The team at Construction Skills Village welcomed Steve Siddons, Council Leader of Scarborough Borough Council this morning.
Councillor Siddons toured the facilities and learnt about the expansion taking place at High Eastfield Farm, partly funded by the recent Town Deal.
£535,000 has been allocated to CSV from the Scarborough Town Deal to support the development of construction apprenticeships, groundworks, building, joinery, plastering and two new courses, domestic plumbing and electrics, which will be offered from September.
Graham Ratcliffe, MD at Northern Regeneration CIC, thanked the Council Leader. “This visit was a great opportunity to show Councillor Siddons how we are providing life-changing opportunities for young people along the Yorkshire Coast and helping to fill the growing skills gap in the construction sector. Our hands-on learning in a real site environment is a fantastic start for anyone wanting a career in construction and we thank the Council, CLLD and North Yorkshire LEP for their continued support.”
Later in the day Robert Goodwill MP who took a tour of the facilities and then met with past CSV apprentice, Lewis Watherstone. Lewis now runs his own successful joinery business L. W. Joinery and has taken on his own CSV apprentice, Mitchell Coles.
Graham explains “Apprenticeships are fundamental to providing much needed skills in the UK. It’s fantastic to see Lewis doing so well and now taking on his own apprentice. It’s what we’re all about at CSV! Mr Goodwill has always shown a great interest in our work, and I was delighted to be able to introduce him to apprentices – both past and present – and thank him for his continued support.”
Both visitors were also shown around CSV Training which provides a range of industry-recognised qualifications in Health and Safety and Plant machinery and learnt about the plans to train apprentices in green construction methods and reskill tradespeople in the technologies that will be needed to meet the green skills agenda in home building.
Later in the year SoHoCo Developments will be building two prototype smart, low carbon homes at the site, which will enable new and future apprentices and tradespeople to develop new and demand led skills to help, the UK meet the carbon neutral challenges.