Podcast 127: Loving the Levy - will apprenticeships solve the skills shortage?

In April this year the new Apprenticeship Levy came into effect, which means for the first time business with pay bills of over 3 million have to contribute to apprenticeships. It is expected that the Levy will encourage more employers to introduce apprenticeships or expand their existing programmes. In this episode we talk to employers, apprentices and apprenticeship providers to explore what the new world of apprenticeships could look like. What implications will the levy have for businesses and what opportunities could it provide potential candidates? With an increasing number of organisations offering apprenticeships, how can businesses stand out from the crowd? And could apprenticeship extend beyond the traditional 16-25 demographic? Also in this month's podcast, cast your minds back to Ksenia Zheltoukhova and her partner Ryan McKelvey, who were among the mere 7,500 who in the past year decided to take advantage of shared parental leave, a legislation introduced in April 2015 allowing both parents to share a block of fifty two weeks leave after the birth of a child. This month, in their final conversation with us, Ryan and Ksenia sum up the experience after a year full of surprises...