Caption: Pictured at the Apprenticeship Awards at Civic Hall are competition winners(left-to-right) George Moore, Anthony Pearce and 16-year-old Oliver Neal, who has secured an apprenticeship in carpentry and joinery with Bermar Building, along with Leader of Leeds City Council Cllr Keith WakefieldLeeds City Council has announced a range of ambitious new plans to encourage greater youth employment in the city.
The council’s annual budget proposals for the financial year 2012/13 include a host of new initiatives to offer young people in Leeds the chance to take advantage of opportunities in employment, education or training following on from a hugely successful previous 12 months which saw the number of apprenticeships being taken up in the city almost double.
From August 2010 to July 2011, the number of new apprenticeships in Leeds was an impressive 7,030 – a 98 per cent increase on the previous year. This success was down to new initiatives such as the YOUth Inspire Programme, delivered by Learning Partnerships and supported by Leeds City Council, Leeds City College and the Skills Funding Agency to offer support and skills training to young people aged 16-24 to help them find a job, apprenticeship or training.
This success was down to new initiatives such as the YOUth Inspire Programme, delivered by Learning Partnerships and Leeds City Council, Leeds City College and the Jobcentre Plus to offer work experience, support and skills training to young people aged 16-24 to help them find a job, apprenticeship or training. Other successful schemes included the Leeds Apprenticeship Challenge which asked 100 employers in the city to create 100 apprenticeship places in 100 days, a challenge which drew the impressive response of 162 employers offering 375 apprenticeship places. The city now has around 1,700 businesses offering apprenticeships.
Despite these successes, there remains an estimated 1,880 16-24-year-olds in Leeds who are not in employment, education or training (NEET). The new proposals for 2012/13 are aimed at continuing to reduce this number, working especially with businesses in the city to create new opportunities for young people following the idea of ‘civic enterprise’ to encourage all sectors of the city to work together to deliver improvements and new ways of working.
Leeds City Council executive member for employment and skills Peter Gruen said:
“The success of the last 12 to 18 months in doubling the number of apprenticeships in Leeds has been a superb achievement but we know this is only the starting point and we need to do much more to help young people start on the path to jobs and careers.
“Leeds City Council itself offered 120 apprenticeships last year. We are committed to working with all sectors and agencies in the city to continue to look at new opportunities to help young people into work, and the range of plans for the next 12 months are really impressive and will help us to greatly build on the success from last year.”
Proposals in the budget which is to be ratified at the full council meeting at Civic Hall on Wednesday 22 February include £1.75m to be invested in economic initiatives to deliver jobs, training and apprenticeships.
This includes the creation of a new Apprenticeship Training Agency by Leeds City Council and Leeds City College supported by the Leeds Chamber of Commerce to support small and medium-sized businesses to take on apprentice and support them through the process.
An investment of £100,000 is also being made on a new programme to encourage the top 100 companies in Leeds to promote jobs and skills and attract investment through the wider Leeds City Region, building on the success of last year’s Leeds Apprenticeship Challenge.
On a larger scale, £15m is to be invested over three years to support innovation and economic initiatives, while the city council is working with partners to maximise the employment opportunities from £900m of ongoing and planned retail and leisure projects in the city, such as the new Leeds Arena and Trinity Leeds shopping centre which are expected to create 7,500 jobs.
Working with partners such as Leeds Metropolitan University, the University of Leeds, Leeds City College and Jobcentre Plus along with the support of Skillsmart, the Retail Sector Skills Council and leading retailers in the city, the aim is to support a large number of young people into entry levels jobs. This will enable them to gain transferable skills within a sector with diverse opportunities for progression including logistics, marketing, human resources, finance, business administration, hospitality and customer services.
This week saw the council’s first-ever Apprenticeship Awards at Civic Hall to coincide with National Apprenticeship Week, celebrating the success of young people who have taken up apprenticeship places.
Among those being honoured were 15-year-old George Moore from Brigshaw High School and 18-year-old Anthony Pearce, who were the winners of the ‘Build My Future; Build My Leeds’ competition.
The pair have been rewarded with full apprenticeships on the Leeds Arena and Trinity Leeds respectively after submitting 100 words and illustrations about the schemes. George is to be an apprentice electrician with Rotary Yorkshire Ltd, one of the contractors working with developer BAM on the arena, starting in June 2012.
George Moore said:
“I am glad I entered the competition which offers a fantastic opportunity in gaining an apprenticeship, which has given me the confidence to go forward in my career. For lots of schoolchildren about to leave school, I would say definitely look at apprenticeships.”
Anthony will also be an apprentice electrician, starting work with Laing O’Rourke on the Trinity Leeds development in the coming weeks, having been at the Leeds College of Building since September 2011 on an electrician training course.
Anthony Pearce said:
“I enjoyed attending the site visits and also the group exercises at Leeds College of Building. To be honest it’s been great and I have enjoyed all of it, even better getting an apprenticeship as an electrician, which is what I always wanted to do.”
Leader of Leeds City Council Councillor Keith Wakefield, who opened the awards ceremony, said:
“The success of Anthony and George and other young people like them are the perfect examples of what we are committed to doing in Leeds to provide career opportunities especially for our young people.
“The future economic prosperity of our city depends on helping people find work and through the idea of civic enterprise we want to work even harder with our partners and organisations in all sectors and all areas of our city to identify and create new job opportunities.
“The success of the last year or so in terms of apprenticeship creation provides a strong platform but we must now think bigger, go further and look at new relationships and new ideas to make even more of a difference.
“The new proposals in the budget are really exciting in helping us achieve that and we look forward to seeing huge numbers of young people taking up the opportunities they will provide over the next 12 months and beyond.”
Notes to editors:The ‘Build My Future; Build My Leeds’ competition was open to all year 11 pupils in the city’s schools and people aged 15-18 in Leeds who are not currently in full-time employment.
The Leeds City Region Partnership brings together the eleven local authorities of Barnsley, Bradford, Calderdale, Craven, Harrogate, Kirklees, Leeds, Selby, Wakefield, York and North Yorkshire County Council to work with businesses and partners toward a common prosperous and sustainable city region in areas such as transport, skills, housing, spatial planning and innovation. For more information visit www.leedscityregion.gov.uk/
ENDS
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Leeds City Council, Tel 0113 247 5472
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