Haringey Council

Apprenticeships for Haringey Council’s gardeners are part of a policy of developing new members of its 60-strong gardening team.

Shirley Hall (foreground) and Helen Steel

“These are skilled jobs. Gardening should be highly -regarded as an occupation”

 

Training the next generation of landscapers and gardeners is important to Don Lawson, head of parks at Haringey Council.

He said: “We’ve got a team of 60 gardeners who look after 288 hectares of open space and parks in the borough, but within our directorate we have the highest ageing workforce. So, it makes sense to bring new people on, train them up and develop their horticultural skills.”
 
For Don, who started off as apprentice gardener himself, running an apprenticeship programme to cultivate staff is essential.

“These are skilled jobs. Gardening should be highly-regarded as an occupation and growing good gardeners through apprenticeships recognises this. Amenity and horticulture needs investment both in the people and the places they look after,” he said.

Haringey, a London borough, has a number of apprentices helping maintain its Green Flag parks.

Among them are 44-year-old mum-of-two Shirley Hall and 23-year-old Joanna McGavin.

For Shirley the job is a complete turnaround in career and the apprenticeship she says is something she wished she’d been able to do years ago. “I’d really had enough of being a prison officer. Then I saw an advert for a gardener with Haringey Council,” she said.

Shirley goes to Capel Manor College every Monday and is on a Level 2 Apprenticeship in Amenity Horticulture. She said: “I am glad they are investing time in me, I’d go as far to say that Haringey has done me proud.

For Joanna McGavin her Level 3 studies in Amenity Horticulture also includes a Level 3 Garden Design element which she says she is enjoying enormously.

“I saw an advert for an apprentice gardener which really appealed to me. What I like about the apprenticeship is the mix you get between the theory at college and the experience out in Finsbury Park where I’m based." 

Find out more about Apprenticeships

Find out what it takes to be a gardener