I have just been reading the Strategic Forum for Construction's consultation paper Accelerating change. This is Sir John Egan's follow-up to his 1998 Rethinking construction report, which set out drivers and priorities for change in the construction industry.
The new paper sets out three new drivers of change: client leadership; integrated teams; and the need to address "people" issues, especially health and safety. I was very interested in the section on "supporting culture change in people issues".

The document highlights that attracting good people to work in the construction industry – and retaining and training them – is the biggest challenge the industry faces, and that 370,000 new employees are needed over the next five years.

I don't know where the figure came from but certainly, wherever I work, from rural to urban areas, clients and colleagues are concerned about the declining and ageing pool of construction labour in their area.

Everyone seems to acknowledge that collectively, the industry is still failing to attract new people.

The paper asserts that there are too many initiatives to tackle the various strands associated with attracting new employees – health and safety, pay and conditions, recruitment, training and competence and image – and recommends that the emphasis should be on those that produce the greatest impact in the shortest time.

I don't know enough about the various initiatives to comment, but reading the paper makes it obvious that there are a plethora of organisations, not to mention working groups, engaged in furthering improvements, so it seems reasonable to expect a certain amount of confusion.

It would be useful to see a directory of the different organisations, with the areas they cover, to gain some sort of overview as to who does what.

The section on "people issues" makes recommendations for training and competence, qualifying the workforce and improving working conditions. However, the sections on pay and conditions, and recruitment – two fundamental areas – seem a bit thin to me.

Earning plenty of money and being their own boss would compare favourably with a job in an office or a factory

The recruitment section advocates encouraging more recent graduates to undertake ambassadorial work for the industry in schools to generate interest.

This seems a good idea, but there is no suggestion that it could be applied to craft trades too. I would have thought that skilled tradespeople could do a lot to sell the industry – particularly emphasising the increasing competition for their labour (job security) and new industry emphasis on improving pay and conditions (status and money).

The report identifies that the industry needs to offer attractive pay and conditions and highlights long hours and poor pensions as issues, but stops short of making recommendations.

I would have thought that one of the key barriers to attracting young people into the industry has to be the self-employment issue.

The vast majority of large and small contractors don't employ tradespeople direct. It is probably unlikely, and possibly unreasonable, to expect this to change very much.

If this is the case, I wonder what could be done to "sell" self-employment. Propound the tax-efficient benefits, mobility and therefore variety it offers? Provide construction industry support to help new recruits set up accounting systems? Launch industry occupational health and pension schemes? Give access to subsidised training and development? Promote the support and minimum standards that the management contractor has to provide?

Perhaps this is naïve, but I would have thought that if school leavers can see a bright future earning plenty of money in a job where they are their own boss, this would compare favourably against a job in an office or a factory?