The 22-year-old, who works for local housing regeneration specialist Lovell in King’s Lynn, learned new skills at a local college and during a work placement with a Finnish plumbing firm. He was one of six CWA students taking part in the exchange visit.

Cambs Times: Plumber Billy SmithPlumber Billy Smith (Image: Archant)

Trainee plumber Billy is part of the Lovell team working on the large-scale housing regeneration programme which the firm is carrying out for Freebridge Community Housing at Hillington Square.

For his month-long trip abroad, Billy was based in the town of Kouvola in south-east Finland, around 80 miles from Helskini. He spent the first week of his trip working alongside Finnish plumbing students at a local college.

Billy then spent two-and-a-half weeks on placement with Finnish firm R A Wickholm working alongside one of the company’s plumbers.

Billy, who is in his third year of his four-year apprenticeship, said: “I found the welding particularly interesting and satisfying as it’s not something we do a lot of here and I also liked the ventilation work. I enjoyed working with so many different people – and in a different language! We had some basic phrases to start us off and I picked up some of the language while I was there.”