Co-operative Group to recruit 800 apprentices
The Co-operative Group has announced that it is to recruit 800 apprentices, doubling the number who joined the business last year.
The 800 apprenticeships on offer in 2012 will be based within one of the Co-operative’s businesses ranging from food, pharmacy and motors to legal and financial services and farming, as well as corporate functions such as IT and HR. This year will also see the launch of the UK’s first ever funeral industry apprenticeships.
Opportunities will be available throughout the UK and apprentices will work towards a nationally recognised qualification. They will also have the opportunity to progress onto the Group’s Management Development Programme and gain a range of transferable skills and professional competences, helping them to progress up the career ladder.
The Co-operative recruited 400 young people to its Apprenticeship Academy during 2011, and says it is on track to take on a further 2,000 by 2014. The group hopes that eventually all new recruits under 25 will be part of the £9 million Academy.
Peter Marks, group chief executive of The Co-operative Group, said: “Through our Apprenticeship Academy, we are offering young people across the UK proper jobs with qualifications and real career opportunities. With a quarter of our employees under the age of 25, eventually we want to make them all apprentices and I would encourage other big businesses to follow suit.
“The professionalism and enthusiasm shown by all of the apprentices we have recruited so far shows just how much young people have to offer. There are so many young people looking for opportunities such as this and we have been overwhelmed by the hard work and commitment our new apprentices have already shown in their roles.”
