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I do not—

I apologise if I did not convey this well enough. For several months, the Government has been doing extensive work with stakeholder groups on skills shortages. As you know, there is a distinction between skills shortages and workforce shortages. We cannot magic up people, but we can ensure that people with the right skills are available.

We have been looking at drilling down into some of the assertions that are made. If I say to you—you will have heard this number—“We are short of 3,000 welders,” your question becomes, “What kind of welders, and where?” If we are short of engineers, the same question applies. We need that level of intelligence to help to shape the future. That applies not just to our apprenticeship offering but to our whole approach to tackling some of these issues.

We are going forward armed with that information, which is being developed through detailed work from particular sectors. That has proven to be really helpful, and it is driving an immediate response through our colleagues in the economy directorate. The skills and economy directorates are working closely together on things outwith the bill in order to deal with some of the short-term problems.

In the longer term, there are economic priorities, and we will have the opportunity, through the new arrangement, to feed that into our planning. An example is childcare, which is a critical sector. If we do not have enough childcare in the country, we are not accessing the entire workforce. Other sectors include planning and construction—all the obvious things. However, there are other critical elements to the economy that we need to protect, although they might not involve huge numbers.

I know that you have taken an interest in stonemasonry, and that is a good example of what I am talking about. We will always need stonemasons, so how do we ensure appropriate access to stonemasonry apprenticeships, in the interests of the economy and our young people? In relation to the careers work, how do we encourage young people into those pathways?

On the apprenticeship model, we need to ensure that the funding that is available for some of those disciplines reflects the cost. As you know, one of the reasons why there has been a reduction in the number of stonemasonry apprenticeships, for example, relates to the cost that has to be incurred by whoever provides the training. We therefore need a model that takes account of those elements of the costs, too. That is another piece of work that will inform what we do as we go forward.

That has been quite unhelpful, and it means that I have not seen the specifics of the issue that you raise. However, I figured that you would ask that question.

I understand the argument that is made around the principle of remuneration for senior staff, particularly in the university sector—I think that that has been the biggest challenge from the point of view of the University and College Union. However, it is difficult to legislate to address that issue.

It is a fact that some of our larger institutions are competing salary-wise with multimillion-pound businesses for the very brightest and best. However, I absolutely recognise the concerns that trade unions and others have raised about remuneration packages and the increases that have been offered.

Earlier, I referred to a meeting that I had a couple of months ago with the university chairs of court. I would be wrong to go into too much detail, but I took the opportunity to point out to them how the increases were viewed out there. You are absolutely right about institutions wanting more public money at a time when they were offering large remuneration increases, particularly to principals but also to others. I read some of the media stories, and I have made it clear to them that they are expected to exercise restraint and self-awareness going forward. That is probably as much as I can do currently, but we need to see that play out.

Instead of apprenticeships being, as Andrew Mott has said, an add-on to the organisation, they will become a critical part of the SFC’s activities. The Government’s view is that there needs to be a growth in apprenticeships, both numerically and in quality.

In that sense, it will—I cannot disagree with you on that. However—and I do not think that we can make this any clearer, convener—the new organisation will, in every respect, put a huge emphasis on apprenticeship delivery.

If anything, we want to enhance business involvement across the gamut. You talked about careers. We need greater business input into the careers offering—that is a challenge to them. Skills planning has been enhanced—

I do not accept that at all. In this instance, the work that has been done on skills planning would see the existing functions still sitting within those two organisations, with the Government taking an overarching lead. I do not think that anything would be pulled out. The careers service is about much more than SDS.

All the component parts of the careers services collaborative need to do their bit. At the moment, there is a bit of a conflation that suggests that this is all about careers advisers in schools—far from it. All the work will come together with an overarching vision for the post-16 landscape. I do not accept that placing the responsibility for apprenticeships elsewhere would create the difficulty that you are suggesting.

The SFC already engages considerably and in a variety of ways with business. I fully accept the member’s point, but, since day 1 of the process, the team and I have been engaging directly with business. An employer group has been set up, which met a couple of weeks ago. In the first instance, it will look at apprenticeships, but its remit has been broadened beyond that. An apprenticeship committee will be provided for within the SFC, which will have a broader remit than the existing SDS committee, the SAAB.

Extensive work is being done. This is about making the offering better than it is currently. In the context of employer engagement and the SFC’s committee, some of the evidence that the committee has taken from various stakeholders on how we could expand that has been quite useful.

Some of that sits outwith the apprenticeship delivery. As I said, getting the careers offering right will be critical to that. It is about all the things that I have identified, including how apprenticeships are delivered and the issues that arise from that. In moving all that into a different organisation, with that awareness and all the work that has been done around that and all the work that will be done to build on that, the opportunity arises to do this differently and better. That is what it provides. I was simply giving you a flavour of the type of things that we could do in that space.

I am sorry, convener, but, with respect, I think that I have told you that.

Here is the other thing. As we move forward, we charge the people who will deliver this with exploring the practicalities and pros and cons of making those changes, and other things that they will bring forward in their dialogue with wider stakeholders. Although we have done a lot of work up until now, we need a lot more conversation with the various sectors about what better would look like.