SIR ARNOLD Clark leaves behind a tangible legacy for his city. The business itself is certainly the most obvious, Europe’s largest independently-owned family-run car dealer.
He grew it from scratch, nurturing its success all through the years when Glasgow saw one after another old-established family business go to the wall and Scotland as a country was lamenting its comparative shortage of entrepreneurs.
When Glasgow was reaching its lowest economic point in the mid-90s, Sir Arnold was busily expanding his company into England.
But there is also another of his legacies which is providing opportunities for literally thousands of young people in Glasgow every year.
In 2003 he took full control of an initiative called the Glasgow Training Group. Formed in 1971 by a consortium of motor industry businesses, including Arnold Clark, it was designed to make sure there was a robust system for delivering top quality apprenticeships.
Since its rebranding in 2004 as GTG Training, the Arnold Clark Group has invested over £40 million into the facilities, the tools and equipment and the excellent staff at GTG.
If you have ever visited the training centre in South Street you will know just how important the Arnold Clark Group takes its support for industry training.
In 2015/16 GTG helped over 2,200 mostly young people achieve a good apprenticeship, and at the same time partnered local schools to deliver 238 work experience placements.
The Prince’s Trust is a regular partner spotlighting opportunities for 16-22 year olds from the poorest backgrounds, who usually end up with a job offer in the Arnold Clark business.
The last time I saw Sir Arnold was at an annual graduation for trainees and apprentices at the South Street site. As usual there was a collection of classic vehicles outside for the apprentices and their families to explore and have their photographs taken.
The steady flow of talent from GTG’s work means that over half of Arnold Clark’s workforce is under 30.
Glasgow Chamber of Commerce awarded Sir Arnold its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2003 in formal recognition of the contribution he had already made to the business life of our city.
We are proud that he was a member of the Chamber and we send good wishes to his family at this difficult time. They can look back on Sir Arnold’s life with pride.
Stuart Patrick is chief executive of Glasgow Chamber of Commerce.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here