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He remembers a by-gone time when a job was guaranteed for life, and now Joe Devlin is offering that possibility to new apprentices in Belfast.

It’s not complicated, it’s not glamorous and it is hard work.

But for master upholsterer Joe, 52, it is a job that has looked after the family for four generations and counting.

Now he wants new apprentices to join the family business and carry it on the tradition.

There’s just one problem. No one wants the work. No one has responded to his ads for apprenticeships. In fact no one has even asked for an interview at the job centre.

And Joe just cannot understand it.

He said: “I thought people were crying out for work - especially young people. All I hear about youngsters desperate for work but none of them has found their way to me.

"My family has been in this business for 80 years. We're a Belfast family with one of the longest traditions of work starting with my grandfather Thomas Devlin who started his upholstery apprenticeship in 1936 when he was 15.

"The family worked closely with Leonard Holmes who was the local carpet fitter and was Eamonn Holmes' dad. It was an ordinary life but a good life.

“All these years on the work has reared all of our families well, fed and clothed us, allowed us to have a few nice holidays and buy family cars, given us the confidence and importantly given us pride in having a good job and being able to provide for our families.

“We were never rolling in money but we’ve always worked hard and been comfortable and more importantly, we have always been secure the work would keep rolling in and it has.

“What we do takes great skill and years of training but it’s something people have demanded over the decades and will continue. We make quality furniture. We strip and upholster, we build and create and we help make people’s homes beautiful.

“And even when the big boys came to town, the big national shops like Ikea and DFS, I never worried because I knew there’d be room for what we did and to be honest, we’re busier than ever.”

Joe, from Dunmurry, runs Carryduff Upholstery in East Belfast in a far-from-glamorous unit on the Saintfield Road.

Just along the road towards the city he is soon opening the Bespoke Sofa Studio to showcase his creations and all hands are on deck to make sure it's a success.

And like most self-made men, he knows what the public wants.

He explained: “If we make a sofa for you, in any shape or size, something that you don’t want your dog on, we can make you a dog bed to match and that gets round the problem.

"If you want Belfast’s biggest chair or Northern Ireland’s longest settee, we just get on and make it and our customers keep coming back. We don’t need to advertise either because the orders come from word of mouth, tradition and the trust that we do a good job.

“Our frames have a lifetime guarantee, our work is perfection and to exacting specifications. Being an upholsterer is not a glamorous job but what we deliver is like a piece of art.

“And that’s what we want our apprentices to do. Once the beech wood frame is made, one person takes on everything else so it becomes their creation from start to finish.

"That’s what our apprenticeships are all about, helping someone build a career that will sustain them and their family for life – if they want to.

“My dad Pat followed his dad Thomas into the business. Then I followed my dad into the business and so did my brother Paddy.

"And now our own sons, Ruairi, 12 and Patrick, 14, are involved even though they’re still at school – they're making buttons and filling cushions and learning the trade from the inside.

“Today my dad, who is 74, and my brother, my wife and sister-in-law, and now our sons are working in the business and we need more people to join us but no one seems to want the work.

“I couldn’t believe it when the job centre said no one has responded to the apprenticeship ads. We have three going and we need 15 to 16-year-olds who will stick the pace for four years and learn the business from scratch in a family atmosphere where they will be trained and cared for like one of the family.

“We’ve had a couple of lads who turned up a while ago but one didn’t want to get his clothes dusty in the frame-making room and the other just couldn’t stick the pace.

“We have three generations of Master Upholsterers in the family and it’s precious to us but we are willing to share with others.

"We’ve done well and we’re in a position to share our success now - if they want it.”