‘A National Union of Apprentices’ is the answer to educational funneling | Alex Brown

For years Britain has failed to project apprenticeships as a reasonable alternative to university as entry numbers to the latter continue to increase ever since 2007. Numerous attempts have been made to coerce more young people into apprenticeships, but all have seemingly failed as the UK observed an 11% drop in apprenticeship starts in the 2019/20 academic year. What we need is coordination from both the state and the private sector in order to organize apprenticeships in a nationwide effort to rebuild our ‘skills armory’ and ensure we can keep up with the ever-rising power of the vast industrial giants in Asia. We need to utilize the swathes of domestic labour at our fingertips. One of the best ways to do that is to create a ‘National Union of Apprentices’ (NUA). 

Before any real emphasis on apprenticeships as we knew them, the Education Act of 1944 (Butler Act) created the tripartite system, one branch of which included secondary technicals which focused on technical practical skills. This is the closest we have ever gotten to a nationally coordinated system of apprenticeships yet few were built and the potential to create a more specialized workforce was never capitalized on, mainly due to a lack of government attention and resources. 

But through an NUA, the government can take control of the apprentice system and deliver a practical education for millions at a time while involving a more professional and modern private sector in such a delivery. Resources and logistics have been massively scaled up since 1944 and there are thousands more professionals to pass on knowledge and teach which was one of key problems originally.

This ‘union’ would financially be run by the state but practically be run by employers (big and small) who would liaise with the government in finding where skills shortages are geographically and economically. They would plug those gaps through recruitment of the copious amounts of young unemployed which stood at 528,000 in April 2020, and ensure that we have a more balanced post-16 education system that doesn’t propel students ill-suited for academia into university. A system that instead gives them opportunities for a meaningful and better suited career that will not only be worthwhile for them but will aid the country in closing the enormous skills gap that the Open University estimated cost companies £6.3 billion in 2018. This service will be used by prospective apprentices, employers and the government to research apprenticeships and recruit apprentices. 

Many typical conservatives fear the state as a means of fostering economic and educational growth because of inefficiency, and they wouldn’t be wholly wrong as many state infrastructure projects like HS2 and Crossrail continue to go billions over budget. But with the NUA, we are proposing that the private and state sector work hand in hand to coordinate potential apprentices to where the skills shortages are through career-based incentives. We need to convince young people that they cannot be attached to a geographical location in terms of employment forever. They must ‘spread their wings’ and be willing to move around the country where the shortages are occurring. 

These career-based incentives will revolve around the guarantee of employment at the end of their apprenticeship and the guarantee of further training, promotion and educational opportunities. If an apprentice takes up this opportunity, they will receive the guarantees already laid out but in return will be expected to commit to moving around the UK (within reason) to practice their profession and hopefully employ further apprentices’ years down the line, thus repeating the cycle. We do not propose that apprentices be required to travel from Birmingham to Carlisle - more like from Birmingham to Nottingham.

The current government system of researching apprenticeships is clunky and does not communicate between the prospective apprentice and employer what is available for employee development - something critical to many apprentices of today who wish to progress and not to linger on one purpose. What is being proposed is the best solution because it involves state and private sector which will crucially allow for increased efficiency as the problems are routed out, better targeting of where new skills and apprentices are needed, as well as the old yet important principle of business. Innovation being heavily incentivised through the NUA as businesses strive to attract more apprentices and create a dynamic and mixed system of training and business.

This system I am proposing will not only create a new generation of plumbers, builders, joiners, administrators etc., but will also guarantee them the opportunity of progression and development that will create future entrepreneurs, recruiters and businesspeople. And these two paths do not have to be mutually exclusive and with the NUA. They would be the opposite – a plumber will be a businessman in the more formal sense under this proposed system.

A bonus of having a nationally coordinated system on this issue would be that data would be easier tracked, meaning we can focus even more on what the most popular companies to work for are, the most popular sectors of interest are. And most crucially, if data is better tracked then we can try to get back up to pace with the Asian giants in growth as we track where demand grows and falls. The UK tertiary sector already makes up 80.89% of the workforce so we should try and expand it further but as a more diverse sector (which and NUA would strive for) so that should an economic shock arrive, we don’t crash and burn because of an overreliance on one industry like we have seen with the coronavirus and airlines. 

As a final point for the NUA, it will provide an opportunity to ‘build, build, build’ like we have never seen before as the PM envisions. And with his most recent promise of more apprenticeship or work placement opportunities for young people post-coronavirus, what better way to coordinate them than through a shared union between the private and state sector which will provide the best possible results in targeting where needed most in the country.

So let us offer every young person a meaningful job, a wealth of knowledge and experience. But most importantly, take the emphasis away from university and move the status quo towards a ‘National Union of Apprentices’ so that we are creating generation after generation of hard skills instead of streamlining people into university when they don’t thrive there. If you're going to any join a union, join the NUA.