Regardless of how you voted in the Brexit referendum back in June 2016, I think we can all agree that – for the demolition and construction industry, at least – the outcome was a disaster. It was like we collectively pulled out a shotgun, aimed at our foot, and pulled the trigger.
In an instant, thousands of the migrant workers upon which the sector had previously relied upped sticks and returned home, leaving us with a new skills shortage on top of the one that we have failed to address for decades.
Now, having previously made those migrant workers feel about as welcome as a rattlesnake in a lucky dip, we are reaching out to them once again with offers of relaxed visa rules in the hope that they will return and bail out a construction industry that – once again – has insufficient workers.
Even taken in isolation, this single about-turn illustrates the lack of foresight in the UK’s corridors of power.
But that doesn’t even begin to cover the mixed messaging prevalent in and around the demolition and construction sector.
Young people – you know, the ones that we criticise as feckless one moment and then hail as the saviours of the sector the next – are being actively discouraged from pursuing careers in the construction sector. There are countless cases of young people telling their careers adviser of their desire to work in the industry, only to be greeted with suggestions that three years at university would be a better alternative. University. Studying to become a YouTuber or a Pronoun Professor whilst running up a huge amount of student debt – That’s how you put the nation back on its feet!
And then, of course, there is perhaps the greatest example of the nation’s lack of joined-up thinking.
At the same time we are attempting to lure workers back from Eastern Europe, most of whom will be unqualified under UK regulations and who will, therefore, be granted special dispensation to qualify for a relevant competence card, we are about to take away the competence cards of between 70,000 and 200,000 workers that are already here and that are already doing the job to the satisfaction of their employers.
Given that we live in the age of the professionally and perpetually offended, let me be clear. This is not in any way “anti-migrant”. In my experience, I have found migrant workers to be exceptionally hard-working and diligent. I think they would make a fine and welcome addition to the industry workforce.
But surely it is madness to be inviting migrant workers who might need to learn the language, gain the required training and obtain the requisite competence card, when we are about to remove Grandfather Rights from such a huge number of incumbent workers?
All of this begs the question. What do we do if some of those currently qualified under CSCS Grandfather Rights choose to quit and leave the industry? Do we change our thinking on education and vocational skills? Do we change our stance on training and competence cards? Or do we simply hope and pray that we can find enough migrant workers to hop across the Channel (the same Channel that is awash with tiny boats filled with migrants of the type we apparently DON’T want) and leap to the industry’s rescue?
