Okay, I think that's the majority of people come on board. So as I said before, very good afternoon and welcome to today's webinar. My name is Justine Fosh and I sit on the Food and Drink Wales Industry Board. And I'm going to tell you a little bit more about the work that we do shortly. However, what I'd like to do just to kick off is talk a little bit about our housekeeping rules. So we really want this to be a very inclusive webinar but it's difficult with such a huge number of people. I think we've got about 90 people joining us here today. So just a few housekeeping rules. The team have made sure that all the microphones and cameras are switched off. So if you could keep them switched off, that would be great.  If you have any questions, obviously we'd be delighted to take them. There's a chat function. So if you can put your questions into the chat function, what we'll do is we will be looking at the themes that are coming through some of the questions and we'll put them to the panel if you like when we have time towards the end. There's some time being built in to answer some of your questions. So this to be clear, make sure you're on the right webinar. This webinar is in relation to the Food and Drink Industry Welsh Apprenticeship Consultations. It's not about anything else. So hopefully you're on the right one. And also just to say this is primarily about reaching out to businesses, to food and drink companies in Wales to get their views. So we're particularly keen to hear views of the food and drink employers here today. Unfortunately today we're not able to offer a Welsh translation service, but there is a transcript available if people need it. Microsoft Teams has it in-built. So it's easy to do. And the webinar is also being recorded in the event that anybody wants to see it as a future date. So without further ado, I'm going to move on now and just explain a little bit more about the work of the Food and Drink Wales Board. We were created really to support delivery of the action plan and provide industry leadership to help achieve industry growth. We have a wide number of topics that we look at, but skills from the very start has been a core focus of the work of the Board. And we developed a document called Transforming Skills in the Welsh Food and Drink Sector which outlined the four key areas of our work and apprenticeships was absolutely top of those. It's a key strand of the strategy. And one of our objectives is to ensure that employers are informed and that their voices are heard as we come through a period of reform. Currently apprenticeships throughout all sectors in Wales are being reformed and it does include food and drink. And the purpose of this webinar is to provide the opportunity for food businesses to engage, find out more and have their voices heard through the consultation that is now open. So today I am delighted to be joined by two very eminent speakers on the subject. So I'm going to introduce firstly Louise Codling from the National Skills Academy for Food and Drink and then I'm going to introduce Wayne Scoburg from Welsh Government. Louise, would you like to just introduce yourself? Tell us, what's your name? Where'd you come from? And what is it that you do? My name is Louise Codling. I am Chief Executive of the National Skills Academy for Food and Drink and I'm working very closely with the Welsh Government in their reform agenda or apprenticeships. OK, fantastic. And Wayne, are you there? Are you able to introduce yourself and tell us a little bit more about yourself? Hi, I'm Wayne Scoburg. I work in the apprenticeship unit of the Welsh Government. I'm a senior apprenticeship frameworks manager and my role is to oversee the development and reform of the apprenticeships in Wales. Fantastic, thank you both. Thank you both very much. So without further ado, I'm going to dive into the subject and to try and understand a little bit more about the consultation and where we are. So turning to you, Wayne, I wonder if you'd explain what the background to the reforms of friendships are. What are the policy drivers? What's the Welsh Government trying to achieve by reforming apprenticeships in Wales? Hi, our vision is to develop a responsive and resilient apprenticeship system that will support employers who want to develop and deliver apprenticeships that are innovative and industry focused. The system needs to support economic growth be responsive to the needs of the future economy and provide a range of skills that aid social mobility and ensure equality of opportunity. Back in 2017, the Welsh Government published its apprenticeship plan, which was a five-year plan and part of that plan set out how we were going to reform our apprenticeship frameworks. We wanted to increase the school leavers into apprenticeships. We wanted to deliver more higher level apprenticeships and we wanted to get a more robust system and to establish a pattern and a programme of getting responses from employers. And this is what we're trying to do now is to meet the needs of the employers of Wales through our apprenticeship system. Last year, we had two consultations to aid us in that. The first consultation was for the Welsh Government to take ownership of the issuing authority of apprenticeship frameworks. And the second one was to look at the actual structure of the apprenticeship frameworks. And part of that was to move away from the current apprenticeship framework model to 23 sector frameworks and food and drink being one of those. Can I ask you, Wayne, perhaps, why was food and drink chosen to be one of those sectors? Was there a recognition, dare I say, of the importance of food and drink in Wales? Yes, food and drink is one of the 23 sectors. We chose those which were a priority sector for Wales and those which we felt would aid the economy in Wales. Fantastic. And that's really good to know. And I think it's great that the Welsh Government have recognised importance, particularly food and drink manufacturing to the Welsh economy. It's a subject that's dear to our hearts on the board. One of the things I'm interested in in Wales is what's the linkages to things like the Future Generations Act and you mentioned about an inclusive framework. How important is that? Yes, we're looking to, over time, look at the content of our frameworks and to make them more inclusive, both gender-wise and age-wise and by link release. So we are looking at the holistic approach to apprenticeships as well as looking at improving the content of both the knowledge and the competency elements. We're trying to look at making our frameworks more occupational focused and go towards higher levels and more technical areas. We're looking that an apprentice has an apprenticeship progression pathway so they can start in the industry and see a map away through the industry through an apprenticeship pathway. OK, that's great. So in summary, what I'm hearing is, I think that part of the aim of the reform agenda is greater occupational focus, more robust, more technical content and then more closely meets the needs of industry and employers as the customer and the custodian really of apprenticeships. Yes, that's right. Lovely. I think that's really clear. So that's really helpful. Thank you. So what is the process that's being used to? Obviously, you've got frameworks that you want to reform. You've got an ambition to achieve quite a different future. What's the process by which you're going through to reform apprenticeships? We are currently going through a three-year reform process by we are taking framework sector by sector. And over the next three years, we will review and reform those frameworks. We do that by commissioning development partners who will set up a steering group on the Welsh Government behalf and to go through the four-step process, which I think Louise is going to go into more detail later. But the fundamental part of our reform is the inclusion and engagement with employers. And we put a lot of emphasis on actually meeting the needs of both the apprentice, but also sharing the voice of the employers. Because at the end of the day, it's the employer who's going to employ these apprentices. And that's the way we want to take this forward. Fantastic. So it's important that employers are very engaged in the activity. And I'm sure Louise will come on to talk about how employers can be involved and engaged more in it. So am I right in saying that in terms of the partner that the Welsh Government are working with on the reform agendas, that's very much what the National Skills Academy for food and drink are doing. So if I could turn to Louise then, I suppose the big question is that there's an ambitious reform agenda that Welsh Government have got across all the different apprenticeships that exist and clearly there's a need for that to apply into food and drink. So in terms of supporting the food and drink industry, what experience have you got in this area, really, of supporting apprenticeships? So the National Skills Academy has had many years of experience working in all four nations around development of apprenticeships, frameworks, national occupational standards. As the Sector Skills Council for food and drink, it was our role to lead on the development of apprenticeship frameworks and standards across all four nations. Previously, we were also the issuing authority for Wales, although Wales has subsequently taken on that role themselves, but we are still the issuing authority in the other nations. And we were responsible for leading the development of all of the original Welsh frameworks and looking after the ongoing maintenance of those frameworks through working within the sectors and doing the work we do. We also have been heavily involved in the England Apprenticeship Reform agenda, facilitating a number of employer-led groups in the design and development of their new apprenticeship standards in areas such as food operations, food tech, bakery and engineering to mention, but a few. In the last few years, the process in the nations has changed significantly. And we now have to submit a bid to deliver these types of activities in a competitive tendering process. And we've been successful in securing this part of the Welsh apprenticeship activity and other activity in food and drink across all of the other nations. So I've been in a very, very long time working in this arena and have some very experienced in-house personnel to help support that happen. It sounds like you've been busy. OK, so tell us a little bit more about what's happened to date in terms of the reform. So Wayne's obviously engaged yourselves, wants to achieve all of this ambitious programme. Where are we now in the programme? What's happening? OK, well, Mark, if I could have a slide please, that would be quite helpful. So it's important to understand that the National Skills Academy are here to help facilitate Welsh government implement the reform process for apprenticeships that they want to do. So we follow the four step process that is very clearly laid out to us in the documentation as part of our sufficient. And then it's the document that we live and breathe by whilst we are leading on this process. And the first stage is planning. So we work closely with Wayne and his team to understand what they're thinking in this area, how we can bring that together, the direction of travel, what's working and what's not working and looking at how those current apprenticeships are landing. Once the planning stage is through and we have an idea of how we want to approach the particular frameworks that we're reviewing, it is our role to help facilitate the setting up of a steering group. And the steering group is made up of various different people, employers, stakeholders, we have providers on it, we have Welsh nation support on it and Welsh government are also part of, also part of that group to help ensure that it goes in the right direction and that the policy is always being, that they can make sure that policy is being adhered to as part of the steering group activity and just sort of steering us really in the right direction and making sure that we're not going too far or outside of the agenda. The steering group really does the top level review of the particular framework or the particular area that we're looking at and makes its recommendations. And then we set up a series of employer workshops where we take it out to specific employer groups to look at recommendations that have been made by the steering group and then really get into the detail of what that would look like in terms of an apprenticeship. So we get into detail of the types of units, the types of technical skill and knowledge that they would like to see as part of it, what the direction of travel of the industry is. So it's reflected in the programme and the friendships that's being developed. And with a high focus on occupations and technical skills and knowledge, with hopefully the output of being a better high quality apprenticeship product and programme of learning to support that product. Once those workshops have happened, we take that back to the steering group. We then collate all of the feedback and recommendations into a public consultation. And those consultations are available through many different access points. The Welsh Government have an access point. I know that the food and drink board have also been making that available through some of their medias. And it sits on our website where employers can come on and give us feedback around the specific recommendations that are coming out of the steering group and the employer workshops around those particular programmes that we're reviewing at any moment in time. Once we have the feedback and the conversation, we will make some changes to it, depending on what the feedback is. And sometimes that might be minor changes and other times it might be that we would relook at that again and take it back to our steering group for feedback. And we would then submit those recommendations into the Welsh Government for its final sign-off. And once that's signed off and everybody's happy, it either remains as it is or there are minor changes made to it and then qualifications Wales will step in and support the development of anything new that needs to be developed as part of the apprenticeship that's been designed and help support the sector take that out to market in terms of its qualifications and how they're going to manage it from a full Wales perspective. Okay, and that sounds a fairly rigorous process from start to finish in terms of getting a lot of feedback from your steering group early on and then obviously getting feedback and amending it as you go. So not many people, I think, possibly understand what an apprenticeship framework is, the fact that there's lots of different projects within it. There's almost like apprenticeships within an apprenticeship. So what's happened to date? Where are we in the process? Have you done any already? Have you got some to, are you in the middle of them? What's the current situation? So the current apprenticeship frameworks allow employers to select from a huge vast array of units and it can be quite difficult for employers to navigate their way around the framework, particularly in understanding what's necessarily the best option for them but also to understand when they're recruiting an apprentice that what skills and knowledge do they have because the apprenticeships are quite huge so they're quite difficult to navigate their way around. But part of the remit that we are working on is to make them a little bit more sophisticated in terms of how employers engage with them and allow them to engage with them in a more proactive way where they understand exactly what they're doing, what units they're choosing and how they can work with these apprenticeships to deliver much more technical and higher quality programmes. If you could put that slide up, Mark, that would be quite helpful, sorry. In the little, is it coming up? Yeah, thank you. So currently we've been working on the review of four different pathways, engineering and brewing. So food and drink engineering maintenance, which is a level three apprenticeship and brewing, which there was an existing programme. We also reviewed food manufacturing excellence at levels two, three and four and industry skills at levels two and three. The first two, engineering, this was reviewed by the steering group very, very early on. It's a fairly new programme and nobody's actually been through and completed the whole programme yet. So the recommendations from the sector group were let's just leave it alone until we have a little bit more data is already a very technical programme. It was designed with occupations and roles in mind and really designed around the roles of the specific to engineering within the food and drink sector. So it already meets quite a lot of the new reform criteria and is getting very positive feedback from the employers that are engaged on it. So we made a very light touch review of that programme. We went out to the employers that are engaged in the programme and we worked with the college that are delivering that programme and we also did the public consultation to say, can we leave it as it is? Let's wait until we've had our first learners complete the programme and let's see where we are then rather than mixing with tweaking with something when it's partway through, it's for the pilot phase. So Pembrokeshire College are delivering this and they're the first provider to take up the delivery of this apprenticeship and having spoken with them and all of the employers that are on the programme, the feedback on that is currently really, really positive. It's a really successful programme. So we are continuing to work with other providers to help drive demand for this programme more broadly across Wales. I think it was worth saying, Louise, that that programme was one that the board were very, very keen on and I think at the last skills summit we had in the Flandando, I think we helped launch it. So it's really good to know it's doing well and successful so far. Both provider and employers extremely happy with it so far. So it would be a miss of us to sort of dive into that and start changing it without the knowledge of its success. So the second apprenticeship that we reviewed was brewing. An existing brewing programme was reviewed through the steering group and the beer and cider cluster and the feedback was that they agreed it needed to be far more technical in its nature as the current framework, as with all of our framework, has a very large number of units that employers can select from, not all of which are brewing specific. So in essence, you could have a learner that goes through without doing very many technical brewing units. So they're very, very keen to ensure that some of the brewing technical units would be mandated as part of the brewing programme. So we worked with them, we worked with the clusters and we rebuilt the qualification to ensure that learners going through it had to do a number of specifically mandated brewing specific units to enable to demonstrate that they were working with our sector and gaining the right and appropriate technical knowledge and skills to call themselves a brewer. So this has been through consultation, it's been through public consultation and the new qualification development is being facilitated by qualification in Wales currently and our understanding is that all of the feedback from the public consultation on that programme was extremely positive and certainly we've enabled us to engage with a larger number of brewers that hopefully will decide to engage in that apprenticeship very forward. So very successful so far on those two particular programs that we have reviewed. Have they been through the full cycle, the one to four stages that you identified earlier? They've done, that's all we've done. They have, yeah, so engineering was pretty simple, so it's, that was a, but again, it was still a good process to go through to make sure that, because we could have made the changes if we needed to and we didn't review it anyway, but from a brewing perspective, I think the sector will end up with a really high quality apprenticeship programme and it's just really now about making sure that brewers that consulted with us and engaged with us on it now actively embark on using that programme as an apprenticeship going forward. Okay, excellent, so yes. So that's engineering and brewing and they've mentioned food manufacturing excellence and fears and I think that's where we are now in terms of the process and consultation. So where are we with those? What's happening and what's the proposals that they're in place for those? So with the food manufacturing excellence and food industry skills, we have been through the first two phases of our process. So we've done the planning phase, we've had this employer steering groups and we've had the working party group. So it's been through quite a few phases of that already and at the moment we're at the public consultation stage and obviously there's been a number of things that have happened over the last few months sort of impeded organisations and businesses engaging in this. So part of the reason that we're doing this today is to try and encourage more employers to become involved in not just reviewing these particular apprenticeships but also getting involved more broadly in the reform agenda. So food industry skills is the largest framework and the one that's most widely used by the food and drink sector. It is pretty generic framework and again allows employers to select from a vast array of units, which again is difficult to understand sometimes what particular framework and what skills you are developing. So with a focus on occupations and more technical content, the main role for the steering group with these two reviews was to try and determine which occupations and roles within the sector sat within the individual frameworks to enable them to ensure that they covered the right amount of knowledge and skills in the right areas and enable them to be developed much more closely around the roles that have been identified as linked to those. The really important framework as they're very widely used and these are the ones where we can start to develop more technical operational skill and keep in line with the future of the food and drink sector which is moving more towards automation and high tech factories and the technical skills that are needed to deliver the food and drink agenda need to be within these frameworks in terms of operations and technical capability. Okay. So with that in mind, you've got obviously the reforms that you've looked at, you've got some consultations out and you've got the level two and the level three where it's in play. Okay. So if I talk about it, for food manufacturing excellence, it's best to sort of put them all together. The apprenticeship is focused on quality and improvement and the steering group really found it difficult to determine which occupations sat within that specific framework. And we were unable to determine that this met the criteria that was being set in terms of identifying the roles and the occupations and at these particular levels, the steering group didn't believe that there were roles within organizations that were specific to this type of apprenticeship. It was agreed that elements of all of the apprenticeships needed to include parts of what's in the FME framework. So things like continuous improvements and quality and asset care. However, it wasn't a role in its own right at that level and that elements of those should be taken and used in the other apprenticeships rather than having that as a framework in its own right. Also, the numbers at level two and three for the food manufacturing excellence apprenticeship are very, very low. And most providers are delivering it, but they're not delivering it as an apprenticeship. They're delivering it as a standalone course of qualification. And this will still be able to access by employers and providers as a standalone qualification. But as an apprenticeship framework, it does not meet the criteria of the occupations. It's more elements of a role rather than being a role in its own right. So the recommendations from the steering groups for food manufacturing excellence are that levels two and three, the best bits of levels two and three get incorporated into other apprenticeship standards and it is not any more a standalone programme. And however, the group were able to identify an occupation for a quality improvement role at level four. So the level four apprenticeship will remain or the recommendations are that it will remain and we may put that into the food industry skills framework. So you have levels two, three and four or it may stand alone, that's yet to be determined. But as a standalone occupation, we were able to identify somebody at the level four role. So therefore that qualification and that framework will be recommended that it will remain. So that's food manufacturing excellence. So food and drink industry skills level two, the recommendations coming out of the group where this should be split into operational and sales service areas. At the moment, all of the units are together within one qualification. So it's quite difficult again to understand whether you're dealing with somebody in operations or whether you're dealing with somebody that is doing sales and service or working in the sales and service areas. And the manufacturing elements of it needed to be pulled out more and the sales and service side of it also needed to be pulled out more. So many of the roles covered by this framework, the employers felt a split would identify the roles better in between manufacturing and sales and service. So the recommendation for fears at level two is that the qualifications are redeveloped but with specific mandated areas to cover compliance, technical knowledge and skills, then with a separate set of units to cover the specific areas that they're working in and then some software skills and then also a group of principles of knowledge skills which are the deep diving to the knowledge required of the particular occupations. So that's the recommendations coming out of that group. So it's quite a big change and it does allow businesses to focus on operational people in a different way and have a more specific set of units that they pick from and having to select a mandated set of units within compliance and technical ensuring that the agenda is met that the apprenticeships do have a more technical focus. So you will see more technical units being mandated as part of the qualification. And in fact, the employers and Welsh government have been very flexible around what can be included within the apprenticeship. So we could include just a knowledge certificate if the employers felt that that was useful. We could blend it into the competency programme. So there's real lots of different ways that employers can approach and take a view on some of how they are developing these new programmes to deliver what they're requiring in terms of technical skill going forward. So that's the level twos. Okay, so on level twos, so if I try and summarise what I think I heard. So what you're saying is in essence, FIS sounds, the food industry sounds like it's being sort of split and there'll be a sort of an operations one focusing on food manufacturing factories and activities in there. And then another one, which is looking at sales and service. But essentially it sounds to me like whatever's in there now in terms of units will either probably be in one or the other or will it be very, very different? It will be in one or the other. And there will be some that will be, you'll be able to share across them when you're talking about some of the softer skills. But the sales service will kits it separately to the manufacturing operations. So that you, if you're an employer recruiting somebody that has conducted that apprenticeship, it will quite clearly say that it was a manufacturing pathway or the sales and service pathway. So you know what you're getting when you recruit and you know as an employer when you're looking at it, which is the most appropriate route for your learners to take. Yeah, yeah. And I would imagine that level two, some of the level two skills that we see are quite, they're not all automated. It's quite, they can be quite manual, even some craft skills. I noticed those questions around about sort of some of the craft skills. Are they included in that? Would they be in the operations route way or in the sales and service or? Well, the craft frameworks are separate to this particular framework. So this is really about manufacturing operations. So if you were training to be a butcher, you would do the meat and poultry pathway rather than this. Unless the majority of your role was an operator with a little bit of craft knowledge, in which case you would contextualize how you're delivering that program.  So it is designed particularly to look at, you know, operational roles within the manufacturing environment. There will be some technical elements in it, but it won't be as technical as a level three qualification where the capability requirements will be higher. Okay. So on level three, then level three is a step up. It's a similar environment, manufacturing environment. It's a step up in terms of, I'm guessing autonomy, you know, potentially technical requirements and first line maintenance and things like that. Is that what we're trying to get out to here? Some of these more automated plants or? Yeah. So the steering group identified the main occupation for this level would be a technician. So that could be a technical operator. It could be a multi-skilled operator. We had lots of different job roles within this particular occupation that came out, but it did require an element of multi-skilling. They wanted to include things like asset care. They wanted to include, you know, some higher level technical skill around quality and science. So a real different approach to, you know, what the future role of the operator is likely to be. And already is in a lot of the organizations that we spoke with. And to achieve that, you know, currently the framework has no requirements for technical units. You can pick and choose from all of the units that are there and, you know, they're all at a level three, but you could do some that aren't relevant to a more highly skilled role. So the recommendations from the group were that there were some mandated technical units that the learner must do at that particular, if they do this particular course of action. And the new framework should offer, you know, a really sufficient level of technical units to help develop the operators of the future for the businesses where things like automation and high-tech operations will require more highly skilled technicians. And we've seen this as a pattern across all of the nations wanting to have a more technician level role within the food manufacturing environment to enable them to future-proof, you know, that their operations going forward. So this is a theme that we see across all of the nations with people more technician-type apprenticeship programs. Okay, that's really helpful. So I think it was a very thorough kind of review of all of that, so quite complex, but I think the changes are gonna speak to themselves really. I think one of the, presumably you've been out to consultation, have you had feedback already? What's the general consensus been from the feedback that you've had to date? So it's out for public consultation at the moment and I know that Mark and we'll share all of the links to that later so that everybody can go on and involved in. Generally, the feedback is very positive. So including the steering groups, the working groups and the online consultation, we've had over 20 responses to the level two operations program. So the respondees are a mixture of employers, providers and awarding organizations. Generally, the employers are all happy with the proposals with a few recommendations for enhancements that have been made. They certainly understand that the proposed changes will start to deliver significantly better and more technical apprenticeships. And I think that they're very happy to sort of go along with the reforms and try and generate, be involved in the design and development of something that's quite exciting. So some organizations are less keen on the reforms and that will take a little bit more work. But I think the employers are keen to improve the quality of both the frameworks and the training that's provided as part of the apprenticeship framework. So from an employer's perspective, the feedback has been extremely positive. Okay, and as I should have said, presumably at the beginning of this, really one purpose of today is to make sure that we get as much feedback as possible from employers because that's who this is primarily aimed at. And I think the consultation, I know Mark put the details up on the slide earlier and I think you'll put them in the chat if people are, well, hopefully people will be encouraged to go and have a look at them in more detail and get involved. Just a very quick question really to Wayne, who's obviously the architect of much of this. Is it sound to you like the reforms, the design that's coming up, the feedback from employers, that it's heading in the right direction? Yes, we are looking from a policy perspective for more high level frameworks, more technical frameworks, more occupational focused frameworks. So it's going in the right direction, yes. Perfect, that's really good. Okay, so I was gonna say, your job's almost done. The consultation, more involvement for people and then these two frameworks or pathways rather will be done. What's next? Is there any more or what's yet to come? Okay, Mark, if I could have my final slide please. So the public consultation on food manufacturing excellence and food industry skills is being extended and it is open until the 30th of September. The links are here and I know that they will be circulated post this meeting as well. And it's very important from a world government perspective that the employer's voices are heard. So please, please go on and completely the consultation. If you need any more information about anything that I have spoken about, then feel free to contact either myself or Matt at the National Skills Foundation. The next phase of the reform agenda is already coming quickly and fast at us. And in early October, we will be beginning to conduct a review for the next phase of the food and drink reviews that are happening. So meat and poultry, bakery, fish and shellfish, fresh produce and dairy are the next five pathways that we will be looking at. So I understand just being somebody might have put something in about craft and these are the ones to get involved in when you wanna look at the craft. And certainly do feel free to contact us if you'd like to get involved. We are in the process of the planning phase at the moment with Wayne and Welsh government, but we sort of know the process. So in the background, we are trying to already set up some working parties in the specific sub-sector areas and taking them through. And we've had really, really good interest in this already. So anybody working in those sectors that would like to get involved in helping shape what those apprenticeships look like going forward, then please do get in touch with us and we'll ensure that you're included in all of the information and meetings that we have going forward. So as well as filling in the consultation for this set of apprenticeships, people can actually get involved in the steering committee or being a part of the employer group or what's all of that. So it would be great if we could have, the steering group was set up to do FME and FIS. So as now we will look at who watch employers we need on the steering group now as well so that we make sure that we've got good representation across those sectors and then sub-sector groups that will look at the individual pathways independently. So in the world of Zoom and Microsoft teams, we might find bringing some of those employers together far easier, particularly with the geography like of Wales. We are going to do it in short, sharp sessions rather than big long, one-day sessions. So we have a plan and if somebody would like to get involved, just let us know and we'll ensure you are. So what I'm hearing is very open process though. So people who want to be involved and it's great, there's so many here today, it'd be great to get in contact and get involved with you for either the existing ones or the craft ones. And my big bold letters here say to everybody on the call. So if you're an employer, please make sure that you get involved, fill in the consultation by the 30th of September and get in touch with Louise if you want to be part of the steering group or get involved in any of the future activities because back to Wayne's point, this is really important that we get as many employers as possible feeding into this and being informed and supporting. Or on the other hand, challenging if they think it's not right because this framework doesn't belong to the NSA, it doesn't belong to the Welsh government but really it belongs to the employers and so that's why the call out is so important. So I think we've got about 10 minutes left. So I had a couple of questions that were sent in from people who couldn't come and also I've been looking at the chat information on the, that's been coming through. So there's a couple of things I just want to touch on if that's all right. So some of the questions earlier on that we were asked were around about and I think maybe Wayne or maybe Louise, either of you, when will all this be completed? Was one of the questions I had asked because obviously it's a rolling program. Is there an end in sight for a situation where the food industry can say we've got all of our apprentices have all been reformed. There's no more change because we all know that change breeds instability. It's difficult for the whole supply system that has to deliver friendships to gear up for that. So do we have an idea of when the end of the reforms might happen? Probably a Wayne question I think maybe. Yeah, we're quite far advanced with the food and drink framework. So we're looking for it to be completed anytime between next March and next summer. We would then like to hold it for two to three years before we do any more reviews, that's the plan. But obviously if something changes, if something new comes along, then we are at liberty to review them at any time. But we're trying to make them a bit future proof so that they can remain there for a number of years. What we don't want to be doing is reviewing every six months. But then we don't want to review and leave it there for five or six years. So we're looking at about a three year standstill with the opportunity to review it if the sector so desires. So if some new technology comes along and that needs to be embedded into the pathway, then there's the opportunity to do that. So we'd like it to be robust and stable, but we'd like it to have the opportunity as technologies come on board to step those into the framework as a quite easy way. So two one, yes, we'd like it to remain stable, but we'd also like to update it as when required. Okay, that was really helpful. So I think I suspect a period of time to enable it all to bed down and see how it's going. Sounds like a very sensible idea. So a couple of questions that have also been raised along the way. So there was a question around about the makeup of the steering group. Now, who's involved in the steering group? Who sits around it? Are they Welsh? Do they work in Wales? So I think I'm right in saying that the makeup of the steering group is suggested by Ewan and then it's Louise, you kind of recruit. Is that right? So what's the makeup of the steering group? We've issued guidance on who we expect to be on a steering group. So on a steering group, we would expect industry and sector representation. We would expect employers. We would expect an awarding body, or awarding body representation. We would expect qualification Wales. We would expect training provider representation and where appropriate trade union representation and also Welsh government policy and apprenticeship representation. So that is the guidance. We then hand it over to our development partner to put that steering group together and somebody from Welsh government sits on the steering group and we have suggested people to come onto the steering group just to make sure that there's a fair balance. What we would like to have with the employers is a representation from across Wales. So somebody from North, somebody from South, a large employer, a small employer. So we're trying to get a balance and a fair representation of the employers. We also get in contact with FSB and CBI who are on our advisory board and they oversee this as well. So we'd like to make sure that because one of the original criticisms to be had of the development was that the same two or three employers were asked to be on the steering group every single time. And so we were only getting the views of a limited number of employers. So we're trying to be much more transparent and get a much wider range because we want the apprenticeship to be appropriate not only for large employers but also for SMEs as well. Okay, perfect. Thank you. So Louise, in terms of the steering group that you have, I think have you got a, so presumably it's chaired by somebody and so have you got sort of, have you got people from Wales there? Have you got representation from the key people that are required? Yeah, so it's chaired by an employer. We have a number of providers on it. Coles Wales is on it, so they look after all of that side of it for us. Obviously somebody from Wayne's team sits on it. It's difficult to get some of the smaller providers, smaller employers to come to the meetings, which is why I think going forward, we will be able to roll that out to quite a few of the SMEs that we already work with. And so we hit most of that, but we certainly get that when we get out into our working parties too. Yeah, okay. There's a couple of questions being raised about, can people see the makeup of the steering group? Can they see the terms of reference? I've seen them on your website, I think, in Welsh Government, so they're free published, but we can certainly send over or get linked up to who's in the steering group and the terms of reference. So I don't think there's nothing secretive in any of this. It's a very open process. I think that's right, isn't it? Yeah, so yeah, not a problem so everybody can see who's involved. And this is very much, the purpose of doing this is everybody on this call has an interest in the project sector will have contacts, will be working with employers, might be an employer, might be supporting employers. And I think the whole point of having the steering group as certainly I think when you explained it to me is that it's that reach out that everybody has throughout Wales, it has many different businesses involved. How has COVID affected the ability to engage kind of with employers? Would you often, would it be something that you'd want to do kind of face-to-face or one-to-one? How has it helped or hindered? We have changed our guidance because initially the steering groups were face-to-face and we had face-to-face workshops. Now, due to COVID, everything is Microsoft Teams Skype. And what we're finding is we are getting a more representation because people don't have to travel, they can just. So yeah, so we are finding, we are getting more varied take-up as well due to this but everything is going to be virtual for the foreseeable future. It's even easier for people to get involved with all here and you don't have to travel to be involved in this. You can do it from the comfort of your own desk at home. I think it would be much easier. We've been doing some research last week with around all of the businesses that we've been working with and a lot of that was Wales focused and if we are able to run them much more remotely, we will have a lot more businesses that will want to get involved in both the steering group and the working party. So I think it will be a much richer experience going forward. Excellent, good. So my final question really is to Louise and to Wayne is, is there more that the Boondring Wales Board can do to support you? Has this been helpful? Should we do more like this? And what else could we do to help you? Me? Yeah. From a board perspective, I think, you've been incredibly supportive and I also think that raising the profile of some of the work that we're doing, I think it would be really good to do a session with employers about what apprenticeships are and how they have been engaging with them and how they can access them. I think that might be quite helpful. But I think anything that you can do to help support getting the message out about being involved and taking part in all of this work, anything that you can do in that area would be very helpful. Yeah. And, similarly, Wayne, anything else that you can think of or is that helpful? I think, yeah, that's very helpful. It's the communication and representing the industry, be honest, on this Stephen group and just help us with the communication because the more we communicate, the more feedback we get, the more people get involved because the apprenticeships are for the apprentices and the employers, those are our end users. Yeah. I guess at this particular period in time where the industry, well, the whole economy has gone through quite a shock in terms of lockdown, in terms of COVID, that there's even more incentive to try and support younger people into work. I think all the evidence suggests that there's younger people who are being hit most by the current economic situation. So, and whilst I know apprenticeships aren't just for young people, but I think it's a great opportunity for employers to think about how they can be part of supporting people coming into our industry because we do know we have a shortage and it was ever thus. So hopefully, new apprenticeship frameworks that are rigorous and robust, that give them a great career, there's even more incentive for young people to hopefully come and join our industry. So, in terms of final questions really, I think that one question which I think is often the case, there's a lot of really good work is done on apprenticeships in terms of reform and everything, but in terms of communicating the end result of it, the fact that there's a new apprenticeship launched, I know quite often it's not something that Welsh Government do with a flurry is announced to the whole industry that there's a new apprenticeship. And I'm just wondering if that's something that we could maybe help with in terms of also celebrating when the new improved frameworks are available, perhaps raising profile, celebrating, I think the people more aware of those, I think could be something that we could certainly help with. Yes, that would be great. Okay, good. There's one final question coming in around about the role of the regional skills partnerships. So, I think it'd be interesting weighing just for you to give a very quick summary if you're able to of their role. They've obviously been around for a number of years now and they have a particular role in the landscape. And then perhaps Louise mentioned just whether, how involved your team have been, I think they've been meetings between the regional skills partnerships and people there, but the use were just to talk about engagement with them. So, Wayne, do you want to just comment on who they are and what their role is? Yeah, we have regional skills partnerships across Wales and they feed the Welsh Government or advise the Welsh Government on labour market intelligence. We have in Wales the Wales Apprenticeship Advisory Board which advises the Welsh Government on what frameworks to develop, what frameworks to review. And on the, what we call the WAB, there is a representation from the regional skills partnerships or the regional skills partnerships on an integral part of the Wales Apprenticeship Advisory Board and they then advise the Welsh Government and helps Welsh Ministers on developments going forward within apprenticeships. Fantastic, yeah. So, and I think from memory, I think if I'm right in saying that there are, of the three of them, I think two of them have food manufacturing as a priority sector. And I think one of them has food as a within an advanced manufacturing definition I think of a priority sector. So again, it's quite good to see. And I think, I think I've been to a meeting with James from the National Skills Academy, I think where we were talking to one of the regional skills partnerships about reflecting the importance of food and drink. Yeah. So, I think that was probably early last year that happened. So, yeah, I think it's important that there's representation from the industry on all of these places to make sure that we are, we're recognised for the importance that we are. I'm very conscious of the time. It is now one minute to three. So, if nothing else, I should finish on time. I'd just like to say a huge thank you to both Wayne and Louise for their time and for giving us such a really helpful overview of the reforms. I will stress again, it's your frameworks, your apprenticeships, employers, please do get involved and join in the consultation. Just on my behalf, I'd like to say huge thanks to the team at Welsh Government to help organise these chats. They're doing a fantastic job. I think Wales is incredibly lucky actually to have not just a skills division that really understands the importance of food and drink, but a food division that really goes out of its way to help inform employers and make a difference. So, huge thanks to the team, Mark in particular, and Gwen and others for putting this together. And finally, a thank you to all of you for attending. I know this is quite a detailed subject, so thank you for sticking with it as well for the duration of time. And I hope they look forward to seeing you on another webinar at another time. So, thank you very much. Have a great rest of the day and goodbye.


Ryan Snitger, manager of the Braves, has his team one win away from going to the World Series for the first time since 1999. And Snit's been with the organization since 1977. He was a manager in their minor league system in his late 20s. He is a 44 year veteran of the Braves organization and now he's at the top and has a chance to take them to the big dance. This one's brought to you by DraftKings. When you download DraftKings number one Sportsbook app, use code Johnboyt to let him know that I sent you and that helps us out. Eddie Rosario's up. He's been on fire this postseason. They traded for him. He steps into the box, looks out at Walker, Walker looks back, nods, says, let's do the damn thing. Two runners in scoring position, two outs, and that's a center cut. Fastball, dangerous pitch to a guy who's swinging at everything and making good contact. That is just right down the middle. Eddie misses it. Walker gets away with it. It didn't cut that much.  Eddie's saying, throw that again. I'd like to see the cutter again. And that's exactly what Walker gives him. He gives him the cutter down the middle again. Now this one does have some cut action to it. It jumps inside. He fouls it off for strike two. And now he's thinking, OK, oh, and two. Lock in, lock in, calm, cool, collected. OK, lock in, kind of like cloudy headed. Oh, and two, that's the same pitch again. And he misses it again. And now he showed him the same pitch three times. And they've been dangerous every time. And he's swinging at them every time he's attacking them. And you think you probably don't throw that again. They go sinker, two-seamer away, and the catcher loves it. He says, hey, there you go. There you go. It's not a strike, but we changed it up. Good pitch, good pitch. And Rosario's thinking, OK, is he going to go back to that cutter now? I'd really like it if he goes back to the cutter now. And that's exactly what he does, center cut again. And Rosario gives everyone the international sign for, damn, that's my pitch. I wish I hit it, fuck, right there. And you hope Bueller sees that, or the catcher sees that, and they can kind of pivot and say, OK, maybe he's sitting on that pitch. Maybe that's the one he wants a lot, because he went cutter, cutter, cutter, sinker, cutter. And all those cutters are in the middle of the zone, or waist high, but inside, he's thinking, OK, what's he going to do this time? Cat scratch, looks awesome. He goes two-seamer away, gets the foul ball. Catcher loves it again. But now he's going to go back to the cutter, isn't he? That's what Eddie's hoping for. He does. Foot down, barrel to bat, bomb. Three-run, a homer to give the Braves the lead, and they never look back. It propels them into the World Series. World Serial. Propels them into the World Series. Eddie Rosario gets the MVP. His numbers are absolutely insane. 500-something batting average, 600-something on base percentage, one dot slugging, three home runs, a triple, a double. He's going to get MVP. And the curtain call he deserves from the home crowd. Let's go, Eddie! Yeah!  Bam! Gone. Really weird sequence from Bueller. He just showed him the same pitch five times. Eventually you're going to get burned, especially when the batter is showing you. He wants to swing at that pitch. And he wasn't far off. He fouled some off, but he was on it. This is a cool shot. Boom! Crowd going crazy. He's going to watch it. Big ol' left fist pump from that guy in a spin, celebrating with the boys. He uses his first base as a springboard around the bases. And you know who predicted a Braves Astros World Series? My co-host, ex-big leaguer Trevor Ploof, for this moment, is the smartest man on Twitter. And if the Braves beat the Astros in six games, Trevor Ploof, we burned at the stake. This one's brought to you by DraftKings. Go to DraftKings. Download the number one sportsbook app. Use promo code JohnBoy when you do have some fun.


Our altcoin of the week this week is Ethereum. Warning, Game of Thrones spoilers ahead. If Bitcoin is a father of all cryptocurrencies, Ethereum is certainly the mother. She has given birth to more than 250 ERC-20-based projects that are live in the market, plus over 500 currently in progress. So what makes Ethereum different? Mainly, smart contracts. A smart contract is a special protocol intended to contribute, verify, or implement the negotiation or performance of the contract. Smart contracts perform credible transactions without third parties. Smart contracts ensure that all sides of any transaction hold up their end of the bargain so that you don't end up running into problems like this. Warning, not to trust me. Or this. Or this. Or this. Smart contracts make it so that you don't have to rely on potentially corrupt or self-serving middlemen like this. Or this. Or this. Or this. Wow, Game of Thrones would have been really boring if they had smart contracts. Ethereum is a platform fueled by Ether tokens designed for the creation of distributed applications or DApps. These DApps are built on top of the Ethereum blockchain and each has its own unique aspirations and utilities. Ethereum's smart contracts ensure that their DApps function exactly how intended without being altered or corrupted. Ethereum was founded by Vitalik Putirin. He was the founder of Bitcoin Magazine who saw the technology behind Bitcoin and said, I can do better. Which was a lot different than the most common reaction of, uh, right. With ubiquitous cries of to the moon and lambo time. Vitalik tends to cut through the noise by advocating for reasonable investment strategies and altruistic uses of cryptocurrencies. Being one of the most well-known and talked of cryptocurrencies, Ethereum has to face a lot of fud. Hackered fud, regulation fud, rumor fud, bubble fud, ban fud, fud fud, and it has survived them all. Many ambitious newcomers to the cryptocurrency scene are often described as Ethereum killers because despite the misguided notion that women are dramatic. If you ever call me sister again, I'll have you strangled in your sleep. The male-dominated crypto community can be a lot like this.  Or this. Bitcoin is the true king. Why even talk to anyone else? Or this. Why does Vitalik dress like that? It's so not fetch. Or this. Hashtag, Ethereum killer. Maybe it really is all cocks in the end. Unfortunately, we do not have time to go into Casper Protocol, where Ethereum is transitioning from proof of board to proof of stake, or go into as much detail about solidarity, the coding behind Ethereum, which has close ties to JavaScript. There's way more to Ethereum than a fun little game of thrones comparison. And if you think you've seen all that Ethereum can do, will do, then you'll probably end up like this guy. Instead of this guy. Oh wait. Oh god, never mind. Turn that off. Ugh. Incest aside, if you're interested in cryptocurrency, or more importantly, the potential of blockchain, then you should take some time and figure out what exactly can be done on Ethereum.