Anne Veck, owner of Anne Veck Salon in Oxford took her seat at the (virtual) table for her first Cabinet Office Meeting to discuss the state of play in the world of hairdressing and apprenticeships. The meeting was held on Friday 19th March 2021.
The roundtable was led by Boris Johnson, senior Cabinet Ministers and the other business leaders.
Each participant was invited in turn to speak and the topic given was what can Government learn from your experience in skills and training to help us Build Back Better from the pandemic?
“Organised by the Prime Minister’s Business Team this was an honour to participate, an opening given to me by the British Beauty Council to represent the hairdressing voice on this topic” said Anne Veck.
The areas presented by Anne included data that there were just 7,000 entrants in 2020, down 30% previous year. 75% Employers planning to cut back according to government’s own report. Anne presented ideas as part of the conversation of how can government help to build back better post-Covid?
“I acknowledged the government action of the £3,000 grant when new apprentices are recruited and talked about additional and welcome dispensation to make completing hairdressing apprenticeships “easier.” by easing Covid close contact restrictions. I made the point strongly that hairdressing is an industry with huge career scope, and yet suffering a skills shortage so it has enormous scope for recruitment and career opportunity. I even managed to squeeze in a pitch for the VAT to be reduced to 5% on services. The one thing I ran out of time to offer was a haircut for the P.M. once we are out of lockdown!” reported Anne.