Meeting of the Parliament 19 November 2025
As always, I am delighted to speak in support of our education and skills sector. It is great to see Labour at long last accepting what I and my colleagues on the Conservative benches have been demanding in skills development for years. It shows that members of other parties, even if they are a little late, can join us and be persuaded to get on the right path.
Who would have thought that we would be debating the idea that we should be matching skills development with industry need? What has the Scottish Government been doing for the past 18 years? The answer is that there has been an on-going systematic dismantling of the FE sector. At a time when we desperately need a huge increase in apprenticeship numbers, the Scottish Government has squeezed funding for our colleges, forcing cuts year after year.
I have often said in the chamber that education is the cornerstone of every portfolio. I came into this place saying that education was the solution to health and welfare issues. A good education leads to decent, well-paid jobs, which has an impact on predicted health outcomes, leading to a reduction in the pressure on our national health service. Decent, well-paid jobs also lead to a higher tax take, which allows for greater investment in our public services.
The alternative is increased pressure on the welfare budget, which is exactly what we are seeing from the SNP Government. The Government’s one-dimensional thinking is exactly what is holding back Scotland’s economic potential and starving our pupils and those wishing to upskill of those important opportunities.
Among the many fantastic FE colleges across Scotland, Ayrshire College is a shining example of what can be achieved. It is working closely with local industry to develop apprenticeship programmes that are required in engineering, including in aerospace, trades and social care. Prestwick Aircraft Maintenance Ltd, which is based at Prestwick airport and services Ryanair aircraft, is desperate to expand its operation and create more than 700 jobs. It is working with Ayrshire College to develop an apprenticeship programme in engineering and aircraft maintenance. PAML already contributes millions of pounds to the Scottish tax take, yet it told me last week that it is having to recruit from as far afield as Ethiopia and Turkey because of the lack of local apprenticeships.
XLCC plans to operate 200 apprenticeships by 2030, once its plant at Hunterston is operational. Again, the company is working with Ayrshire College to develop that skill set. The companies in the engineering cluster around Prestwick are also looking to expand. The limiting factor in that economic expansion is access to constant apprenticeship throughput. Meanwhile, Ayrshire College has reported that some 834 applications from qualified applicants for apprenticeship places have had to be turned away because of lack of Government funding. Those include 400 places in engineering, 120 in apprenticeships and 71 in social care. So much for the issues in social care staffing being only down to immigration; we cannot even give people in local communities the opportunity to work in social care.
The same is true for foundation apprenticeships. A lack of foresight means that there is a lack of opportunity for pupils. If someone is academically minded and good at exams, there is a pathway for them through the education system to university and beyond, but what about a pathway for those who would excel in travelling the foundation apprenticeship route into modern apprenticeships and on to successful careers? That is just as viable a route into great careers, but it is hugely undervalued by the Government.
We need careers advice in schools that enthuses pupils to consider the pathways into great local careers. That should include recruiting local industry to showcase opportunity, but we need a Government that will match that industry need with an investment in our education system that speaks directly to it. It is only when the Scottish Government wakes up to the economic opportunity that increasing apprenticeship places would offer that our economy will reach its potential. After 18 years of SNP mismanagement, however, it is obvious that it will not come from that department.
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