Government

Construction bodies have slammed Nigel Farage for “laughable” claims about migration and the sector. Industry leaders dismissed Farage’s claim that the construction sector does not need any workers from abroad and the “myth” that builders are “unskilled”. They described remarks by the Reform UK leader as “incorrect”, arguing that he…

Plans for the next five-year period of road investment have been delayed due to the general election, Construction News can reveal. A draft of the third road investment strategy (RIS3), outlining which road schemes the government will fund between 2025-2030, was due to be published in late May. However, in…

Major contractors including Balfour Beatty and Morgan Sindall are demanding a new financing model from the next government to drive private investment in infrastructure. The contractors, also joined by the likes of Mace, Costain and Laing O’Rourke, warned that the next government can only meet its national targets around net…

The next government should fund building-safety remediation works, abolish retentions and ban late-paying firms from winning public sector jobs, according to the National Federation of Builders (NFB). In its Supporting Construction to Power Growth manifesto, released yesterday (30 May), the industry body also urges a smarter approach to retrofitting plus…

Oxfordshire County Council has had to spend more than £13m on fixing defects in buildings once worked on by Carillion. The council found problems with dozens of schools that required remediation in the years following the company’s collapse, the BBC reported yesterday. Carillion was the UK’s second-biggest contractor by turnover…

The Conservative Party’s election pledge to provide 100,000 new apprenticeships by 2029 has received a cold response. A leading construction academic dismissed the £885m plan as “nonsense”, while a senior executive at one contractor described it as “simply smoke and mirrors”. If it wins the 4 July general election, the…

Multinational manufacturer ArcelorMittal has warned a “catastrophic” planning decision will cut the UK’s access to concrete rebar steel by nearly a third. Chatham Docks in Kent, which is the firm’s only site producing the product, is set to close after Medway Council approved a project to develop a mixed-use scheme…

A decision on whether to move forward with the Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) road scheme has been pushed back until after the general election. The planning decision is now scheduled for 4 October “to allow appropriate time” for a new transport secretary to consider the plan post-election, said Mark Harper,…

MPs have called for a radical rethink of how facilities to tackle the risk of highly infectious diseases are delivered, after the cost of new labs soared by more than 500 per cent in under a decade. In a report released on Monday (27 May), parliament’s Public Accounts Committee says…

A leading construction body has urged the next government to provide financial incentives to encourage companies to invest in modern methods of construction. The Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) made its views known in its manifesto for the forthcoming general election. Major contractors have already called for a clear focus…