Recognition for engineering apprentices
Three engineering apprentices have won awards at Linde Material Handling’s annual Apprenticeship Awards. Liam Mann, 23, Callum Armour, 19, and James Middleton, 25, were each recognised as the best in their respective year groups and James, from Linde Creighton, was named as the overall ‘apprentice of the year’ by Linde’s UK MD, Kerry McDonagh.
The awards, held at Renault's F1 Technical Centre in Chipping Norton, recognise the talent within the Linde apprenticeship scheme with nine of the company’s 54 apprentices shortlisted for the awards this year.
The trio are currently studying for apprenticeships in engineering in the UK’s first certified apprentice scheme for the forklift truck industry, established by Linde in 2011 to address the skills gap for qualified engineers.
Having started the course in 2015, overall winner James is now one year into his training and is working on site at Linde Creighton with customers including Topps Tiles and Triumph Motorcycles. At the end of the three year vocational and technical skills related course, James, along with his fellow winners, will receive a formal qualification recognised by the International Motorship Institute as a Linde forklift truck engineer.
James said he is thrilled to have won the award which will take him on a summer trip to Linde’s main factory in Aschaffenburg, Germany where he and his mentor will get a behind-the-scenes tour of the company’s latest innovations.
