Once apprenticeships were a recognised path to skilled employment, but in recent years they have become all but invisible as the Government focused on getting 50 per cent of young people through university. All that appears to be changing, with the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills behind a drive to expand the number of apprenticeships.

David Lammy, the Minister for Skills, provides just the merest hint that one reason for this development is a concern about the behaviour of young men. He admits that there is some concern about young people, in particular young men, and that apprenticeships can provide skills and other important disciplines necessary for employment.

“Apprenticeships are about training, learning skills,” he says. “They are about a method of skilling up a workforce. That is good for organisations and businesses. It is time-tested.” But he says that they also provide young men and women with much more of value, particularly about what is expected of them in the world of work.

“They are also about some time-worn principles. About mentoring, not just peer-to-peer relationships that we associate with young people, but about the adult passing on skills and advice to young people. What it means about routine, dedication, application and skills. These chime with people,” he says.

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Lammy admits that he learnt valuable lessons about the world of work from his holiday jobs while he was at school and university.

“What I learnt in those jobs was to get up on time, a routine and discipline and a skill that went with the job,” he says. And the lessons he learnt were basic. While working in a small law firm he was told not to wear a nylon shirt and that the clip-on earring he wore was “not the best idea”.

Lammy says that it is this type of advice and guidance, along with skills and routine, that apprentices gain from the world of work: “There are huge benefits to acquiring those skills at the age of 16, 17 and 18 as well as the particular skill required for the job.”

From 75,000 apprenticeships in 1997, the number has risen to almost 250,000. The Government has promised 400,000 apprenticeships by 2020 and Lammy concedes that there is much to do. The world of Whitehall can do better, he says. Five hundred apprenticeships have been announced across Whitehall, but he suggests that it is time to rethink the tradition that people start working in the Civil Service when they are 18 and allow them to start earlier. He also says that the police, NHS and local government need to do more. “It seems paradoxical when we have a large public service, that in the police force and local government, the culture of apprenticeships is fairly low or has never been there.”

Local councils should do more to develop apprenticeship opportunities, and not just in the traditional ways, but in areas such as administration, to “bring young men and women into local government”.

Asked about complaints from employers about the poor standard of literacy and numeracy among young British workers compared with foreign migrants, he does not answer the question directly.

“Of course companies will choose migrants to fill some vacancies in our economy. But I believe there is a huge contribution that our own people can make, particularly our young people. This agenda is not just about productivity and your company, it is also about investing in family, commun-ity and country. The public sector can lead it. Local authorities, the NHS and government can make a real difference.”

Born: July 19, 1972
Education: School of Oriental and African Studies, London University LLB, 1993; Harvard Law School, LLM 1997.
Career: Admitted to Bar, England and Wales, 1994. Since 2001 he has served as a minister in the departments of Health, Constitutional Affairs and in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport; parliamentary under-secretary, Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills, since 2007.
What he says: “There is a social justice element [in skills] that cuts through families and communities.”
Little-known fact: Worked in the legal department of The Times as a student.

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