An industry-leading training facility for people working in the construction sector has been officially opened by His Royal Highness The Duke of Cambridge.
Leading construction materials business, Tarmac, has developed a National Skills and Safety Park located at an active quarry near Mansfield in Nottinghamshire, to ensure that it can provide first-class, practical training for emerging industry talent – including apprentices, graduates and those retraining from other sectors.
Marking the official opening of the innovative facility, His Royal Highness met with a number of Tarmac’s young apprentices to learn more about their roles and career ambitions. The Duke got first-hand experience of Tarmac’s 100 year-long expertise in road building at the helm of a cutting edge paving machine, as well as being introduced to apprentices in the training centre’s maintenance workshop and trying his hand on one of the company’s quarrying excavator simulators.
Martin Riley, Tarmac’s senior vice president who started his own career in construction as an apprentice, commented: “It was an honour to welcome His Royal Highness to our new facility which is already helping people beginning a career in construction and those already established in the sector to develop new skills.
“Major infrastructure programmes are the foundations on which the construction industry and its supply chain are built, providing exciting and rewarding career opportunities for people from all walks of life across the UK who can help shape the built environment of the future.
“We’re extremely proud to launch this new facility.”
The Duke also joined a meeting with Chairs, CEOs and MDs of leading UK businesses meeting at Tarmac’s National Skills and Safety Park to discuss joint opportunities for UK companies to support social mobility and to improve the options available to young people in all parts of British society. The discussions were hosted by former MP Justine Greening, co-founder of The Social Mobility Pledge and John Whelan MBE.
The opening of the new facility forms part of Tarmac’s ongoing commitment to upskilling young people – with over 300 of the company’s existing staff currently undertaking its apprenticeship programmes. The business is proud to be a member of the 5% Club, an organisation committed to ensuring that in the next five years 5% of its memberships UK workforce are young people on training schemes.
Image Credit: HRH, The Duke of Cambridge, with Chris Hill, Tarmac Assessor
