Mark Wall (Kildare South, Labour)
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1918. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if his attention has been drawn to discrepancies in pay for apprentices completing the off-the-job college phases of their apprenticeship at a company (details supplied) compared to other apprentices completing the same course; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11960/25]

Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail)
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1926. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will address the concerns raised in correspondence (details supplied) regarding disparity in pay for apprentices; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12246/25]

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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1930. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the reason apprentice wage norms in engineering have not been reviewed since July 2016; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12402/25]

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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1931. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the reason discriminatory rates of payments to apprentices exist between the electrical, construction, mechanical and engineering industries where apprentices attain the same qualification; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12403/25]

James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 1918, 1926, 1930 and 1931 together.

Craft apprentices are employees and are paid directly by their employer during the “on-the-job” training phases of their apprenticeship. Craft apprentice gross wage norms differ for different sectors, are set through collective bargaining, and may be underpinned by sectoral employment orders.

When craft apprentices attend “off-the-job” training in Education and Training Board or Higher Education facilities they receive a fortnightly State paid training allowance. This is not a wage and there is no contract of employment between SOLAS and the apprentice. The State training allowance is aligned to gross wage norms for the industry in which the apprentice is employed and to the phase or year of training the apprentice is in.

Neither SOLAS nor my department are involved in the setting of wages for craftspersons. As training allowances are based on the sector in which an apprentice is employed, it can come about that apprentices engaged in off-the-job training on a particular apprenticeship programme receive training allowances that are different to other apprentices on the same programme, just as they may receive different wages when on the job.

The engineering sector has not been able to set gross wage norms for apprentices through collective bargaining. The matter of State training allowances for the engineering sector is currently under review.