Bread giant Kingsmill has announced that it will be investing in its local communities by funding primary care workers’ training for the third consecutive year.
The funding from Kingsmill is used for trainee health and care workers across care homes and surgeries in the UK. Training courses typically involve two to three years combined university study and on the job training.
The programme – which forms part of the company’s Slice of Kindness pledge – started in 2021. Since then, Kingsmill has met the full training costs for 16 healthcare roles, including healthcare support workers and nursing associates in Greater Manchester and Staffordshire, with eight further roles in Lincolnshire now agreed.
The Kingsmill-funded training is delivered through an initiative between Health Education England, the National Skills Academy for Food & Drink and British food and drink companies – in this instance, Kingsmill’s parent company Allied Bakeries. The scheme sees the companies’ own unused apprenticeship levy funds redirected to pay to train new NHS health and social care workers.
“The whole ethos behind our Kingsmill Kindness campaign is to give back to our bakeries’ local communities and we do that in a number of ways – from making food donations, to supporting community groups and local sports teams,” said Emma Eggleton, head of marketing for Kingsmill. “However, like our partnership with Save The Children, the apprenticeship levy scheme allows us to give back on a far larger scale.
“We are all aware of the impact that the Covid-19 pandemic had on primary care NHS workers, and we are delighted to be helping grow these services for the future,” Eggleton added.
The latest round of funding has allowed the Kingsmill depot in Lincoln to provide training to eight trainees, including Helen Marshall, from Boston, who will be training to work at St Peter’s Hill Surgery.
“I recently turned 40 and have been looking for new work opportunities that will give me the chance to develop my career further over the coming years,” said Marshall. “I’m really looking forward to being able to support St Peter’s Hill Surgery in Grantham and eventually be able to run my own clinics taking blood and giving babies their immunisations.”
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