Eoghan Kenny (Cork North-Central, Labour)
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1237. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the estimated cost of paying all apprentices a living wage; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23576/25]

James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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Neither SOLAS nor my department is involved in the setting of wages for apprentices.

Apprentices are employees and party to a contract of employment with their employers. For the 25 craft apprenticeship programmes, the minimum rates of pay applying under the contract of employment are either agreed within the relevant sector or are set out in legally binding Sectoral Employment Orders recommended by the Labour Court. Any review of those rates currently payable is a matter for negotiation between staff representatives and their employers under the appropriate industrial relations structures in place. In the case of the 52 consortia-led apprenticeship programmes wages are agreed between the apprentice and the employer in the contract of employment.

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.

Minimum wage legislation, which falls under the Department of Enterprise, Tourism and Employment, does not apply to the remuneration of a person who is an apprentice within the meaning of or under the Industrial Training Act, 1967, or the Labour Services Act, 1987.