Labour’s economic ambitions are undermined by plans to increase employment red tape.

At Hudson, we welcome the government’s pledge to go further and faster on planning reform to boost economic growth.

In numerous speeches and briefings, ministers have told regulators to embrace a “pro-growth” mindset and have vowed to “clear out the regulatory weeds”.

To help increase mortgage availability, the Financial Conduct Authority is looking at ways to simplify lending rules introduced after the 2008 financial crisis.

The promise of planning reform with relaxed lending criteria makes us cautiously optimistic for the year ahead after a period of aggressive government legislation under the Conservatives that saw the end of the red diesel rebate, the VAT domestic reverse charge, a clampdown on IR35 and, of course, the end of easy access to European workers. 

Over-regulation of CSCS cards

However, Labour’s drive for deregulation stands in stark contrast to increasing workforce restrictions. The ending of grandfather rights for CSCS cards removed industry accreditation for some of the most highly skilled and experienced people in the sector. CSCS itself said more than 60,000 workers held these cards. A Hudson survey last summer found nearly half of card-carrying respondents would refuse to sit an NVQ to renew their accreditation.

Further changes to the CSCS scheme took effect at the start of February with the labourer card’s validity cut from five to two years.

This removal of experienced operatives’ grandfather rights is ironic, given the government’s big new initiative to roll out NHBC training hubs will see blue cards dished out to people who have never set foot on a building site after just five weeks of training.

The green card expiring after two years is yet another barrier, on top of the fact that CITB is charging £100 for an online course to get the card while sitting on a £100m surplus that it can’t even give away.

Workforce regulation changes ahead

Meanwhile, Labour’s Employment Rights Bill, introduced in October, continues its passage through parliament and has reached the report stage. To date, there has been little opposition to the part of the bill that gives unions greater powers to access the workforce and cause disruption in the workplace, which should be of concern to employers. 

The construction industry faces additional uncertainty from the next part of the government’s Plan to Make Work Pay – which proposes to consult on moving towards a single status of worker. This could significantly impact the construction industry, which depends on a pool of highly skilled, productive and flexible self-employed tradespeople. 

CITB review echoes past criticisms

Finally, the government has published the long-awaited review by industry consultant Mark Farmer in 2023 into the effectiveness of the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB). 

As expected, Farmer highlighted the same failures as previous reviews stretching back years, finding that the CITB is ineffective, overly bureaucratic and the schemes it chooses to fund are unjustifiable when comparing costs against results. 

Farmer concluded by saying the CITB should be given yet another chance to reform and, as always, some trade federations which take money from the CITB have wholeheartedly endorsed the outcome. 

The chief executive of the CITB, Tim Balcon, took the criticism on the chin and said his organisation needed to be “laser-focused on addressing industry needs”, echoing former chairman James Wates, who in 2016 said the CITB needed to be “laser-focused” following similar criticism and the same old skills crisis.

Time will tell if the laser is a bit more focused this time – it’s highly unlikely, but we can live in hope that one day levy payers will get value for money.