My thanks to everyone who has got in touch with ideas, opinions, comments and contributions, in particular Accenture's Bob Paton, Ross Smith of the NECC, the team behind the Adonis Report, the local employers like SCA, the team at the Department for Business, the FSB, and even the team at the Department for Education who heards about the debate and were keen to plug their early years apprenticeship bursary scheme.
Bob Paton is both my constituent, and the key driver of the dramatic rise in apprenticeship numbers at Accenture in the North East. He took specific time out of his busy schedule to come to Westminster to brief me today.
The debate is 11am in westminster hall. Still drafting as I update the blog - the key is to try and condense all that there is to say on such a subject into less than 15 minutes, which is the time limit of the speech.
