2026-07-02

88. Deputy Eoghan Kenny asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science given the growth in apprenticeships in Ireland if he is considering plans to introduce a CAO-type application process to secure an apprenticeship; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [50207/26]

As I have mentioned already during these questions, given the growth in apprenticeships in Ireland, is the Department considering plans to introduce a CAO style type of application process to secure an apprenticeship? We all know there is a significant number of people who are waiting and trying to get an apprenticeship and trying to get a company to take them on for their apprenticeship. There is the CAO system and an application process for students who are going into further and higher education from sixth year. Is that going to be brought in for apprenticeships?

I thank the Deputy. The CAO processes applications for undergraduate courses in higher education. Unlike higher education, apprenticeships are different. They are employment-led programmes that start in the workplace. The apprentices are employed, registered with SOLAS and training is a combination of on-the-job work experience and structured off-the-job training. Part of the process of starting an apprenticeship is finding an employer and arranging with that employer to take the apprentice on. It is a little bit more direct and deliberative than the CAO process where a student applies to a course and sees what availability there is. In the case of an apprenticeship, they start by going through an employer, come to an arrangement locally and then they commence their training. It is the other way around. For that reason, apprenticeships are not historically advertised on the CAO rather employers advertise apprenticeship vacancies directly. They can do that in many ways. They can use - and I encourage them to do so - the Generation Apprenticeship website and apprenticeship.ie. If the Deputy goes onto its website, as he probably has done, and I have done as well, he can look through it. I looked through my own county out of interest to see what was available. I was surprised to find that many were not available. When I looked into it further, I found they were being provided but the employers had not signed up to the apprenticeship.ie website. The response I got was that they did not need to because they are getting apprentices coming to them anyway. There is a gap there. I encourage more employers to utilise the available machinery and frameworks we have put in place to allow that kind of matching take place between the apprentice and apprentice employer. Of course, my priority is to ensure learners can access clear information on all pathways and tertiary pathways. A new apprenticeship action plan will be published later this year. A big focus of that is improving the communication and access to opportunities. People cannot apply for something if they do not know it exists or know where to start. One of things we have done is that we have included apprenticeship information on the CAO website. It is not quite a CAO process but it is on the CAO website. Ultimately, I would like to get to a point where we have a one-stop-shop students, apprentices, learners and all young people can come into and begin their journey.

In relation to apprenticeship.ie, I ask the Department to promote this more strongly and more to career guidance teachers in our secondary schools who are probably aware of it but I am not necessarily sure how many parents or young people are aware of apprenticeship.ie. It is a simple fix. It probably would not need a lot of funding to promote that. The main focus of the question is on the fact they are no longer confined to the traditional trades anymore where they approach a local plumber or carpenter to take an apprentice on. It is covering areas like ICT, finance, biopharma, logistics and engineering. They are providing young people and career changers with excellent opportunities to earn while they learn. It is an opportunity so employers have more of an understanding of how to get the apprenticeships but also apprentices would be able to access local employers or national employers.

The Deputy is right. We need to continue to promote this pathway. My Department is very industrious and engaged on that front. Among a number of things, we launched the careers in construction action plan and relaunched it recently with a number of actions. There are over 20 actions related to the promotion of training opportunities and activities to make students and would be apprentices aware and to encourage greater gender balance across the apprenticeship sector, particularly craft apprenticeships. On International Women's Day, I attended an event with my colleague, Deputy Dempsey, in Trim, attended by students from all-female secondary schools and at which we highlighted the ability of that as a path. At a time when we have great construction challenges and ambitions, we cannot afford to leave one half of the workforce outside of that conservation. That was strongly welcomed. We have the building heroes campaign which is running at the moment. It has 12 young people sharing their stories about working in construction. Among them, there are four outstanding female young apprentices who are sharing their stories. That is a strong tool to attract people into the pathways as well.

I am willing to work with the Minister on this. Our objective should be to remove barriers and not create them. If Ireland is to meet its future skills need, we must make apprenticeships as visible, accessible and attractive as every other education pathway. I welcome the Minister's views. This CAO style application system for apprenticeships is not going to happen overnight but that is the ambition the Department should have. It is the ambition we should have in this House as policymakers and public representatives. There is an opportunity to give every young person across the country, no matter what pathway they want to go down, the best possible opportunity to access that pathway. That includes a centralised application system like the one we have for those who are heading into undergraduate programmes to provide them, as the Minister said, with a one-stop-shop. That is the level of engagement we must have with those young people who are seeking apprenticeships but also with career guidance teachers, employers who are willing to take on apprenticeships and the higher institutions.

I wish to take the opportunity to thank the higher and further education committee for its work on the report on apprenticeships, which I received in February, led by Deputy McGreehan and supported by Deputy Kenny and others in the House. There are 48 actions in that which will be considered. I will action as many of them as I can in the next round of the action plan. We are engaging in second level schools. There is a documentary on careers that has been circulated. The National Apprenticeship Office has done some very good work around the promotion of apprenticeships and options and trying to remove any barriers that may exist and raise awareness. The Deputy is also correct that second level is the key point. That is where people make choices about their future career paths. Engagement with career guidance counsellors and secondary schools more broadly is something we certainly look at more. I will work with the Minister, Deputy Naughton, in the second level system around pathways there and look to promote that. We will continue to try to centralise information to have a one-stop-shop, whether a person is going down a university path, apprenticeship path or tertiary path, to ensure we have a place we can point people to and where all the information is freely available.