Raynsford: Change or lose out!

The Government is putting mounting pressure on construction employers to tackle sexual and racial discrimination and to improve safety and welfare conditions for site employees.

On Monday, construction minister Nick Raynsford told the second Egan conference that a skills and recruitment crisis was looming unless action was taken. And he announced that a new Respect for People working group is being formed which will use demonstration projects to set key performance indicators and drive change forwards.

It follows a relative lack of action on welfare issues since the launch of the Egan report - in marked contrast to the response on productivity and benchmarking (see page 3).

Raynsford said the situation had worsened since the Egan report and produced figures showing construction was losing heavily to other sectors in the competition to attract students.

He said that the number of students enrolling in degree courses was up 12 per cent across all courses, but those enrolling for architectural degrees was down by 3 per cent, civil engineering by 21 per cent, and building-related courses by 30 per cent.

He added that blacks and Asians accounted for just 1.9 per cent of construction, and had fallen to 0.7 per cent of CITB trainees. "It's getting worse, not better."

He continued: "It's difficult to be positive when faced with the record on recruiting women, ethnic minorities, safety and site welfare. Fundamentally, it is not good enough. Above all we need a fundamental change of attitude, not least among managers and supervisors."

Construction leaders were quick to respond. Alan Crane, chief executive of Christiani and Nielsen and chairman of the Movement for Innovation, said: "There is no more important issue as far as construction is concerned, we have a totally unacceptable situation in this industry, whether you talk about discrimination because of gender or race, or whether you talk about working conditions, we are not thought of as an industry that supports its people and respects them."

Eoin Dunn of John Doyle said; "Tradesmen are already leaving in droves. Shortages are happening now." The new working group will put forward demonstration projects this autumn. These must show innovation in either safety, site facilities, training or equality. The group will also draw up a Respect for People charter, which companies will be asked to sign up to at a Government-led conference next spring.

A research survey for Contract Journal in May found that more than four-out-of-10 contractors attending the first Egan conference were not providing workers with clothing or good toilet facilities, and two thirds were not providing showers. Contractors have made hardly any attempt to recruit minorities or women.

The group will form part of the Movement for Innovation, which was set up last year to implement the Egan report by stimulating improvements through demonstration and dissemination of best practice.

An industry focus group on sustainability is also being incorporated into the Movement. Entitled Sustainability, the Environment and Elimination of Waste, it is chaired by Sir Martin Laing and marks the Government's determination to get green issues taken seriously within the industry.