Over a month ago three Tory MPs asked the same question of the new Minister of Equalities, Amber Rudd. It always seems strange when the wording of three questions from three individuals is identical, almost as if the three colluded in some way. However that aside the question was a good one so the three MPs, Gillian Keegan, Trudy Harrison and David Amess asked:

What steps the Government are taking to ensure that women are able to access high-quality apprenticeships.

If I have a minor concern about the collusions, the big problem is in the response from Ms Rudd:

It is good news that women now account for over half of all apprentices. We continue to implement apprenticeship reforms to improve the quality of apprenticeships for all, and we are using the employer apprenticeship diversity champions network to champion gender representation in industries where greater participation by women is still needed.

The reason I have concerns regarding this answer is that I work in an industry that is dominated, in terms of the engineering side of things by men. The issue is not that we as a business are unwilling to recruit women, it is that very few women present themselves as being interested in working in our area of work. I was recently invited to speak to some engineers at a local University to explain how a small business deals with CVs and recruitment and the sea of faces was almost all male. Not much has changed since I studied at the same educational institution 40 years ago. This same view was expressed in Gillian Keegans follow up question:

The further education college and the university in Chichester offer a wide range of courses giving young people in my constituency access to high-quality apprenticeships. However, I am concerned that only 21% of places for degree-level apprenticeships in digital, tech and management are filled by women. That is the same as it was 30 years ago when I did that apprenticeship. What is my right hon. Friend doing to encourage more women and girls to take up apprenticeships as a pathway to a successful career?

The response from Amber Rudd to this question was:

My hon. Friend raises an important point. It is not enough that more than 50% of apprenticeships are being taken up by women. We want to ensure that there is greater diversity, particularly in areas where lower numbers of women are participating than we would like. Our careers strategy sets out a long-term plan to build a world-class careers system to help young people and adults to choose the career that is right for them, and promotes gender equality by increasing young people’s contact with employers, demonstrating different jobs and career paths to raise aspirations. In addition, a new legal requirement means that schools must give providers the chance to talk to pupils about technical qualifications and apprenticeships. In that way, we hope to raise awareness of the additional routes that are available to young people.

There are at least three problems with this response. The first is that the coalition Government stripped out all of the funding from School based careers arrangements. How on earth can a party that has cut the funding by 100% claim it wants a world class careers system? They must begin to invest in this area if they want to be taken seriously. The second is that writing as a STEM Ambassador in Sussex I can assure Amber and Gillian (both Sussex MPs) that there are no barriers to being invited into Schools in our area. Indeed Schools are crying out for STEM visits. The big problem is that most businesses, by a huge margin in Sussex are SMEs and so finding ways of making such visits sustainable is the problem. What would help is if procurement by government agencies took such provision into account and paid attention to the needs of SME engineering and technology companies that are prepared to work with schools and educational providers. What happens instead is that the Government procurement systems favour large businesses such as Carillion because this Government wants to enjoy black and white balls with the directors of large multinationals who will fund the Tory Party, rather than favour smaller businesses who are committed to working in local communities. We need to turn such procurement practice on its head so that the number of female apprenticeships rises from 21%! Finally the availability of apprenticeships to SMEs is currently almost non existent because the non levy funding for apprenticeships which was promised to be delivered last May is still not even on the drawing board as far as businesses like ours can tell.