Shared Apprentice Ltd wins Scottish Government Delivering Excellence Award

A programme which enables small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) offer construction apprenticeship opportunities to young people has been recognised with a national award.

The Shared Apprentice Ltd (SAL) initiative, the first of its kind in Scotland, won the prestigious Scottish Government Award for Delivering Excellence at the 2018 COSLA Excellence Awards.

A glittering ceremony held at the Fairmont Hotel in St Andrews honoured eight Scottish councils and their partners for outstanding quality of service to the public.

SAL has been established to offer added value apprenticeships in a geographical area that is subject to low wage rates, high youth unemployment, and an industry skills shortage within the construction sector. The programme specifically enables SMEs to deliver apprenticeship opportunities that they have would otherwise been unable to provide.



The programme which is currently in its 4th year of operation began operation in Angus, has now expanded to Dundee and has further expansion opportunities through request from other local authorities including Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire, Orkney, Fife, Edinburgh and others.

The SAL is a collaborative approach between public and private partners to increase the skills levels in the construction sector. As a partnership SAL has created a Private Limited Company that employs only apprentices whilst they are completing their training. Currently it has 40 fully employed construction craft apprentices.

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Each apprentice is placed with a number of private sector employers throughout the duration of their apprenticeship and the employer contributes towards the cost of having the apprentice. There is no contribution required from the employer when the apprentice is on holiday or at college. All employment terms and conditions lie with SAL, thus offering the young person comfort that they will get a well rounded apprenticeship and for the employer the comfort that there is no risk in committing to a four year apprenticeship.



Kevin Murphy, director of curriculum & attainment at Dundee and Angus College and interim chair of SAL, said: “We are all delighted to win the Scottish Government Delivering Excellence Award at the COSLA Excellence Awards 2018. SAL is a great example of local partners working together for the benefit of young people in the region. We have 40 apprentices employed in various craft disciplines and we hope to grow this year on year. Obviously, that’s with employer buy-in so we would be delighted to hear from any construction company that would be interested in finding out more about this award winning initiative.”


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