Record number of apprentices for BAE Systems

DEFENCE giant BAE Systems is to take on a record 568 apprentices in 2014, up from 387 this year.

Just under half will work at its shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness where BAE is building seven new Astute class attack submarines for the Royal Navy and designing a successor to the UK’s Trident missile system.

A further 94 will work on military aircraft design and production in Warton and Samlesbury, Lancashire, and 48 will join the firm’s aircraft maintenance academy in Doncaster, while 100 will join shipbuilding and maintenance teams in Portsmouth and Glasgow.

Other roles will go to the company’s electronics arm in Rochester, its combat vehicles station in Telford, and munitions factories in Cheshire, Tyneside and South Wales.

The business said the increase reflects its growing workload, but in November it announced 1,775 shipbuilding jobs were to go after completing aircraft carrier work, and earlier this month the United Arab Emirates pulled out of a potential £6bn deal with the Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft.