Struggling apprenticeship scheme closes
Twm Owen, local democracy reporter
An apprenticeship scheme that has helped train more than 340 people in construction skills is to close.
Y Prentis was set up by Monmouthshire County Council and housing association Melin Homes in 2016, and provides apprenticeships across the 10 authorities that make up the Cardiff Capital Region in South East Wales.
But the scheme has struggled to provide opportunities in recent years, resulting in it recording a loss of £75,123 in 2023/24 on top of loss of £24,311 the previous year, and only a minority of those in training were completing their apprentices and gaining the required qualifications.
Joint shareholder
Melin Homes, which was the joint shareholder with Monmouthshire council and paid a management fee for hosting the programme, decided earlier this year it no longer wished to do so following its merger with Newport City Homes to create the Hedyn housing association.
Monmouthshire council’s Labour-led cabinet has now agreed to close Y Prentis and around 50 apprentices and staff will transfer to South West Wales-based training body Cyfle.
Run by three independent construction industry training groups, it holds charitable status and is the largest shared apprenticeship scheme in the UK, currently employing 95 apprentices with plans to expand its operating base to take in South East Wales.
Council deputy leader Paul Griffiths described the closure of Y Prentis as “unfortunate” but said the relationship with Cyfle is “very postitive”.
Surplus
It’s estimated Y Prentis will have a surplus of around £100,000 on closure and any money remaining after paying off creditors will be transferred to Cyfle in line with its article of association that any surplus is transferred to an organisation with similar objectives.
A Monmouthshire council officer will also have a seat on Cyfle’s board of directors to provide future updates to council committees and the cabinet.
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These housing association mergers are usually detrimental to the service provided to the residents and involve paying managers are lot of money or bonuses I suspect. Housing Associations should be relatively small scale and local. That’s not to say they can’t share maintenance contracts. I note that residents are moving into properties which have been poorly refurbished often with old flooring which is breaking up and deferred rewiring and poor bathrooms and kitchens.