Train to Gain places contracts worth £440m this year with training providers

Train to Gain estimates it will place contracts worth £440m this year with training providers.

Cheshire-based apprenticeship training specialist Protocol Skills tops the contracts-placed league table in terms of the value of Train to Gain business won so far this year. Troubled Nottingham training services provider Carter & Carter is second, sector skills agency Constructionskills third, Sheffield based A4E Management fourth while Constant Browning Edmonds, a Peterborough training provider comes fifth.

Train to Gain refused to give the value of the contracts it awarded to each provider as a matter of confidentiality. But it has been reported that Carter & Carter won at least £10m worth of Train to Gain business this year.

Train to Gain says Carter & Carter won the single biggest contract in terms of value that it had placed this year and the second largest in terms of how many trainees were involved. In October Carter & Carter suspended trading in its shares on the London Stock Exchange after it fell from a 2007 high of £12.75 in April to 83p before the suspension.

The regions that have benefited most, in terms of values of contracts awarded, from the Train to Gain Programme are North West England, London and South East England though this reflects various factors such as the number of SMEs in a region and how many people in a region don't have a Level 2 qualification.

Next year Train to Gain, which is backed by the Learning & Skills Council, expects to place contracts worth £650m, up from last year's figure of £230m.