SBF Chief Executive, Michael Levack, today welcomed the commitment made by the Scottish Government's Education and Lifelong Learning Secretary Fiona Hyslop to move quickly to consider the actions identified at the Apprenticeship summit held on the 28th April as necessary to support modern apprenticeships in Scotland.

Mr Levack appeared alongside Ms Hyslop as a keynote speaker at a conference entitled "Maintaining Fife's Construction Apprentices" hosted by Fife Works at the Carnegie Conference Centre in Dunfermline on Friday (5th June).

Following the event, he said: "I'm pleased by the level of priority the Scottish Government is giving to the issue of supporting modern apprenticeships in Scotland. It's clear that there's a lot to be done in the current economic climate to help apprentices in industries such as construction to complete their training. In that context, the £16m of additional funding the Scottish Government has pledged towards creating additional apprenticeship places is to be welcomed.

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"But to be a success, that commitment needs to be matched with increased investment in the industries that recruit apprentices in Scotland. The construction industry is widely recognized as one of the largest recruiters of apprentices in this country. We therefore need to see building firms' order books bolstered by additional public investment in schools, hospitals, infrastructure and housing."

Mr Levack said the Scottish Government also needs to be open to finding new and innovative ways of leveraging more private investment into the construction sector. "Looking to the future, green building technologies and techniques have the potential to revolutionize the building industry. We need to be investing now in the skills required to deliver those technologies and techniques."

The Chief Executive thinks a good place for the government to start would be through the creation of additional tax incentives to encourage homeowners and businesses to invest in making the buildings they use each day much more energy efficient.

"This is the sort of joined-up thinking we will be urging Ministers to adopt to reverse the current alarming decline in construction apprentices completing their training," he concluded.

(GK/JM)