Severn Valley Railway "Careers"

[Badger]

Hi,
I just catched a bit of Inside Out West Midlands, in which they said the Servern Valley Railway is desperate for new engineer apprenticeships. They talked about how people aren't taking on a "career" there.

Now I assumed it's all voluntary, for no pay; but the way they talked was as if it was a viable alternative to a job elsewhere though. Am I right in thinking there is no payment?

I would take it on if I was more financially stable, but the cost of the ticket to Kidderminster would wipe out my actual wages.

Or, are there paid (even minimum wage) jobs available?

The SVR website is blank on employment (http://www.svr.co.uk/Employment.aspx) and I don't want to waste their time sending in an application if it's unpaid.

 

[Tomnick]

The major heritage railways (including the SVR, of course) all have a fairly substantial core of paid staff to keep things ticking over, including the engineering function - so, in answer to your question, almost certainly yes!

 

[JonathanP]

The SVR does offer paid engineering apprenticeships from time to time, based in the workshops at Bridgnorth. I'm not sure whether they are recruiting currently, I guess it's worth asking if you're interested.

The problem being referred to I think, is that the salaries offered to those who have completed apprenticeships are not competitive with the commercial world, and due to the SVR's relatively small size there is little prospect of quick promotion. So even though the SVR has an apprentice scheme specifically to try and train young people in specialist heritage skills, the results of that training ends up leaving the railway.

 

[svrbridgnorth]

This is what the Inside Out programme was about:

http://svrtrust.org.uk/our-projects/heritage-training-academy.html