Welding and engineering training group XLT Industrial Training is offering services with no upfront charges or ongoing fees while participants complete courses, in an attempt to entice existing labourers to increase their skill sets and assume more senior roles in the mining and construction sectors.
XLT director Clive Langley told WA Business News he was introducing what he calls a learn, earn and pay system to help tradespeople enhance their skill sets to meet increasing demand for welders and engineers.
“The barrier to entry is training and the barrier to training is finances,” Mr Langley said.
XLT would allow some students to undertake training at its Bibra Lake facility free of charge, he said, with course fees to be repaid on a monthly basis following the completion of studies.
Mr Langley said training costs were between $1,000 and $5,000, and were dependent on an individual’s existing skill set.
“We have people that come in for one to three weeks and it will cost them $3,000 but they leave and can get a job where they earn $2,500 a week,” Mr Langley said.
He said the learn, earn and pay system was targeting trades assistants and labourers because many of them wanted to learn new skills but were not prepared to spend more than $1,000 upfront to gain the skills.
Mr Langley, who invented the underwater welding system that has provided big profits for Neptune Marine Services Ltd, formed XLT 11 years ago to provide accredited welding and fabrications training.
He said the business trained about 10,000 people a year. Clients include BHP Billiton, Alcoa, Austal Ships and the Australian Navy.
Mr Langley said many companies were paying to have workers trained, however he believed there was also a strong market of self-employed people and sub-contractors who wanted to gain better skills to take on better paying jobs.
XLT’s learn, earn and pay initiative comes after the state government’s skills formation taskforce earlier this year identified that there would be a 2,100 shortfall in tradespeople in WA this year.
Mr Langley said many people wanted to enter the mining and construction industries but many had little understanding of what was required.
“They think it’s a day or two here and then they can get in,” he said.
XLT has been recruited by the federal government to assess 1,000 people from Bangladesh and Indonesia with the possibility of training those people at its Bibra Lake premises.
