It will come as no surprise to anyone from the construction industry that margins are down across the board throughout the sector. Desperate to keep men and machines working, the construction sector has done what all market sectors do in a time of economic crisis: it has slashed its rates whilst attempting to offer its customers ever greater levels of added value in order to remain solvent.
Of course, such a reduction in price was predictable; and the fact that it may take many years to ramp prices back up to an acceptable level is equally evident.
But what few people seem to have recognised during our recessionary clamour for work is the stealthy encroachment of a “big brother” mentality that is being forced upon an industry punch-drunk from repeated economic blows to the head. And while low prices will slowly but surely give way to sensible profit margins in the months and years to come, our universal acceptance of these intrusive practices today sets a worrying precedent for our business tomorrow.
Take, for example, the dreaded pre-qualification questionnaire (PQQ). It has been around for years and gets ever more cumbersome and time-consuming by the day. An increasing number of main contractors are now insisting that you use their own unique PQQ in order to qualify for their tender list. This means more and more paperwork for everyone in the construction supply chain, often purely to satisfy an office administrator at Company A who likes to check your address first while his/her opposite number at Company B wants your insurance details front and centre. Desperate to make it onto both tender lists, subcontractors continue to fall over themselves to spend time filling in PQQ A in one way and then PQQ B in a slightly different way. And, let’s be honest, if a major contractor today insisted that you would only make it onto their preferred supplier list if you provided your company MD’s inside leg measurement, the vast majority in this industry would be reaching for the tape measure.
More intrusive yet is the growing use of Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) checks on construction personnel. Setting aside the fact that the rules governing the use of CRB checks specifically stipulates that they are appropriate only when workers might have “significant access to vulnerable persons”, these checks are increasingly becoming an accepted part of the construction procurement process. But on what basis? Under what criterion would a worker with a positive CRB check be refused access to a site? Where is this information stored and can it be used by an employer against an employee? And while CRB checks might be appropriate for individuals working for a prolonged period in, say, a school environment, what place do they have in the construction of a new housing development on a Greenfield site?
Unfortunately, having taken one hell of a beating in recent months, this industry currently has its guard down. And in our desperate need for work, and without a strong and vocal trade union to call these inquisitions in question and fight the industry’s corner, we are in serious danger of going like lambs to the slaughter down a one way road of administration and bureaucracy.
