23 August 2011

Costain recently attended the National Skills Academy for Construction London 2012 Awards ceremony as part of its drive to be at the forefront of skills training in the UK construction industry.

The awards, which were held at the CITB-Construction Skills National Construction College’s Waltham Forest Training Centre, were attended by apprentices, managers and contractors from across the construction industry.

The awards celebrated the significant achievement of the National Skills Academy for Construction on the Olympic Projects led by the ODA Employment and Skills Managers.

As of May 2011, 848 NVQs have been achieved by subcontractors, 426 apprentices have had an opportunity to work on the Olympic Build programme, 66 graduates have been recruited and 797 leadership and management courses have been completed.

Costain’s Training and Talent Manager, Jeremy Galpin, attended in his capacity as Chairman of the National Skills Academy, representing construction industry employers, together with Loraine Martins, Head of Equality and Inclusion for the ODA, Jennette Arnold, Chair of the Greater London Authority and Steve Geary, Skills Strategy Director, CITB Construction Skills.

Commenting on the awards, Jeremy said: “Over the past three years we’ve had some exceptional results across the UK. Collectively the current 37 national skills academy projects represent £10billion of investment and in total the National Skills Academy projects have delivered over 2,500 work experience placements and seen 2,100 people secure jobs. Likewise, we’ve had more than 1,400 apprentices and 200 graduates work and train on the projects and more than 2,000 people have completed NVQ’s. I would like to congratulate the London 2012 winners for their highly significant contribution to UK construction and for setting a benchmark for the level of skills and development outcomes that can be achieved on construction projects.”

Costain has three National Skills Academy projects at Lewisham, Brighton and Hove and most recently for the Cable Tunnels project for National Grid.

 

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