Skilled workers taking lowest payments

With jobs still at a premium across the sector, many skilled construction workers are accepting as little as the minimum wage in order to secure work in the trade.

That has meant that many employers are choosing not to take on apprentices as they know they can get fully trained workers at almost the same cost.

The Construction Industry Federation is in talks with training agency Solas regarding incentives to employers which would make it more favourable for them to take on apprentices.

What is being discussed includes upfront payments to employers or measures whereby the apprentice would be kept on the books of Solas for the first stage of the apprenticeship.

Last year, Registered Employment Agreements, which governed construction sector workers’ wages as well as working conditions, were deemed unconstitutional on the grounds that there were insufficient limitations placed on the power granted to those creating agreements.

That meant there was no legal obligation to employers to maintain wage levels at the previous REA rates. As a result, a number have reduced the amount they are willing to pay to workers to as low as the minimum wage.

One industry source said a situation has emerged as a result whereby it is “not in the interests” of the employer to take on an apprentice. They do not have to guarantee work to the fully trained person.

It recently emerged that, in the first half of the year, just four people had started plastering apprenticeships around the country; three had begun apprentice positions learning brick and stone laying; and three had started apprenticeships as painters.

Nobody has taken a tiling apprenticeship since 2012. When the sector was booming in the middle of the last decade, more than 1,000 people were registered for apprenticeships in those four “wet” trades alone in the space of just one year.

The figures were more positive for some of the other construction trades, with 69 people taking up carpentry; 168 doing plumbing apprentices; 385 beginning electrical apprentices; and 88 metal fabrication apprentices starting this year.

In general, an apprenticeship takes four years to complete with a mixture of lectures and fully supervised on-the-job training. If nobody registers for a particular trade in 2014, that means no fully skilled graduate will become available before 2018 at the earliest.

A CIF spokesman said: “We need more apprentices in the system. There is a very low number at present. We are concerned for the viability of future projects if there are not the skills to meet them.”

Last week, the industry was given a major boost when French building materials multinational Saint-Gobain announced plans for a building skills academy which, it said, will train 25,000 workers in five years.

The facility, which is to located near Lucan, will train all of the key construction professionals including builders, architects, and tradespeople.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions yesterday called for the restoration of wage-setting mechanisms in key sectors of the economy such as construction.

Addressing the joint committee on jobs, enterprise, and innovation, Congress vice-president Patricia King said: “We need to bring back some balance for workers in key sectors through the restoration of wage-setting mechanisms. ”