Sunday morning people Stu from Trail Talk. Last night I got a random text from a producer from
Radio 5 Live and which basically read look we understand you've done a interview about
traineeships on Coventry Warwickshire radio and we're doing a segment tomorrow morning at nine
on traineeships you fancy jumping on and having a chat so I said yeah fine absolutely no problem at
all I've recorded that and I thought it'd be awesome to upload it for you guys to listen to
if you're a tradesman watching this video now and you're considering taking on a young lad or lady
to work beside you in your business and help you to grow and expand we've got a key opportunity at
the moment the government's just announced that they're going to be pumping a load more cash into
these traineeship schemes and if you're a sole trader business like myself a tradesman working on your
own or maybe just a one or two man setup and you're busy and you need a hand we've got an opportunity
on our laps at the moment with these traineeship schemes you've probably seen my videos before
I've done other stuff on the traineeship schemes and if you're a member of Trail Talk Facebook group
I've talked about it on there and so basically what it is is they the government are helping us out by
giving us an incentive payment to take on these young kids and they're also covering wages for a number of
weeks two or three weeks so it gives us a chance to test out the waters with a young person see whether
they like plastering or if you're a plumber carpenter sparky whatever it is you do see whether they take to
the trade and and for you to see whether they're a good fit for you and your business so it allows us
to test the water without sort of wasting too much of our time and money which I mean taking on an
apprentice is hard graft if there's anyone out there that's done that you'll know if you're self-employed
you're a tradesman I think there's a bit of a misconception from people when tradesmen take
on an apprentice they might think oh you know the wages are a minimal in a way they get covered you
get help and they don't cost you very much money that is a misconception if you take on an apprentice
not only do you have to cover their wages but you also have to cover things like their holiday pay
their time at college there's costs involved with uniforms the list goes on so there is an overhead
but I'll tell you what the most expensive side of it for me personally and you could probably relate
with this as well is the time lost on jobs when you take on a trainee or an apprentice so for example
we might price a job that takes you know two or three days for example if you've got an apprentice
beside you or a kid that's you know completely clueless he hasn't done any construction work at
all before by you training him and having to shadow him and watch that he doesn't burn the house down
for example that's going to eat into your time that you've allowed for that job so a job that might
normally take you on your own two days because you know how we work we're against the clock we bash
these jobs out and we often work through lunch breaks and time is money at the end of the day isn't
it so if you've got an apprentice by your side it's a case of switching things up and having to real slow
things down spend the time needed with them to train them and watch them and coach them and teach
them and repeat yourself and demonstrate how to do the job that that really does eat into your day
and then of course it's going to have a knock-on effect on your bottom line and it's going to
eat into your your profit so um this idea of apprentices don't cost you much money and
the wages are low you know is it is a misconception and um at the end of the day us tradesmen we need
all the help we can get don't we we need all the financial assistance that we can get from government
to um to help us and to push us in the right direction give us a head start and really that's what
this um interview's about i wanted to say more i wanted to um you know be an advocate for trades
really and get get behind us and you know sing our praises a bit more but the interview was quite
short i hope i come across well um but yeah i thought i'd upload it for you guys to have a listen to
and also question for you have you ever taken on an apprentice before and what was the biggest
challenge in doing so drop a comment in because i'll be really interested to to see
your perspective on taking on trainees and what what are some of the challenges that you've found
financially and also um being on the tools with them what are some of the challenges that you face
and what puts you off taking on an apprentice is it just about money or is it something else drop a
comment in and um don't forget to subscribe and join the facebook group guys enjoy the interview and
i'll see you next week before i go um next week i'm going to upload a video on magnetic plaster
um if you're on the trial talk facebook group you would have seen a little live that i did
the other day in my son's room uh where we had a little go at magnetic plastering it's quite an
interesting product and um i'm going to upload a full youtube video for that one next week so
don't miss that and keep your eyes out for that one but have a great weekend guys and i'll speak to
you soon let's talk about what this is meaning to employers and whether they think that t levels are a
good idea stuart roberts is a plasterer based in warwickshire and kelly dunn runs a recruitment
firm which covers north and east yorkshire morning to both of you morning morning so stuart you are
as we say are a plasterer you're a sole trader um but you have employed or you've certainly took on a
trainee as a result of this scheme um how how is he getting on good morning thanks for having me on
today uh curtis my trainee is getting on brilliantly um so he's completed a three-week placement with
myself um on the tools and that's actually led to an apprenticeship for curtis now which he started
last month um so it's been a success for me yeah so this was a local the local college got in touch
with you did they that's right yeah city college coventry uh they got in touch uh they made me aware
of the traineeship scheme um to be honest with you my first initial reaction was look i've took young
guys on before and it's um it's ended up costing me a lot of time and money and um i wasn't overly
enthusiastic about it but they said look we can take this thing out of this for you with this uh
incentive payments and also it's a wageless scheme um so to be honest i didn't have a lot to lose uh by
taking on curtis for the initial few weeks it allowed me to sort of test the waters with him see whether
he was a good fit for my business and also for curtis you know he could he had the opportunity
to see whether he liked plastering and whether he was going to stick it out so it was a win-win
so did he come to you with some skills already or have you had to train him up from scratch
no he didn't have any any skills at all um he'd worked he's very young he was uh 17 so he'd done a
little bit of part-time work at mcdonald's and um didn't have a lot of skills at all to be honest
in terms of construction so yeah it's a case of training him up right from scratch
but he's obviously doing all right he's doing very well um he took to plastering like a duck to water
if i'm honest um he's enthusiastic and he's got a lot of energy which is uh what we need
if you want to be a plasterer well absolutely you know and we need plasterers let's face it let's
let's talk to kelly i mean that's that's an interesting example isn't it from stewart and
obviously some of the appeal is the fact that he could take on this guy without having to to pay
him a wage initially uh it had that those subsidies but is that something that is appealing for employers
do you know i think uh good morning everybody um i think it will be something that appeals i think the
the first thing that we have to do is actually get more and more employers aware of what t levels
are as stewart said it wasn't something he was aware of and there's loads of schemes that have been
happening over the last few years so i think employers have to try and find out more about
t levels i think the government need to make more of a push not from an education perspective because
you know i've worked with a lot of education establishments over the years and they're doing
brilliantly trying to attract the students but what the government needs to do is now educate
businesses organizations sole traders to say right these t levels exist um and this is what they can do
for them because i think there is a place for them um not every student is academic um so some want to
go down the a-level route some want to go down the apprenticeship route and i think the t level is a
good hybrid model um and i think that they will provide really really good qualifications and work
experience at the end of it as long as that education piece is there with employers across the country
one of the criticisms that we've had on the program this morning is that you're asking
a 16 year old to specialize at a quite an early age that most 16 year olds don't really know what
they're going to want to do with their lives no and i think that's the difficulty with anything um
and i think when you look at i mean i've got a 16 year old son myself who's just started college
and some children know exactly what they want to do and some don't and i think where we're looking at
which direction of education is right for them is looking at whether they know what they want to do or not
so those that don't know what to do they want to do tend to go down the more um academic route
because they can do a multitude of different subjects those that have got a set idea so maybe
um you know they want to go into plastering and things like that then actually the t levels and
things are a really good route into that so i think it's on a case-by-case basis what the children want
to do but again that goes back to education at school and having more careers conversations with the
children when they're at school before they need to make these decisions of going to college
going to do a levels t levels apprenticeships so you know we need to really sort of bring it right
back so when they're maybe taking their options in year nine start careers conversations as early as
possible and give them the influx of careers that are out there to make them kind of start thinking
about different ideas you know do you want to go into engineering oh what does that entail well this
is the plethora of engineering roles that are out there do you want to go into the care sector do you
want to be an accountant do you want to go and work in human resources you know i think if somebody
wants to be a vet or a doctor there's a very career clear career goal and you know where you
need to be but if somebody doesn't know what they want to do which is the majority of children actually
what they need is the support to go well there are so many other roles in your local area that you
could look at and you know getting employers from the local area to come in and talk to the children
at schools will help them form those ideas so when they do go to college they have more of an idea
of what they want to do and where they want to do it i'm quite interested steward to know how you got
into plastering in the first place did you know at 16 that that's what you wanted to do um i knew that
i wanted to work with my hands so at school um as kelly touched on not everybody's sort of academic and
you know i could talk to sit behind the desk on a computer i was sort of one of those kids that was
i was good with my hands um i'll get a lot of praise from my woodwork teachers and my art teacher
um but when it came to sort of um the academic side of it um the it and english and maths i was okay
but i wasn't great so um i chose to go down the road of working with my hands just because it was
what came naturally to me and i think um kelly mentioned about employees visiting schools and
um showcasing you know some of the ideas behind what they do working as a tradesman for example i
think that would be fantastic because it would give kids a real insight into um some of the benefits
working as a tradesperson because there's a bit of a stigma isn't there a bit of an image
with tradespeople that i think puts a lot of kids off not many kids are choosing to go into the trade and
we know there's a massive skill shortage um most tradesmen are sole traders so i think it's a case
of linking up these kids with sole traders and again giving them an insight into what's it like
working as a sole trader and what are the benefits and by bringing people in and demonstrating that in
school it might push kids more into that line of work yeah i tell you what it sounds like you and
curtis should go into into his college and and talk to them because it sounds like you're a great
example but final thought from you kelly on this because that you know the fact that the btex as
well have have you know been successful for a lot of kids going through who aren't that they don't want
to do a levels are you are you concerned from your point of view that actually we could be losing quite
a valuable thing if if if the t levels eventually replace btex yeah i think there needs to be a place
for everything and i can see that the government obviously want to reform the higher education
um and make it a lot simpler but you know btex do have a place um a levels have a place and i think
you know what the government need to do is look at what the children need and what the employers need
so you know btex are an alternative to a levels to stay within education the t levels are a hybrid model
of you get work experience as well so you're not a full apprenticeship you're at college but you're getting
some work experience so i think everyone has its merit in the right way i don't think we should be
losing any of them and i think what the government needs to do is actually listen to what the employers
want so the sole traders and the smes make up sort of 99 of the businesses in the uk you know there's
six million smes in the uk at the moment that is what our workforce is so what the government need to
do is listen to what they want out of their employees and most of the time it's behaviors and attitude
you know as stewart said you get the right person as he's got in his apprentice now who's got the
right behaviors the right attitude you can train them you can develop them you can teach them the
skills that they need now that's not to do with necessarily the course he's done that's just who
this kid is and he's got you know he's switched on and he wants to learn as stewart said when he was
at school he knew he wanted to work with his hands so you know that's kind of the direction he's
gone in so i think if we can work with the kids excuse me and really develop them personally as
individuals and not try and shoehorn them all into one set area then you know the future of our
workforce is bright because every single person is different and every single person deserves the
chance to shine really good to talk to you both kelly dunn who runs a recruitment firm covering north and
east yorkshire and stuart roberts who is a plasterer based in warwickshire um if you have an experience of
this if you have a if you're doing a t level at the moment or if you have a a child who is doing
t levels then then let us know 85058 at bbc 5 live it's 18 minutes