More Comment – Page 501
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CommentDon’t stop now
It is vital to maintain good working practices and industry capacity, so that when the recession ends Britain can meet the challenges of a new era
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Building buys a pint … for Mott MacDonald
Building’s meeting with Mott MacDonald’s transportation team has an inauspicious start – there’s a security alert on the Jubilee line. Out of breath, dishevelled and half an hour late, I arrive to find them settled in.
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CommentFisticuffs
Warning: this week’s diary contains graphic scenes of violence, as a Unite officer tests out his right jab, a Wembley grudge match reaches round two and Tim Byles submits to the school bullies
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CommentRumours of Dubai’s demise…
The UK and US press have been making themselves feel better by trashing Dubai
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Golden opportunities
I have lived and worked in the Middle East, especially in Saudi Arabia, over the past 25 years and never regretted a minute of it. Some of my friends have been there for more than 30 years.
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Rethinking Britain
Historically the construction industry has been used as either a brake or an accelerator for the UK economy – subject to the whims of the party in power
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Not-so-lucky dip
As a bricklayer with 24 years’ experience in the subcontracting game, it is with some relief that my son and I no longer subcontract
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CommentPayment times: 10 days seems a lifetime away
The government says its suppliers will be paid within 10 days, but it still has an awful lot of work to do to stamp out payment abuse in the public sector
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CommentThe reader: Tony's booklist
Here’s my personal selection of handy reference books to help you solve those legal conundrums that my columns don’t cover
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Do well at schools: How to win BSF work
If you want to come out at the top of the class in the competition for Building Schools for the Future work, now’s the time to pull your socks up
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CommentOne hell of a job
So are we all agreed, then? What the government needs is a construction industry that is able to turn public investment into buildings and jobs
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CommentWhat remains
The housebuilding industry that emerges from this recession will bear little resemblance to the one that grew out of the nineties slump
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Private housing starts dive well below levels in 1980s and 1990s recessions
Housing starts in England plunged in the final quarter of last year to levels not seen in modern times.At the depth of the last house building recession during the worst three month period at the end of 1992 private firms started 19,227 homes. In the final quarter of 2008 just ...
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War, Peace and Taylor Wimpey
“I am so fed up with this process.”This was the verdict of someone involved in the fraught and never-ending Taylor Wimpey debt talks this week.They were referring to the latest delay in signing off on a restructuring deal that has been more than six months in the making.Pen was expected ...
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Inflation, deflation, Japan and paradoxes
So consumer price inflation isn't falling as fast as many commentators had expected. Is that a surprise? Well not really.Ok there are lags in the systems. But with oil price falls, the cut in VAT and deep discounting the big plot twists pre-Christmas, it was hard to see where the ...
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More buyers sniffing around for bargain buys in the housing market, says RICS
More green shoots appear to be sprouting in the housing market with the surveyors' body RICS finding an increase in interest among potential homebuyers over the past three months.Sensibly RICS economists are not getting over excited by this, after all interest from buyers was at basement levels and was almost ...
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Could buying up unsold private stock be stifling social house construction?
Is it just me, or is there a link between the deals being struck through the Government's National Clearing House to take unsold private homes into the social sector and the recent collapse in new construction orders for social house building?I ask because I have been doing some analysis and ...
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CommentSurprise! : New information in adjudication
The box of matters for adjudication that arrives at your door may contain some nasty shocks – such as a cartload of new information. The question is, as ever, is this fair?