Funding announced to train 45,000 in housebuilding trades

Over 45,000 new homebuilding workers will be trained by 2019 to help tackle the nation’s housing shortage through a £2.7 million initiative announced by the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) and Home Builders Federation (HBF).

The first of its kind, the Home Building Skills Partnership – working with research on their needs from some 40 UK home builders – will bring together firms of all sizes to ensure that the industry has the skills it needs to build more homes. This will include initiatives to promote collaboration on skills across the supply chain, so that the industry can better plan for its future needs.

The partnership will support over 3,500 construction businesses and, by 2019, train 45,000 new entrants and 1,000 experienced workers with the new homebuilding training qualifications.

The housebuilding industry has delivered unprecedented increases in house building over the past two years. The latest figures show that 181,000 new homes were provided last year – up 25% year on year – with the largest companies increasing their output by 50% since their troughs.

With the industry looking to meet Government ambitions to increase output still further, whilst maintaining high levels of build quality and customer service, it is imperative industry capacity is increased.

This new partnership will use industry insight to understand skills needs and develop new training and qualifications ideally suited to the modern homebuilding sector. It will create long-term skills solutions to meet the government’s target of one million new homes by 2020.

It will be overseen by a Board that will be chaired by Redrow CEO John Tutte and include a range of senior industry representatives and CITB.

Initiatives throughout the four year Home Building Skills Partnership programme will include:

1. Research led by HBF and employers, to get a better understanding of the barriers faced by the home building sector.
2.  Design and delivery of a new Homebuilding Training and Developmental Needs Analysis tool. This will ensure the right training is delivered to ensure the sector’s skills needs are met, now and in the future.
3. Establishment of a framework that will set common standards for skills and training in the home building sector. This will deliver a more relevant and valued curriculum and ensuring the safety and satisfaction of homebuilders and their customers.