Pete Birkett, Chief Executive of Barnfield College Luton, has been appointed special part-time adviser to the Skills Minister, Lord Young.

He will be advising the Minister on a major new campaign to increase the number of apprentices in the FE sector.

Barnfield College, itself, is leading a local apprenticeship scheme which could see as many as 19 new apprenticeships being made available this year.

Pete Birkett said: “This is a great honour for Barnfield and Luton to be selected to help the Government in this critical area of job creation and training.

“Across the country 35,000 new apprenticeships are being created with the target of 2,500 for the FE/HE sectors.”

Under the local scheme, the Barnfield Federation (the college and two academies)  and some local schools will create 10-14 apprenticeships and the University of Bedfordshire a further five apprenticeships. They will mainly be in support areas such as IT, business, administration and marketing. Recruitment for these positions will start in the next few months.

Pete Birkett said: “Given the present economic climate, we felt that Barnfield needed to take the lead and develop a high quality public sector apprenticeship scheme that would ensure our young people are equipped with the confidence and skills necessary for a sustained career.

This initiative will also ensure that Luton will not suffer from a skills shortage when the boom times return.”