THE two national enterprise agencies claimed significant gains in skills and training programmes in their annual reports published last week.
Scottish Enterprise says modern apprenticeships in central Scotland stood at nearly 13,000 in the year to the end of March. Training for new Skillseekers reached 24,550 of whom six out of 10 were expected to go into ull-time jobs.
Highlands and Islands Enterprise saw the number of Skillseekers in employment rise to a new high of 85 per cent in 1999-2000. Some 200 modern apprenticeships were completed and 45 per cent of those on training programmes achieved a vocational qualification of some kind. In-company training benefited 3,602 staff in 313 businesses.
