APPRENTICES NEEDED

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 95, 3 August 1945, Page 5

APPRENTICES NEEDED

BUILDING TRADE SUFFERS

FIVE-YEAR PROGRAMME

SUGGESTED

The necessity of finding ways and means of providing more apprentices for trades was stressed by Mr W. Sullivan .speaking in the House of Representatives. It was his opinion, lie said that one of the chief reasons why there had not been the necessary number of apprentices in the building trade had been the irregularity of work. A continuity of the i building programme was needed say a five-year, seven-year or twelveyear programme. Employers would thus be. given more confidence in their own industry. A member: A guaranteed working week too. Mr Sullivan said he quite agreed that that would make for efficiency. It should be incumbent on the employer to train the apprentice efficiently he said. Likewise there should be provision in the afcpren-i ticeship contract by which if the apprentice did not carry out his side of the contract as it should be carried out there should be a cancella r tion of his contract. The road should be made easier for employers 1 taking apprentices. It must also be made attractive for apprentices to enter the trades. APP ren ti ce s should be indentured to one employer and not to the industry. Mr Sullivan considered that the question of the ratio of apprentices should be reconsidered in the building trade. It was one apprentice to three tradesmen, and that may have been all right in 1908 when the Act was. introduced and when a great deal of the skilled work was done by hand, but this was a machine, age and the bulk of the work was now done by machinery.