET plays an especially important role through the implementation of our ten-year adult literacy for life, ALL, strategy. This is an important point. We boast about being a knowledge-based economy, and we are. We boast about having a very high participation rate in third level and that is also true, but beneath those truths and headline statistics are other truths. We still live in a country where one in five adults struggles to read, one in four struggles with numeracy skills and one in two lacks basic digital skills. They should not feel the shame or stigma they feel from time to time. It is our collective shame that these people did not have the educational opportunities many others did. The ALL strategy is pulling together all stakeholders. It is funded. There is a new literacy office and a new director of the strategy working within SOLAS as well. We now have ALL regional literacy co-ordinators in each part of the country developing regional literacy plans and asking what we do in our community to tackle literacy needs. We have a €1 million innovation and collaboration fund. I am pleased to say that calls for this fund attracted significant engagement and participation with many high-quality proposals from civil society and NGOs, which will support collaborative programmes, including digital literacy projects, to address those with literacy needs as well.

Deputy Ó Murchú is here and will probably raise support for students with disabilities in FET. We have many conversations around this and around the importance of personal assistants. I have asked my Department to do a significant body of work with SOLAS around how we embed good practice in supporting students with disabilities. I look forward to meeting the group the Deputy is bringing to see me about this issue shortly.

I conclude by thanking everyone who works in FET, in apprenticeships, in SOLAS and in all the ETBs. This is an area that was left as the poor relation of third level education for too long. Against that backdrop, it has still achieved incredible things. Now we are very much putting it up in lights by increasing our funding, putting in place capital programmes and, crucially, providing pathways to move between further education and higher education. Fifteen degree programmes are being launched this year where the learner will start the degree in further education and then be able to finish the degree in university outside the points system. We need to embed these sorts of diverse pathways. If they work this year, we will look to accelerate them the following September.

We have got to change the conversation. We have got to explain to people what they know in their hearts and guts, which is that success comes in many forms. It is not about people doing in college what their granny thinks is a good idea or what their brother did before them. It is about people finding what they are interested in and what difference they want to make in their community, society and country and going for it. We need to ensure that there are many different ways of getting there, including apprenticeships, further education and higher education, and that they work together in a unified way. I am committed to continuing to work with all stakeholders and all people and parties in this House to ensure we can support the apprenticeship and FET system to reach its full potential. If we do that, our economy, society and citizens will benefit now and into the future.

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