Month in numbers

15

The number of months until the Inland Revenue introduces its new online version of the Construction Industry Scheme (CIS). Unfortunately, it takes 18 months to develop and test new software, according to experts, and the Revenue hasn’t sorted out specifications for the scheme yet. Expect chaos.

The industry’s joint tax committee has written to the government asking it to delay the scheme’s introduction. The scheme replaces registration cards (CIS4) and gross payment certificates (CIS5/CIS6) with a verification service. Workers will have to make a declaration of employment status.

The Revenue wrote to 13,000 contractors last summer, asking them to check that CIS4 workers were genuinely self employed. Laing O’Rourke has signed over 1,000 formerly self-employed workers onto the books and others look set to follow.

30

The number of years it will take the industry to become qualified if the rate of Construction Skills Certification Scheme (CSCS) card take-up continues, according to a report written by consultant Bob Bilborough for the CSCS board.

It has been a bad few months for the scheme. First there was confusion over its finances. The board said it had been shown figures saying it was £700,000 in surplus. But CITB, which runs the scheme, denied this and later it turned out the scheme was £5m in the red.

Then the unions revealed only 8.5% of workers in carpentry, plastering, bricklaying and painting held cards 10 years after the scheme’s launch. Weren’t they precisely the trades CSCS was aimed at?

In his report, Bilborough recommended the scheme should have an actual HQ, plus a part-time chairman and a revamp of its administration.

585

The number of members boasted by the Quality Mark scheme, which was to close down at the end of 2004. The government spent three-and-a-half years and £10m on it in an attempt to combat cowboy builders in the domestic market.

But fear not. There’s a new Quality Mark scheme on the horizon. It’s called – wait for it – Quality Scheme, and it’s the brainchild of former B&Q director Dan Bernard.

The idea is that Quality Scheme will become an umbrella mark for trade associations’ schemes for qualifying members. That way it can gather a decent amount of members – the unofficial goal is 25,000 – and the mark will become recognisable to the public. The trade associations were expected to reach a decision on whether to be involved by the end of last month. If they agree, the scheme could launch in March.

10m

The missing money that caused £125-million turnover firm Benson to go into receivership in December. According to Paul Sellars, who was brought in to review the business, the financial hole was not due mismanagement but rather work in progress not being converted into cash.

Morgan Sindall snapped up Bensons’s businesses in Reigate, Hatfield and Southampton for £3m. The 175 employees will now be part of Morgan Sindall’s Bluestone construction division. But the jobs of 80 people working for Benson’s Thames Valley branch and its City of London fit-out branch remain under threat.

Meanwhile, 800 Gleeson staff were still waiting to hear how they would be affected by a planned restructuring, which was triggered by a fall in operating profits from £4.6m to £1.5m to June 2004.

21.5bn

The amount in pounds claimed through property insurance in 2004, making it the most expensive year on record for property insurers, according to Swiss Re. In fact, 2004 eclipsed previous years and reinforces a trend toward higher losses.

It seems man’s battle to tame nature suffered a setback because some 95% of insurance claims were for natural catastrophes, with the rest attributed to man-made events such as the Madrid bombings. The largest claims came from the US, which was struck by four hurricanes, and Japan, which suffered the highest concentration of typhoons for decades plus a major earthquake.

21,000 people lost their lives in the catastrophes with a cost to the global economy of around $105bn (£54bn).