can anyone help me,i'm a plasterer returning to the uk after working abroud for many years,would like to know how i would go about finding some work on olmpic village

tell them your are from former soviet union m8 take you on straight away and you will work for minuim wage

not wrong there m8,since i've been back it's been rough,maybe it's time to put up the white flag and do what gordon brown and lab want and just disappear

   THE GREAT BRITISH BUILDER  (R.I.P)

Im not a racist and they are some good workers who do come over here but the probelm is they are happy to work for minium wage which effects everyone else what ive noticed up here in tyneside is the indians and pakistanis etc have the money now for the big jobs and what is happening is they are getting there own people to do the work and as there system is caste based the workers,work for nothing or next to,i may be wrong but i think in the next few years you will see more indians and pakistanis do jobs as chippies.brickies sparkies even plant operators?

iv'e worked with some good and bad English and eastern european plasterers,ive work abroud for many years,but never put anyone out of work taking a pay cut,i couldn't afford to,the problem is the english builder will take on anyone,east european and aisan builders look after their own first,,

I'm an Architect and trained for 9 years also not so great. I had to really rack my brains to find an opportunity. I always prefer an English plasterer because they take more care but hey this is the EU market we somehow signed up to. The only thing we can do is exploit the cheap labour and get developing !

Sorry but you are all on the wrong tack here.

If main contractors are paying the likes of Hays £7.50 per hour for a labourer, knowing that a suppler couldn't possibly pay minimum wage plus employer's NI and holiday pay out of that.. who's at fault...not the worker who accepts the job that's for sure!

your right,and a trade for most lads from the uk was a way to earn a good livining,if you did'nt do uni and get a degree.,so you could still afford a home,wife kids,but now,having served your time wont mean diddley,and with the attitude of most they dont bother,sad as it is 1 in 5 is livining in poverty in the uk,now getting a trade might just get your head above water.  seems the gap between the havs and hav nots is getting wider

 

Your quite right Paddyman but, worse it's going to get.

I spent seven years learning my trade and when I look at the excuse for Carpentry being demonstrated in some places nowadays I'm left wondering. It's not the fault of the individual but is the fault of our training systems or lack of skilled teachers.

A natural way forward for any young lad in my days (back in 1965) was to leave school at fifteen, find an apprenticeship scheme, go to college and get your trade qualifications. I did City and Guilds Craft and Advanced Craft in Carpentry and Joinery and went on to get the Full Technical certificate (HND in new money). We didn't stop learning, going to CITB at Bircham Newton on many residential courses, the Concrete and Cement Association at Fulmer Grange (C&CA) to study concrete technology and Formwork / reinforcement design along with numerous other openings that were available to us.

I'm proud to call myself a Carpenter (My tools are still in fine shape) I'm proud to have been called a Senior Site Manager and then a Contracts Manager and now, a Clerk of Works because along the long road that I have travelled, I have gained experience and I am able to, and can do, most of what I supervise myself, and no one can take that away from me.

Ok it's tight out there at the moment but, even in this current mess, things will improve however, construction, as I knew it, will never be the same again. It's all about money today, I took home one pound nineteen shillings and sixpence for my first week at work, gave Mrs Angry (My Mum) ten bob and I lived on the rest.

One thing I do know, we need to instil pride in the job again and we do need to avoid those, outside construction, peddling there worthless wears under the guise of Health and safety. "Working Rule Agreement - SMM7 - Clerk of Works" <sigh> those were definitely the days!

Need to go lie down for a while or...maybe to the pub if I can find a shilling or two?

Regards

MVM   

fair play to you sir,a man who knows what he is talking about,and not some white collor ive got a degree, so i know what i'm talking about but no pratical,idiot,oh i can't wait,come the revilution brother,

65% of training in construction trades has been provided by companies employing 10 people or less. In the main they are traders who have been sourced by training companies and are simply customers who just enable those training companies to draw down funds from local and national government.

There really isn't the commitment to training in this industry other than a few isolated pockets here and there. In my area (Thurrock,Basildon,Southend) not one student who took a construction trade NVQ last year got a job when they finished college. It was well before the crash so that wasn't the reason.

And the relevant County and District Councils, even though supposedly committed to the new apprenticeship scheme are not funding construction. I have been told to my face that construction is not a high priority. (Engineering and Retail are the buzz industries for the public sector - one to bring big business into the local area to ease local unemployment.)

 I'm not usually defeatist but skills training in this industry is a dead duck as far as I can see.

 

oh dear,as i've said befor i'm a 42yr old plasterer trying to compeat with big gangs of east europeans,if i dont retrain for somthing else i'l lose my home,i feel let down.

 Paddyman, you should be OK, but in 23 years time, or possibly 28 if we all have to work till we're 70, who'll take your place, not a UK youngster true, but that's not the East Europeans fault, it's the Government's fault for not closing the borders soon enough. (It has been closed (since Feb I think) for semi-skilled and un-skilled workers in construction)

P.S. Is Barking any good for you, it's only 20 minutes from Stratford by train?

i'm an east london lad,lived in forest gate for many years, between trips to ireland,is there anything on in barking???

Me too, born at Forest Gate hospital actually. There's a major project in Barking and I know someone who knows one of the contractors. I'll check it out and get back to you.

cheers carolyn,i would really appreciate that,,

That's what it's all about - good stuff!

Hi Paddyman, I hope you manage to get this contract in Barking , but what after that surely this will be a continual struggle to find work but maybe you are used to it and its normal for the self employed. I swap jobs every 18 months or so but still find it unnerving perhaps because unwittingly I make an 'emotional' investment in the building I am designing at that given space in time and not seeing them built but moving on I feel cheated a bit like some kind of surrogate mother. I'd say the british tradesman already highly skilled should tackle the more difficult jobs where real skill is required. if you send me an email I'll put you in touch with some specialists I am aware of lee.davidson@atkinglobal.com Carolyn, one for you, how could I learn about Concrete Formwork I am free the whole of December, let me know.

Hi Paddyman - the Barking job has gone quiet for the moment, but I have a couple of other contacts so I'll send a few emails today.

Lee, I'll email you and ask for more info.

 

hi corolyn,thanks for trying for me i appreciate all your doing,and any lead you can give me,,begining to regret staying out of the uk for so long,

 

I will be one person who stands up on here and says this Government has ruined the building industry. The open door policy to foreign workers has finished us all. I would not employ foreigners if I was the boss again. They come in gangs of four or more and there is only one tradesman inthe gang. How can bosses not see this. I worked for a terrible Civil Engineering company from Scotland and they thought the sun shone out of a Polish gang of 12 "carpenters". I,m a time served carpenter and could see that 3 out of the gang had an idea. The rest would hide and come to work sozzled. Our bosses think I,ve got 12 men for the price of 5 British workers but the fools don,t see that they only get the production of three  from 12 men. I have worked as a CPCSCrane AP/Supervisor this year as I can not get back to Foreman/Carpenter/Joiner because of the foreigners. The sooner the far right get in and close our borders to foreign labour and do what that bafoon Gordon Brown said, "British jobs for British workers" the  better!

This Government, any government cannot possibly be expected to help save an industry that has willfully destroyed itself - through greed, complacency and inexcusable and completely irreparable ignorance, how could they possibly be expected to go about it?

From the outside looking in - and from (lets say) a completely independent point of view, this industry started to meltdown when Thatcher was shoved out of Downing Street and has and never will, recover due to monetary greed, academics being allowed to invade the artisan domain, taking it upon themselves to dictate "how one should knock that nail in" along with telling the nail-knocker-in how to dress up in order for him / her to do it "properly", what forms to fill in, what assessments to undertake, what method statement to write, sending him / her off to a portakabin stuck in some distant car park in order to tap a computer monitor in acknowledgement to some very obscure question about fire extinguisher colours but, not seeing one single question about knocking nails in?

What I am suggesting here is, do you go to the dentist to have a kitchen fitted, do you go to the chemist to buy 400metres of 100x 50 sawn and treated or, do you buy your concrete from the delicatessen?

Whilst a few of those academic ‘half-heads' out there would very possibly answer "Ah, so that's where I go" - the correct answer would be no.

The construction industry is on its knees because the so-called academics have dragged it there.

Kindly return the Building Industry to the builders and go and do something else.

tony mate every economy needs migrant workers,if there's a gap they fill it,we as construction workers have to learn to compete,i get the hump like most!.

but in the 80s we were in Germany,our brickies were doing the work for a lot less than jerry,

in the 90s i myself was in ireland with many other plasterers and got the "over here stealing our job"by the end of the irish boom,i probably was,,not my falt!

 we cant take a right wing view and god forbid they get any power most of us will be sent packing,,

 

I would agree with you Paddyman, particularly on the German issue.

I'm on me bike, out of the UK for a few weeks but will look in from time to time so..Play Nicely!

Cheers!

MVM 

You say every economy needs migrant workers, well I,m sorry but I will beg to differ. You mention Germany. Yes us Brits went out there and then the Poles under cut us and then the Roumanians under cut the Poles and the building industry in Germany went into melt down. Do you remember that one? The same has happened in Holland and we are in the middle of the same melt down. The menial jobs on site were always filled by the 16 year olds who left school. Now all those jobs go to foreigners who will work for buttons. Our young kids comming out of school end up on street corners or breaking the law. We need the far right to keep these corrupt politicians in the real world. The sooner the election the better.