Two weeks ago, Bovis told workers on its Berners Street site to produce identification confirming National Insurance numbers. After the checks, Bovis ordered 18 workers, most of eastern European origin, off the site.
A spokesman for Bovis said: "We told Duffy Construction we were not happy with the command of the English language of the workers and were not satisfied with their National Insurance credentials." The move comes after a serious accident on a Bovis site in west London last month in which a Polish worker engaged by Duffy Construction was seriously injured after a cherry-picker reversed over him.
Site sources said the worker could not speak English and that he was not aware that the alarm on the vehicle signified that it was reversing.
A spokesman for Bovis confirmed that the worker did not speak English, but said he had undergone a site safety induction with the aid of translation by another Polish worker who spoke "quite good English".
The worker spent more than three weeks in hospital, but his whereabouts are now unknown. The Health and Safety Executive said it hoped to interview him.
Duffy Construction refused to comment, but a source on the Berners Street site claimed that none of the men ordered off site had NI numbers.
The source said: "None of the men kicked off the site had proper working papers, yet they said they were paying tax on their earnings, which were £3.20 an hour." A spokesperson for the Department of Education and Employment said eastern European workers would require a work permit, applied for by their employer, before starting work in the UK. She added: "The employer must prove that he cannot get somebody already resident in the UK to do the job it requires the foreign worker for."
