A pre-election relaunch of the Get Britain Building campaign has drawn up a checklist of policy ideas that includes a proposal to revive the age of “night school” to upskill the construction sector.
Get Britain Building was first launched in 2009 by the Federation of Master Builders, House Builders Federation, Builders Merchants Federation and Modern Masonry Alliance to focus the industry’s calls for a construction-driven economic recovery.
Its latest campaign document is aimed at coordinating the ideas of the four bodies as they individually head off to the party conferences: Labour in Manchester, the Liberal Democrats in Glasgow, and the Conservatives in Birmingham.
Alongside measures to boost housebuilding, retrofit the existing housing stock and invest in infrastructure, it proposes “an extensive upskilling programme to encourage continuous improvement across the wide and diverse construction sector. This could be delivered through on-site, night school and distance learning initiatives.”
"Because we’re in an upturn, there’s less time in the working day to release employees, so the idea of reviving night school has been floated. The idea is to keep training as flexible as possible for people who are working full time."
Sarah McMonagle, FMB
The night-school proposal originated with Mike Leonard, chief executive of the Modern Masonry Alliance, who has apparently had preliminary talks with CITB about the practicalities.
Sarah McMonagle, head of external affairs at the FMB, said that the idea aimed to address the higher skills profile of today’s industry, which now encompasses BIM and environmental issues.
She said: “Because we’re in an upturn, there’s less time in the working day to release employees, so the idea of reviving night school has been floated. The idea is to keep training as flexible as possible for people who are working full time.
“It’s not the only solution, but it is part of the picture as well as increasing the number of people entering the industry through apprenticeships and engaging with schools. The CITB have recently revised up their figures for the numbers of new jobs that will be created – it’s 200,000 by 2019 – while we also have an ageing workforce. The average in construction is 51 and we’re not replenishing the industry fast enough.”
Other proposals in the leaflet include the FMB’s long-term policy aim of reducing VAT on home improvement work from 20% to 5%, and setting the challenge of bringing 2 million low income homes up to EPC Band C by 2020.
In addition, the four trade bodies say that all 6 million UK low income homes should be brought up to EPC Band C by 2025. It argues that the “carbon tax” could be used to help fund this long-term investment programme.
On new build housing, it wants to see the delivery of affordable homes increased by at least 25%, and raising the Housing Revenue Account borrowing cap to allow local authorities to build more new homes.
In a press statement, John Newcomb, managing director of the Builders Merchants Federation, said: “Supporting both house building and the upgrading of existing homes, the building supply chain is vital to the UK economy. We need to know what we can expect from the next government. Once policy is set, we also need continuity with no sudden changes of policy direction, levels of public funding or delivery arrangements, as we have seen so often in the past.”
