Cementation Skanska has secured the £93m job to create one of the largest current open-cut retaining boxes in Europe – equivalent in size to four football pitches.

HS2 approach route to Euston station

The huge piling job for HS2 consortium Skanska Costain Strabag will involve installing 2,000 piles along the near 1km long site that will house rail lines coming into Euston station for the new HS2 railway.

More than 800 piles will be installed in creating the new Euston scissor box that will carry the new running lines.

Works will also be carried out to construct some 700 piles for two new bridge structures – Hampstead Road Bridge and Granby Terrace Bridge – that will take traffic over the new lines.

This is in addition to 418 piles for the Euston Throat Retained Cut, an extension to the scissor box, and 106 piles for the new Euston Cavern shaft.

As part of the project, the team will be developing new techniques to reduce carbon, including through the use of low carbon concrete.

“We are delighted to be working on this iconic project,” said Operations Director Paul Wiltcher.

“The project provides work for around 100 of our piling and ground engineering team who will be carrying out the works through to 2024. ”

It is the third major piling job to be awarded on the project as work steps up a gear for phase one.

A joint venture between Bauer and Keller has been awarded a contract to deliver geotechnical work along a 80km stretch of HS2 between the Chilterns and Warwickshire.

The joint venture announced it had formally signed off the £95m deal today with C2 and C3 section main works consortium Eiffage, Kier, Ferrovial Construction and BAM Nuttall.

At peak production, the works will require over 200 highly skilled experts in ground engineering and foundations, working in a number of varied site locations.

The largest deal so far has been nabbed by Keller and VSL International joint venture.

This secured a £167m contract to deliver geotechnical work for C1 section main contractor Align.

KVJV’s scope of work is to construct the piled foundations for the viaducts, grouting works, retaining structures for four ventilation shafts, and ground improvement works for the execution of the tunnel cross passages.

At peak of the production it will require 270 highly skilled people working on site.

Construction activity is set for double-digit growth this year as the industry continues its strong rebound from the impact of Covid.

But crystal ball gazers at the Construction Product Association have downgraded growth forecasts slightly fearing impacts from supply constraints for key imported construction products and uncertainty around demand for housing new builds, and commercial space.

Construction activity accelerated in the first quarter of the year, although the story varies from sector to sector.

Infrastructure was least affected by the initial lockdown, and is set to motor ahead 29%, reaching its highest level on record.

This will be driven by activity on major projects such as HS2, as well as activity on long-term frameworks in water, roads, electricity and broadband sectors.

Key points

• Infrastructure output to rise 29% in 2021 and 6% in 2022
• Private housing output rises 14% in 2021
• Commercial output at the end of 2023 to be 10.5% lower than in 2019
• Private housing RM&I to grow by 12% in 2021
• Public housing repair, maintenance and improvement to rise by 15% in 2021

Extensions to the stamp duty holiday, Help to Buy and job support schemes are expected to help sustain demand in private housing and private housing rm&i in 2021.

Private housing is expected to continue its strong recovery with the Chancellor’s mortgage guarantee scheme likely to enable demand in the general housing market.

Coupled with expectations of rising house prices during the year, starts activity is forecast to gather pace in 2022.

CPA economics director Noble Francis, said: “While outlook is largely positive, the recovery in commercial – the third-largest construction sector – is expected to be muted given a lack of major investment in new projects, particularly in Central London.

“Questions remain over future demand of commercial space, particularly in offices and retail, which may be converted into residential or warehousing and logistics, if homeworking and online spending persists in the long-term.

“This may hinder the ability of construction activity to increase in line with our forecast.

“Furthermore, concerns remain whether the high levels of demand for housing new build and rm&i can be maintained after the government stimulus and policy measures end on 30 September, particularly the furloughing and self-employment income schemes and stamp duty holiday.”

Now the UK’s lockdown exit plans have been set out and as the economy gradually starts to open again, many businesses will see this as a return towards normality. But in many ways, the world of work will look very different post-Covid. Alongside the changes the pandemic has forced on us, we now have a chance to create a better labour market – and one important way we can do this is by making it more inclusive and making sure companies provide opportunities for a more diverse range of people.

There has been a great deal of progress on diversity and inclusion in recent years. In the REC’s new Recruitment and recovery study, we found that almost two thirds (64%) of businesses believed they were doing well at reducing unconscious bias. But we all know that there is much more still to do. We’ve all seen the gender pay gap statistics and the studies showing how CVs with a white-sounding name are far more likely to get a response than those with a name from an ethnic minority – even when the content is identical.

Our Recruitment and recovery report also found some worrying signs of a lack of focus from employers. Just three in ten companies said that they were focusing more on increasing the diversity of their workforce, and 45% of SMEs admitted that increasing the diversity of their staff was not a priority. No wonder less than half (44%) of the British public thought that the process of recruitment was inclusive to people like them.

The recruitment process can be an incredibly important tool in improving inclusion in a business. Anonymising CVs, using diverse interview panels, offering flexible working options from the outset – all of these can be valuable steps to increasing the range of candidates who will apply for a role or improving the selection process. But while both businesses and the public say that these are important in principle, in practice they are rare.

This is where professional recruitment businesses can prove their worth. Many businesses have taken their eye off the ball on inclusion – understandably due to the pandemic – but it is up to their recruitment partners to remind them how important this issue is and the many ways that it can benefit both their bottom line and the people working for them. And we know this can work – two in three (63%) companies said that working with a recruitment agency had helped them increase the diversity of new hires.

For recruiters, this means helping clients to audit and evaluate their selection and hiring processes regularly, specifically with diversity and inclusion in mind, as well as advising them on whether they might need to bring in tools like unconscious bias training for hiring managers, anonymising CVs, and standardised selection criteria that can help judge which candidate is right for a role, no matter their background.

With so much change already having happened in the labour market and more on the horizon, now is the perfect time to change things for the better, and make the future of work a more inclusive one.

Numbers of self-employed workers are slowly returning to the pre-Christmas level despite worries that many eastern Europeans would not return after the break.

According to the construction industry’s biggest payer of subcontractors Hudson Contract, the number of tradespeople on its books stood at 87% of pre-pandemic levels in January.

The figure was 90% before the festive break when most construction sites shut for a fortnight.

Ian Anfield, managing director, said: “We were concerned that Covid would prevent eastern Europeans getting back to Britain after Christmas.

“We also heard reports from some clients that some tradespeople were using the self-employment support scheme to take extra paid holiday at the Chancellor’s expense.

“While this is most certainly happening in some cases, on the whole the return to work has been at the same level as in previous years.”

But latest pay trends show earnings are running on average 13% down on January 2020 at an all-trade average of £838.

Freelance bricklayer, steel erectors and surfacing subbies have seen the highest year-on-year falls.

Construction Leadership Council makes last minute plea to Rishi Sunak

The Construction Leadership Council is hoping for a last-minute reprieve ahead of the Spring Budget, warning it could snuff out the construction-led recovery.

More than 150,000 construction companies are facing a 20% drop in cash flow when planned VAT changes come into force at the start of March.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer will deliver his Budget statement in the House of Commons on 3 March.

The “domestic reverse charge” change means companies in the construction supply chain will no longer receive their 20% VAT payment when they submit bills.

The VAT cash will instead be paid direct to HMRC by the customer receiving the service who will reclaim it in the normal way.

In a letter to the Chancellor, chairman of the CLC, Andy Mitchell writes: “Our industry remains in extremely challenging times as we continue to adapt to ongoing Covid-19 rules, mitigate the impact of Brexit and prepare for the forthcoming implementation of rule changes on IR35 and the Construction Industry Scheme.

“It is also important to note that by continuing to operate the industry has suffered a serious financial impact as a result of project delays and costs incurred in adapting working practices.

“This has resulted in many contractual disputes which our monitoring suggests are currently growing and which will accelerate further still.

“We are currently quantifying the impact; however, it is reasonable to assume that without further financial support many companies will become insolvent.”

He adds: “The implementation of Reverse charge VAT in April will restrict cashflow in our industry, especially to the smallest firms, at an extremely critical financial period for many businesses.

“This policy risks reversing any recovery industry has made from Covid-19 and will limit the scope for protecting and creating jobs across the UK.”

HS2 is introducing the largest project-wide digital passport system for workers allowing it to keep tabs on skills and health and safety.

HS2 to implement UK’s first ever project-wide health and safety passport

It will be the first time in the UK that workforce data will be available to view across a major multi-site infrastructure project in one consolidated platform.

The new cloud-based central database will ensure only workers with the correct credentials and skills are permitted access to sites, as well as collect whole workforce data allowing HS2 to map competency and track health and safety assessments

Also where suppliers and operatives are working across multiple locations, the new system will be able to flag individual fatigue risks across the project.

HS2 chiefs hope the collection and synchronisation of data from local level to project-wide will help to ensure consistency of standards and performance.

The information collected can also be anonymised and provide a learning legacy for future major projects.

The workforce management software solution developed by Midlands-based Biosite will link biometric data directly to operative information and site access for real-time visibility and traceability.

Workers will be required to complete a central online pre-induction before undertaking a local site induction and provide biometric information to generate their global identification or digital ‘passport’.

The new digital health and safety passport system will be rolled out initially by all of HS2’s Main Works Civils Contractors to share vital health and safety information across contractors.

Emma Head, HS2’s Safety and Assurance Director said: “We aim to lead by innovation at HS2 and the new Health and Safety Passport System is a pioneering way for us to further our best practice approach to workforce health and safety management.

“We are pleased to be bringing workforce management for complex projects such as HS2 to the next level.”

The HS2 HSPS initiative is scheduled to go live in the spring.

Construction sites will continue to operate during the latest lockdown which will be in force until at least the middle of February.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson confirmed a third national lockdown on Monday night with people urged to work from home wherever possible.

But the government confirmed that “you can only leave home for work purposes where it is unreasonable for you to do your job from home, including but not limited to people who work within critical national infrastructure, construction or manufacturing that require in-person attendance.”

Guidance added that construction ” is essential to keeping the country operating.”

Tradespeople can also work in other people’s homes and builders merchants and building products suppliers will be able to keep stores open.

Former construction minister Nadhim Zahawi is now in charge of the vaccine rollout and has been set the target of vaccinating 13.9m people in the four highest risk groups by the middle of February.

A joint venture of Ferrovial and Laing O’Rourke has achieved the milestone of completing the longest single tunnel drive on the Thames Tideway project.

Tunnelling milestone as four-fifths of drive now complete

TBM Ursula’s breakthrough now means that more than 19km of the Super Sewer has been completed, with work on the remaining 5.5km section due to begin very soon with the launch of TBM Selina, which will create the final and easternmost section of the super sewer.

As part of its 7.6km journey from Battersea to Bermondsey,  Ursula excavated over a million tonnes of spoil, all of which was removed from site using barges on the Thames – preventing more than 250,000 HGV trips.

Tim Newman, Tideway’s Project Geologist, said: “Completing the longest single drive on the Tideway project is a wonderful milestone, and our teams have made great progress through a challenging year.

“TBM Ursula has tunnelled at incredible depths, encountering a real mix of geology – through clay, sand, gravel and chalk.

“The expertise required for such a task is immense and allowed us to quickly and safely adapt the tools on the cutterhead as needed.”

Viv Jones, Project Director for the central section, said: “Ferrovial and Laing O’Rourke, the contractors on the central section, have done a fantastic job, and I thank the teams involved for their efforts to clean up London’s iconic river.”