Training and apprenticeships
We are using the scale of our build programme to increase construction training opportunities through initiatives such as our apprenticeship and building academy programmes.
Apprenticeship programme
Apprenticeships are vital to a strong construction workforce in the future. However, it’s not always easy for businesses to find an apprentice or for aspiring builders, plumbers, or electricians to find a company to learn while they earn.
The Kāinga Ora apprenticeship programme works with build partners, training and pastoral care providers, and other government agencies to help keen New Zealanders into a mix of trade apprenticeships, supporting them and their employers to maximise their success.
We’ve already helped hundreds of Kiwis successfully enter into apprenticeships with our partners across our social housing construction programme.
Our apprenticeship programme partners include the Building & Construction Industry Training Organisation (BCITO), the Ministry of Social Development (MSD), and the New Zealand Institute of Skills and Technology. We also work with local service providers, many of whom support our Māori and Pasifika communities.
Working with secondary schools
We’re working with secondary schools to create awareness of the benefits of a trade career and pathways for school leavers to training and employment in the construction sector.
We’ve set up twelve trade academies nationwide where students build houses to our specifications under the supervision of registered builders and teachers, gaining experience in carpentry, plumbing and electrical work. We establish a commercial construction contract with the school and our project managers visit the site for inspections. When the homes are completed we buy them and they're transported to one of our social housing development sites.
Trade academies and institutes we are currently working with include:
- Dargaville High School
- Unitec Te Pukenga
- Massey High School
- Onehunga High School
- Western Heights High School
- Rotorua Boys High School
- Opotiki College
- Weltec Whitireia
- Iconiq Gisborne
- Hastings Boys High School and
- Nelson MIT Te Pukenga.
Beyond the trade academies, we tailor our secondary school programme to suit our build partners and local schools. Our build partners often have schools they want to support so we help set up the partnership with the school they choose or have an attachment too. We can also adjust the level of involvement the students have. A school that neighbours one of our social housing developments in Christchurch has scheduled site visits for students, and the build partner goes into the classroom to explain the stages of construction. There are also work experience opportunities on offer which may lead to an apprenticeship or other opportunities for the students.
Read some of our trade academy stories
MATES in Construction
The construction sector has the highest proportion of suicides across all industries in New Zealand, and Kāinga Ora believes it can play a role in enabling tradespeople experiencing mental health issues to get help when they need it. That’s why we partnered with suicide prevention and mental health charity MATES in Construction in 2020.
The MATES in Construction programme, which is being rolled out at Kāinga Ora build sites, is an onsite suicide prevention programme led by industry that’s about encouraging construction workers to look after each other and seek, offer and accept help when its needed. It aims to build skills and awareness in mental health and build this into everyday work activities.
MATES in Construction has been profiled as an example of global best practice in suicide prevention by the World Health Organisation (WHO) in their publication Live Life: An Implementation Guide for Suicide Prevention in Countries(external link).
Construction Plus
Through Construction Plus, Kāinga Ora helps local communities impacted by urban development, by connecting people with training, employment and industry opportunities across Auckland and New Zealand. The scheme puts secondary school students in touch with our civil works partner LEAD Alliance and gives them opportunities for work experience.
- Supporting youth to earn while they learn - 19 July 2023
- Carpentry student starts big through scholarship scheme - 13 June 2023
- Kāinga Ora Construction Plus students relish on-site work experience - 11 May 2021
Corrections programme
Our partnership with the Department of Corrections is also helping us to build momentum towards increasing the supply of warm, dry houses.
Kāinga Ora works with Rolleston Prison and Spring Hill Corrections facilities in a scheme where prisoners gain skills in construction while refurbishing existing state homes at construction yards on site at the prisons. These houses are then moved onto Kāinga Ora land to become homes for our customers. This programme has been expanded to also include new state homes being built through this collaboration.
New homes and new skills are the result of a positive partnership between Kāinga Ora and the Department of Corrections in the Waikato.
The Spring Hill refurbishment programme, which has been running for nine years, sees supervised prisoners taking up a trade to help restore and rebuild older houses and transforming them into modern, warm, dry healthy homes for state housing tenants and their families.
Each year, more than 60 prisoners get a chance to learn and develop new skills they can take with them when they are released back into the community.
Carpentry is the main trade selected but others like interior lining, gib stopping, painting and plumbing are also available.
Corrections works with the Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation (BCITO) who come to the prison construction yard and assess prisoners on their trade skills which can give them qualifications that will help them find work when they are released.
The programme aims to deliver 10 restored homes each financial year. This year to date, five houses have been placed on their new sites with a further three to be located on new sites in March. A further two completed properties will be moved onto their new sites before the end of the financial year on June 30, 2019.
Spring Hill house being relocated
Finishing touches going on a Spring Hill house
Spring Hill houses relocated to their new sections
Kāinga Ora and the Department of Corrections are partners in a scheme where prisoners gain new skills and confidence by building and restoring damaged state houses at the Rolleston Prison construction yard.
The Rolleston Construction Yard project, dubbed the Second Chance programme, is a partnership between Kāinga Ora and Corrections which provides community and prison offenders with qualifications and skills for employment, rejuvenates state housing stock and enables offenders to contribute to the rebuilding of Canterbury.
Once completed at the yard, the houses are transported to sites across the city and re-let to tenants.
The houses have been re-clad, rewired and re-plumbed and had their walls and ceilings insulated with under-floor insulation to be installed on-site. The houses have new bathrooms, toilets and hot water closets, refurbished and modernised kitchens and new floor coverings. They have new interior plaster, have been painted inside and out, and the roofs have been water blasted and repainted.
The Second Chance project came about in 2013 when Kāinga Ora (formerly Housing New Zealand) was reviewing the future of houses from Christchurch’s Red Zone, and Canterbury Corrections was looking for a project where prisoners could contribute meaningfully to the rebuild of the city and the community.
The project involved 2 new construction yards being built at Rolleston Prison, south of Christchurch, houses being moved onto the site, repairs and refurbishment being undertaken and the houses then relocated onto new sites in the city and re-tenanted.
Approximately 140 tenants and their families now live in a house restored through the programme.
Corrections estimates hundreds of prisoners have worked on the programme. Through the yard, they have learnt, and continue to learn, employable trade skills, including painting, plastering, carpentry, and timber joinery.
Research shows there is a strong correlation between employment and leading a crime free life.
House before being repaired
House on a truck being moved
House partly repaired
House repaired and ready to be moved to new site
Page updated: 23 February 2024