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Thousands of young people are being placed on “dead-end” classroom based construction courses which fail to equip them for a career in the industry. The Unite union has discovered that the number of classroom based construction courses increased by 14% last year – totally dwarfing the number of apprentices beginning their training. Unite is describing the courses as ‘dead-end’ because trainees are only usually able to achieve a technical qualification because they don’t have access to on-site training. The only qualification recognised in construction is the NVQ and this can’t be achieved without substantial site experience. An NVQ or equivalent qualification is necessary to acquire a Construction Sector Certification Scheme (CSCS) card required to work on sites. In most cases people undertaking classroom training…

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London Mayor Sadiq Khan has given the nod to Chelsea Football Club’s plans for a £500m stadium on the site of their existing Stamford Bridge ground. Plans for the new stadium will see Chelsea’s match-day capacity increase from 41,600 to 60,000 and will include the construction of an elevated walkway over the nearby District Line, linking the stadium to Fulham Broadway station. Chelsea will now begin looking for a contractor, with Multiplex, Mace and Sir Robert McAlpine tipped to be interested. His decision today further builds on his support for London football, including his move to give the green light to a new stadium for AFC Wimbledon, which sees the ‘Dons’ set to return to their Plough Lane home nearly three decades after leaving it in 1991.  Chelsea’s…

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Nine construction tradesmen from Widnes and Liverpool have been sentenced for trying to steal £300,000 in an organised tax fraud. James Roberts was central to the scam The men, who worked as subcontractors including painters, decorators, builders, and roofers, submitted false claims for tax repayments. James Roberts, of Widnes, was at the centre of the conspiracy, which was uncovered by HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) investigators. He was found to have made multiple fraudulent amendments to his own tax returns and allowed his bank account to be used by other members of the gang. Roberts’ partner, Natasha Sinnott, 22, of Bootle, helped the fraudsters by allowing the stolen taxes to be laundered through her bank account. The fraud was uncovered by the Income Tax Self-Assessment Repayments Taskforce…

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The chairman of the Environment, Food & Rural Affairs Select Committee, Neil Parish MP, has been on a fact-finding mission to a damage restoration depot in his own constituency. Mr Parish was shown Richfords Fire & Flood’s facility at Cullompton on 17th February 2017 where he saw the equipment used to dry out buildings after an escape of water or flooding. The EFRA chair was also shown a training mock-up of a stud-wall which had been rigged up for injection drying and remote monitoring. After his tour, the Tiverton & Honiton MP said: “I applaud the work of Richfords in allowing people back into their homes much more quickly and then, in the future, increase the resilience of that property. That’s great news because people …

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A planning application is set to be submitted for a new 48 storey tower on Old Hall Street in Liverpool which could become the city’s tallest building. Plans for the  Ovatus 2 tower have been put forward by a joint venture between Prospect Capital and Wilcocks & Wilcocks. It will sit next to the 27-storey Ovatus 1 tower which was submitted for planning last December with a target construction start date of April 2017 for the £37m contract. The adjacent plot of Ovatus 2 currently houses a Shop Direct data centre. Developers will have to wait until 2018 for the building to become vacant before any building work starts. Ovatus 2 has been designed by Hodder+Partners and comprises a total of 530 apartments reaching eight storeys higher than West Tower – the city’s current…

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The director of a joinery specialist is launching a probe into payment abuse in the industry. Chris Bennett said he has suffered at the hands of late payment by main contractors. And now he is taking an MSc in Construction Management at Liverpool John Moore’s University with payment abuse as one of his specialist subjects. More than 100 firms have already taken part in the survey which is anonymous but will be used to inform future debate on how subcontractors are treated. The initiative is being promoted by pressure group Streetwise Subbi. Director Barry Ashmore said: Most, if not all, specialist contractors will experience payment problems of one form or another at some time in their lives. “As a director of a joinery business, Chris Bennett, experienced first…

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The Survey Association launches smart new website New features give clients a fast route to TSA’s expertise   The Survey Association (TSA), the UK’s trade body for commercial survey companies, has redeveloped its website, following a year of exceptional growth in visitor numbers and applications for membership. During 2016, TSA’s website logged more than 142,000 visits from 100 different countries, an increase of 153% on 2014. TSA also received 19 applications for membership, the highest ever in one year. http://www.tsa-uk.org.uk/ TSA President Adam Bradley said, ‘’Improvements to the website’s functionality and refreshed design has been essential to align with the growth of the profession in a number of sectors. With a clearer, easy to navigate listing, clients can now quickly contact a trusted industry professional from our growing …

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Find out more about ‘green’ construction summer university programme at Ecobuild Visitors to Ecobuild can find out more about a pioneering Austrian summer university programme, which provides world-leading insight into sustainable architecture and the built environment. Green.Building.Solutions. (GBS) takes place in Vienna, the capital of energy efficient construction in the summer. Representatives from the OeAD-Housing Office will be on hand at Ecobuild from the 7 to 9 March to discuss the course, from their base located within the Advantage Austria pavilion, on stand number A189. The programme provides a unique opportunity for professionals and students in the fields of architecture and construction to strengthen their knowledge and gain a career advantage in the field of sustainability – an area of increasing global significance. Organised by…

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Engineers successfully lifted into place the 1,550 tonnes A-frame centrepiece of Sunderland’s new bridge over the weekend. The 100m white pylon was raised from a barge to its 90-degree resting place on Saturday, the culmination of nearly two years planning by joint venture builders Farrans Construction and Victor Buyck Steel Construction. It is being hailed as a landmark in the use of off-site construction for bridge building. The vast lift took less than 16 hours split over two days – equivalent to raising 125 double decker buses. Nothing of this scale has been raised in this way since the London Eye was erected in 1999. Stephen McCaffrey, project director for FVB joint venture, said: “It’s a great day for everyone working on the project – we have been working…

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A steel reinforcing specialist has been fined £277,000 after a worker had a leg amputated after being crushed at its Canvey Island plant. Southend-on-Sea Magistrates’ Court heard that on 10 June 2015 Felix Trefas, 27, a welder for F. Brazil Reinforcements Ltd, was making large steel reinforcing cages which were moved by overhead travelling cranes. When one of these cranes broke down, a colleague asked Trefas to climb more than six metres up the crane supports to re-set the controls. While Trefas was resetting the faulty crane, his left leg was crushed when he came into contact with another overhead crane. His leg was later amputated below the knee. The District Judge heard the overhead cranes were poorly maintained so that workers regularly had to work at…

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