Apprentices part of schools plan

Sir Alan Sugar will help ministers promote the value of apprenticeships

Builders involved in the government's school rebuilding programme must hire apprentices, Children's Secretary Ed Balls has said.

Mr Balls said he planned to create up to 1,000 new apprenticeships in one year through the initiative.

Sir Alan Sugar, star of the BBC's The Apprentice, will join roadshows to persuade employers to hire trainees.

The move will be formally announced on Monday, Mr Balls announced in a Sunday Mirror article.

Companies working for the Building Schools for the Future programme will have to reveal a formal training programme, MPs will hear when they debate the second reading of the Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Bill.

Investment

The minister told the paper: "We're bringing forward spending on school buildings this year because it's essential to support local businesses and construction jobs through the recession.

"But we also need to do more to invest in the jobs of the future and the skills of our young people.

You learn your skill at work, you get a proper qualification and you come out as a really useful employee John Denham, Skills Secretary

"That's why I want more apprenticeships, and in Parliament tomorrow we'll be pushing through new plans to give every suitably-qualified young person the right to an apprenticeship place."

Meanwhile, Skills Secretary John Denham said it was time for the public sector to take more responsibility for the creation of new apprenticeships.

He told Sky News Sunday Live: "The public sector has never provided as many apprenticeships as the private sector. Now they need to take the lead.

"Now the public sector, which is where public money is going in and where the Government's investing, needs to create places.

"Apprenticeships have been around for hundreds of years. Why do they work? Because you learn your skill at work alongside somebody who knows what they are doing, you get a proper qualification and you come out as a really useful employee."