Hi Braindead,
Nice to see someone making a stand, not bowing to pressures of management to cover their shortfalls in recruiting or training suitably qualified staff. It would be interesting to find out who you worked for, but I would entirely understand if you did not want to disclose this information. The outfit that I work for have been taking on ex-RAF guys recently. Nothing wrong with that as I am ex-RAF myself, but 757/767 are totally different from Tornado/Harrier that these blokes have been working on for most of their time in, and most are 22 year blokes as well; and in some cases, have difficulty in being molded to the shape that is demanded by preasant management. The currant apprenticeship is being cut to three years, that is one year being cut from the usual scheme. The apprentice that our team have at the moment (I believe that his brother runs easyJet's maintenance) is a great bloke, but he feels that three years is not long enough for him to learn all the skills required for him to go into the big, wide, wonderful world of aircraft maintenance that lives outside. Now he finds himself caught between the devil and the deep blue sea; should he stay and see what happens, or should he leave at the end of his time and go contracting to find out all there is to know about aircraft maintenance, and also 'the real world' outside. But I feel another thread coming on hear so I will let someone else have their say. Over to you..............