AN URGENT NEED.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 61, Issue 238, 21 July 1941, Page 4

AN URGENT NEED.

TRAINING Ob APPRENTICES. NOTE OF WARNING SOUNDED. - ' • . /' I - ’ : T A note of warning about the .urgent need for training of apprentices to_ take their place as skilled workmen in the years following the war was sounded by Mr S. O. Dillon (representing the Cable Makers’ Association of Great Britain) at a function held in Ashburton this morning. “People in industries of all kinds have to be highly skilled and practical these days,” said Mr Dillon. “We are going to be in for very difficult times after (he war, and I am pleased to hear that the Ashburton Power Board has always had its full quota of apprentices. It is essential that apprentices should be employed wherever possible. The country has iost a great many good men and apprentices through the war, and many of those who have, gone overseas will probably not take up the ' same work again, some of them not able to, after the war. Therefore, I should like to say a word of warning on the subject. “If apprentices are not trained today the electrical industry will come to a standstill after the war,” he added. “The cable makers have been in touch with the Government on the subject 'and wte have stressed the great need there is for the training of more and more apprentices.” Reference to apprentices was also made by the chairman of the Power Board (Mr E. F. Nicoll). The Board, he said, had always made a point of employing apprentices to the full number that was permitted. Altogether 17 apprentices' had been passed out through the Board, and there were still nine on the staff. Of the 17, six were still on the staff and six had joined either the Army or the Navy. Of these six, two had gone to Portsmouth, in England, had undertaken a course of instruction and had passed the examination first and second and been appointed to famous battleships. Results like that spoke something for the standard of the work carried out by the Board.