In the run-up to a general election politicians dress up in high vis and hard hats to make out they are in touch with the working man and woman. The fact that most construction workers don’t wear hard hats or high-vis jackets at work seems to have passed them by.
It is this patronising use of the construction industry that seems offensive – and the use of the industry as a tap to be turned on and off to suit government fiscal and economic policy.
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Yet again, when the industry is at maximum stress, we are told by the Labour Party it intends to double the house building programme. With builders already finding it difficult to recruit the staff they need, I wonder how it will be done. The traditional way is to import the labour, but this plays havoc with the immigration numbers.
“Anything that suggests the industry is indifferent to the way people are treated is a deterrent to recruitment. Any scenario that accepts working in construction as a place of last resort is selling us all short.”
Our own CIOB migration report shows just how important immigration is and always has been to delivering our construction needs. So, if migration is to be constrained, the only solution will be to get our own non-working people into construction. But using construction as a punishment for being unemployed never sits easy with me.
The other risk is that the boom will bring with it all the bad things booms have brought in the past, and at the top of the list is the exploitation of workers, especially vulnerable migrant workers.
We have made a fuss about the plight of migrant workers in Qatar working on projects, including some overseen by UK-based construction companies. In the UK, we are already seeing the growth of the labour-only barons because there is no one to do the job. “It’s a matter for the subcontractor” is not a good enough defence any more.
Maybe it is time to consider extending the role of the Gangmasters Licensing Authority to the construction industry before we get our own version of Middle East-type labour scandals. Too often we are guilty of closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Sooner or later the horse is going to bolt on this one. When this avoidable mess does happen, yet again the image of construction will take a hammering.
Anything that suggests the industry is indifferent to the way people are treated is a deterrent to recruitment. Any scenario that accepts working in construction as a place of last resort is selling us all short. The government’s Modern Slavery Act received Royal Assent before parliament was dissolved. It is a reminder that, while may be convenient to criticise what happens other places, those in glass houses should not throw stones.
