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Meeting of the Parliament 14 June 2012

14 Jun 2012 · S4 · Meeting of the Parliament

Item of business

Youth Employment

Wheelhouse, Paul SNP South Scotland Watch on SPTV

I rise in support of the Scottish Government’s motion. As the minister set out, the SNP in Government has done everything in its power to tackle youth unemployment. The Scottish Government is investing in record numbers of modern apprenticeships, which I will come to later. Unlike its counterpart in England, this Government is maintaining the education maintenance allowance. The Government is also guaranteeing all 16 to 19-year-olds an employment or training opportunity, under opportunities for all.

Clearly, the Government has achieved and, indeed, exceeded its pledge to deliver 25,000 modern apprenticeships in 2011-12 and has invested £72 million in the process. The Government will continue to deliver 25,000 new modern apprenticeships each year for the rest of this parliamentary session. Of course, unlike in England, those modern apprenticeships are linked to real jobs. In relation to that, I will mention the presentation that was given to us this morning by Donald MacRae, the chief economist at the Bank of Scotland. He said that, over the past 12 months, the Bank of Scotland’s labour market barometer indicated that Scotland’s labour market performance is better than that of the UK as a whole. When he was asked what he attributed that to, he cited the strength of the oil and gas sector, the strength of renewables, and he said that he believed that the Scottish Government’s modern apprenticeship programme had a role in it. He also encouraged a plan A+, as he put it, or, as I would call it, a plan B, to address the fundamental problem of growth in the economy—that is a message for members of the UK coalition Government. He also suggested that there might be a case for delaying the UK Government plans to restore balance in public sector finances. I would be interested in Mary Scanlon’s view on that.

Skills Development Scotland data at the community planning partnership level indicate that in the Scottish Borders area, some 258 modern apprenticeships were completed in April to December 2011. Of those, 83 per cent went on to positive destinations. Historically, it has proved more difficult to generate MA enrolments in the Borders, due to the economy being more than usually dependent on SMEs to provide such opportunities. However, the figures, which show that there are 437 modern apprenticeships in training as at December 2011, indicate that we are on track to get a much better performance in the Borders. I am confident that with a number of local initiatives that are now under way, we have a good chance to meet or exceed what would be a pro rata number of about 500 modern apprenticeships for the area.

I wish to highlight a crucial issue that is at the heart of the Government’s motion—that of replacement demand. We often talk about growth in the economy and the increase in the number of people being employed in a sector. Even when employment in a sector is in decline or static, however, there is always replacement demand: a stream of younger people are needed to replace those who are retiring at the end of their careers. That has been a strong driver in a number of important initiatives. In the Finance Committee yesterday, the Minister for Youth Employment cited the oil and gas sector, which has proactively taken competition out of the labour market and decided to pool its resources to ensure that there is a sufficient supply of apprentices to meet emerging needs. Competition from the renewables sector has obviously played a part in that, too.

As the minister has visited Hawick Knitwear and the Johnstons of Elgin plant in Hawick, he knows that the Scottish Borders knitwear group training association has pooled together a group of 14 employers—soon to expand to 23—who have also set aside their competitive interests in favour of the future of their sector and decided to ensure that they provide a sufficient pool of trainees and apprenticeships. When we met the apprentices, of whom there are a hundred—it is hoped that that figure will expand to 150—about 60 to 80 per cent of those the minister spoke to had come directly from Jobcentre Plus, rather than having had word-of-mouth referral or having worked there already. That shows the importance of such schemes in extending opportunities to those who are furthest from the labour market.

The minister has dealt with most of Kezia Dugdale’s comments this week but, in response to them, I will quote Graeme Ogilvy, who is the director of the construction industry training board, ConstructionSkills Scotland. He said:

“Employers enrol their apprentices onto the programme at the start of the college term in September. That should not stop us hiring young people earlier in the year and giving them a job. Any change would deny these young people the chance of paid employment. You have to ask if that would be useful right now. The Scottish Government is right to keep the eligibility criteria for funding without any qualifying criteria such as time in the job.”

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Meeting of the Parliament 14 June 2012

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