KINGSTON, Jamaica — Opposition Leader, Andrew Holness, says that over 15,000 youths would benefit from two training programmes the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) has promised to institute, if elected to government.

Speaking at a “Prosperity Live” campaign meeting in Portmore on Thursday, Holness said that the national apprenticeship and national service programmes, which he announced in July, would be on the agenda for a future JLP government.

He said that the programmes would involve some 15,000 youths involved in helping to transform the public sector from a paper-based to a paperless entity.

“It is going to take a massive concentrated effort to convert from paper to digital. It’s is going to take a lot of bright youngsters who are eager about technology to work with a programme like that,” he told a huge crowd at the Portmore Academy.

“[It is] not for two days, not for three weeks, but it will take two to three years, and it will occupy the time of over 15,000 youngsters to bring the Jamaican Government into the digital place,” Holness said.

He stated that those youngsters will fall under the national apprenticeship programme and will learn skills like business process operations, which will allow them to obtain employment in similar operations when their youth service is concluded.

He said that, on the other hand, the government will benefit from by digitising its records, which will make its services more efficient.

Other speakers at the meeting were: Opposition spokesman on finance and planning, Audley Shaw; Opposition spokesman on Local Government, Desmond McKenzie; and, Councillor Keith Blake (Independence City) of the Portmore Municipal Council.

Balford Henry