I recently raised a concern with the "Construction Awards Alliance", (CAA), the CITB administered body, overseeing plant NVQs regarding the competence of many of its assessors. I am assured by the CAA that everything is all sweetness and light.

However... during 2008 when the industry and the Learning Skills Council, LSC, were flush with cash it prompted many training providers/employers, and in particular, colleges, to nominate candidates for NVQ assessor status in a particular category of plant.

The present CAA system allows the training provider/college to nominate assessors from within their own workforce based on a flimsy CV and a tenuous link with competence. The tenuous link on many occasions has been a half day CPCS test on say, a site dumper. The CAA quality assurance, though well meaning and best intentioned is devoid of occupational competence in a plant discipline having probably been recruited from a totally different working environment, not necessarily from within construction !!

At a CPCS road show last week a member of the audience gave a graphic example of how the current CAA system has allowed "incompetent" assessors to gauge plant operator competence on construction equipment. This particular individual arrived on site to undertake an NVQ assessment on a candidate operating a, "concrete pump."

He openly admitted that he had no idea what a "concrete pump" looked like and had to be shown the item and how it worked ! When the taxpayer has coughed up, £millions, through the LSC for in excess of 25,000 plant operator NVQs in the last 18 months one wonders about the audit trail that awarding bodies are taking regarding quality checks?

Many of us are convinced that he much advertised saga with, MP's expenses would pale into insignificance if the National Audit Office, NAO, had a close look at how some plant operator NVQs were actually achieved. Sadly it becomes abundantly clear that the greater emphasis by many has been the acquisition of funding at the expense of the National Occupational Standards, NOS, for plant operators.

 When i finally did my CPCS i did it wth The Lakes Training Centre!

On my CV i wrote "i am fully conversant with PROLEC & SAFELIFT"

The two instructors on site had no idea what they were!

I had to educate them!

Then i was asked to do my test on a JS 130 hired from a farmer who liked his levers on the opposite side!

If it wasn't bad enough that the two of them admitted they couldn't drive it themselves but they were assessing a guy on a 10 day course using it!

He passed me but i think thats because i knew how to turn the machine off!

Way back in the mists of time 1988 / 89  at the very start of the CITB plant operator training and certification scheme I was sent to Bircham Newton by Laings and sat and passed the week long instructors course.

It seemed to me at the time that this was a genuine attempt to improve plant safety and operator skills without as happens now, ordinary blokes having to fork out shed loads of their own money for the operator cards.

At TML I cant remember how many operators I tested and issued CITB cards to - it was in the hundreds - and it didnt cost them or TML a penny.

Towards the end of the tunnel job CITB decided that I could no longer use my instructors card or certification status unless I worked for a CITB approved training company.

In my opinion once the instructors had to be working for a fee charging company the scheme lost its main obecjtives, to improve plant safety and operator skills, and just became a money making excersise.

From what I can see now what 20 years on - CSCS or whatever scheme are all  a total disaster and do absolutly nothing to improve plant safety.

Jeez how can someone who cant operate a 360 machine consider themeselves fit to test someone on a 360 machine.

It defies any sort of logic - or am I just turning into an old fart?

steam boss

There have always been horror stopries with regards to the NVQ system, but people do tend to concentrate on the bad news stories rather than the good news ones. As a Health and Safety advisor on a pretty big construction site in Soutgh Wales I have approx 200 plant ops traversing around the site on ADT's, 360 excavators, Drotts, Blades and (slightly unusualy these days) a scraper. All these plant ops have CPCS categores, about 40-50% of which are NVQ the others being grandfather rights holders.

We also have a local plant training company use our facilities to carry out CPCS training and NVQ assessments. We are a registered training centre for the duration of the job (should be Q3 2010).

I get to keep an eye on how the assessments are carried out and sit in on some of the training sessions. I can also ask the ops what they thought of the training.

To my mind the CPCS NVQ system works. Its not perfect, no system is but for the vast majority of cases its a good proven system. Theres always goign to be some cowboys out there carrying out assessments with no regard to the quality of delegates they churn out but its not all like that.

Back when I was on the tools NVQ's for plant ops were relatively new, I recieved an NVQ lvl 2 for tele handler (not including 360 tele) back in 2003 I think it was and back then I thought this was far better than merely attending a weeks course and rubber stamping the ticket. Back then it was training to fill in the gaps in my knowledge/ability followed by an NVQ assessment which included several assessor visits to the site to look at how I handled the plant. I was pleasantly suprised to see it included maintenance of the plant as well as operating it.

Just my two penneth worth but I am an advocate for the NVQ system.

Sustainer, spot on! We are going round and round with this CPCS scheme. They caused riots, shut companies down, use QAA's with absolute no plant experience [ours is a chef by the way] and now one of the largest MCG [Balfours] have said up yours and are going with National Plant. There is absolutly no support from them, they cannot get it right and now many current training providers have had enough and ceasing QAA to join with Lantra, EDL etc. Monitors are being told bend the rules in testing becuase its getting diar out there! I sit back and smile when the news comes in... The two training providers i contract to have just told QAA to go whistle as they get far more support from the likes of Lantra! Oh what goes around comes around!

In the past I have also worked with assessors who have very little “hands on experience” in my opinion they should not have been assessing some of the categories in which they had and probably still have approval for. At the time this was accepted by my Manager and seemed to be common practice across the industry.

i agree with your coments about caa i have had dealings with a certain qa who has a background in cooking and told me that the assessors who walk onto a site and can tell if the guy is an operator or not is a load of bull. well i must be full of bull because i can tell if somebody is good on the leavers.i have operated all my life between 10 to 15 items of plant i have been a citb instructor and assessor since 2001 i think i know what i am doing [maybee not]. i always wanted to be a good cook i can tell a good cook, how by tasting the food. its the same with the nvq process mr qa i watch i observe.[remember observation the best evidence] these guys are muppets we need qa,s that are ex plant boys. anybody for a madras.   

 There is two kinds of machine driver!

Them that can get in a machine and make it move!

And them that can get in a machine and bring it to life!

Our training schools should be focused on finding the latter from the former!

I disagree sup.

any old muppet can drive a machine, it takes skill to operate one.... but with time comes experience, if you do not teach the operatives how to use the machine and give them opportunity to rack up hours on it to gain experience you will never get replacement plant ops.

Plant ops are rarely born to the trade, it takes time and experience with the machine. this is where I believe the NVQ process works.

 But Angus,

Isn't that just what i said?

appart from the NVQ doesn't teach!

I can't speak for you but the NVQ contributed nothing to my experience although it did leave a nasty dent in my pocket for the privilage!

NVQ = demonstration of experience on that machine, this for me is at least one part of the competence chain (ability-aptitude-experience).

NVQ does not teach an op how to use plant but to be honest, neither does a week long course in a plant training center. I would love to see something akin to a plant op appretiship programme but I think thats just dreaming.

What would I prefer, an operative with an NVQ which demonstrates he has experience operating the plant or a card that says he has been trained operating the item of plant? for me its the NVQ.

My plant operating days are way behind me, all my plant tickets have lapsed and now I am the architypal poacher turned game keeper, I am a health and safety advisor on a construction site. I know what card I would prefer a plant op held...

granted there will always be dodgey NVQ assessors btut hen there are also dodgey plant op trainer who will rubber stamp any plant category you wish if you pay.

 So why would i give my 24 years of experience for free while the NVQ firms make millions out of it!

I don't want replacement operators undercutting me!

I want as few people as possible in my trade making me worth my weight in gold!

Where exactly is my incentive in this scheme?

apprentiship schemes have worked for pretty much every industry out there for time imemorial. I can still recall when foremen picked a rising star amongst his operatives and trained him up/gave him experience in his roll, did this put him out of work or undercut him? I think not.

We need to provide new plant ops with the experience and skills they need to keep this industry moving, if we fail to pass down the knowledge and experience we will be over run by imported skills. Thats incentive enough for me.

 Ok so if apprenticeships have worked for so many years why all of a sudden is a greedy bunch of B-stards charging us £375 a pop claiming we made a complete mess of it in the past?

but thats exactly my point!!! CPCS under Gamble took a Gamble and have now shot themselves in the foot? CPCS tests are being re-arranged due to costs, size of centre etc. Balfours have said enough and gone National plant route - thats a MCG company? Many small centres have gone out of business? Recession hit so ,any out of work and no procedure to help these guys? The entire changes made by CPCS, QAA whatever you call them has been a shambles... when we bounce back and hopefully quickly this countries plant operators are going to be in a mess? Already there is a backlog of cards under the new scheme that are being lost? This aught to go national to expose the total incompetnece of these assholes running this scheme!!!! As Sustainer put it- this Cartel is not doing this country any good [my words] Jeez even a 3rd world EU country has an easier system than ours!

 What eats me is i let my City n Guilds ticket lapse as i was told its no longer useable!

I had 12 catergories!

Now work is tight i find myself in a position that there is lots of jobs i am more than qualified to do but i cannot apply for them because i didn't pay the CPCS their blackmail money!

So now instead of working and paying tax i'm signing on and claiming dole!

reason why we now have CPCS is because so many trainers out there were making mickey mouse competency cards and the few companies with their own fleets of plant ops who were taught through that company via something akin to an apprentiship scheme were few and far between.

We as an industry did this to ourselves and have no one else to blame.

If I have to chose between some unknown brand of competency card and a CPCS card which, while not a perfect scheme at least I know where I stand with it, then I know which way I will go. And Im not alone! Here in south wales all the contractors who work on our site come along with their CPCS cards already, ive not had to turn away a plant op for no card for a long time now. The foreman still monitors the work carried out by new plant ops and we take a special interest in any op with more than 4 or 5 categories on their card but all in all its working for us.