National Construction Week
The final item of business today is a members' business debate on motion S2M-1807, in the name of Marilyn Livingstone, on national construction week, 6 to 13 October 2004.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament supports National Construction Week from 6 to 13 October 2004 and recognises the many economic advantages for Scotland that an expanding construction industry will bring, notably in employment preservation and creation, training, skills and provision of the built environment; acknowledges the continuing work of the Cross Party Group on Construction which considers and debates all appropriate issues concerning the structure and operation of the construction industry in Scotland as they may affect all relevant stakeholders; supports the industry's schemes to register construction firms through the Construction Licensing Executive and workers through approved registration schemes, thereby protecting the public by eradicating rogue traders, enhancing the industry's image and improving the skills base and health and safety practices, and acknowledges that the Scottish Executive, local authorities and other government bodies can assist by supporting registration schemes by insisting that all public works contractors are committed to them, supporting the education and training infrastructure so that it meets Scotland's construction requirements, acting as an enlightened client by ensuring, where possible, that there are advance programmes of work on which the industry can plan its skills requirements and provide its workforce with security of employment and ensuring that public works contracts are fair, open, effective and straightforward to administer and deliver.
I am delighted to have the opportunity to debate a motion in my name on the construction industry. As convener of the cross-party group on construction, I wish to thank all those who have supported me in the group's work over the past year. Many of them are in the public gallery today, and I welcome them all to the Parliament. I particularly thank Alex Neil, vice-convener of the group, who stepped in when I was in hospital earlier this year, as well as Alan Watt and Sid Patten, who have offered us both tremendous support and encouragement.
The construction industry generates around £6.5 billion in Scotland in sales and turnover, and it employs around 120,000 people in 12,000 registered firms, according to figures from 2002. Increasingly, turnover is divided equally between new build and repair and maintenance. I do not need to convince anyone here, either in the chamber or in the gallery, of the significant impact that the construction industry exerts on the social and economic well-being of Scotland.
It was for that reason, and because the industry felt that it had suffered over many years from fragmented representation, that the cross-party group on construction was formed. Alex Neil and I have attempted to bridge that gap. The group is a forum in which we can contribute constructively to this significant, important agenda. The group includes representatives from the professions, contractors, subcontractors, trade unions, training bodies, educational establishments, statutory bodies and suppliers.
The group was formed on 8 October 2003, and we agreed to examine several areas. The first was the relationship between the Parliament and the construction industry. A considerable element of public spending, as the minister will acknowledge, goes on the construction industry. That influences key policy areas such as economic development, housing and urban regeneration. A robust relationship is an absolute necessity if we are to maximise opportunities in all those sectors—as well as in other sectors that I do not have time to mention.
We are also very concerned about the health and safety agenda. We hear far too often about the serious injuries, and indeed deaths, that occur in the construction industry. Furthermore, the Parliament needs to work with the industry to eradicate rogue traders. That is vital, as the issue comes up continually in the cross-party group's meetings.
It is also necessary to have a focused education and training policy to meet the industry's need for skills. We have all heard about the skills gaps that exist. We believe that attractive career prospects and long-term employment opportunities must be provided to meet the industry's needs and to attract minority groups into the industry. That is a challenge for us all.
That agenda is extensive and wide ranging. During its first year, the cross-party group has concentrated on two key areas—procurement and work load, and skills and training—with a view to identifying achievable outcomes that we can progress towards together. That work is not yet complete, but a report will be published later this year. On behalf of the group, I will take the opportunity to highlight its likely key recommendations.
The first is that the information that is required for pre-qualification and tendering should be rationalised and a database that both public sector clients and the construction industry can use identified. Constructionline is an example of such a resource.
Secondly, we will probably ask the Executive to produce a comprehensive public sector construction programme for Scotland, which would allow a meaningful matching of demand with industry capacity. I have already discussed that with the minister. In addition, all public sector clients should be able to use three-year budgets and to roll over overspend or underspend from one financial year to the next, thus avoiding annuality. We put on record our support for the work that the Executive has undertaken in that area, but we would like it to go a bit further.
We believe that the whole industry would benefit from the production of a single procurement best practice document and from the provision of training for public sector procurement officers. We also think that the strategic promotion of the industry in all primary and secondary schools is a key requirement for the future success and development of the industry.
Public sector contracts should specify employment practices to deal with issues such as the bogus self-employed and to support companies that recruit, train and develop their staff throughout their period of employment. It is critical that consideration be given to the registration of firms and employees. The establishment of a matrix of educational and development providers that takes into account geography and individuals' differing development routes and needs is also required.
Supporting the development of construction-related skills should be high on the agenda of the Executive and the Parliament. It is vital that college-funded courses, modern apprenticeships and skillseekers receive increased budgets if we are successfully to address the skills gap. We also want the industry's attractiveness as a good career provider to be emphasised more widely. I believe that a campaign to improve uptake in construction trades would help. It was publicised recently that only 1 per cent of employees in the construction industry are women. That is very worrying—the number of female employees is obviously not high enough. Drastic action and a co-ordinated approach are necessary to ensure that the industry is seen as a career option for women and for minority groups.
The cross-party group uses as its baseline the report "Achieving Construction Innovation and Excellence in Scotland", following the publication of which the Scottish construction forum was formed. We believe that it is now appropriate and, indeed, necessary for the forum to work more closely with the cross-party group. We have invited Graeme Millar, who is a member of the forum, to meet us and we would like to have the minister's support in progressing that agenda.
We will be forwarding our first full year's report to the minister later this year—perhaps by the end of November. I invite him to meet the cross-party group after that, to discuss the way forward.
I look forward to the rest of the debate and to hearing the minister's reply. In seven minutes, I have not been able to make all the points that I would have liked to make, but I hope that other members will take the opportunity to do so. I also extend an invitation to all members who are present to attend the meeting of our cross-party group in committee room 4, which follows the debate.
I congratulate Marilyn Livingstone on securing the debate. As we know, the construction industry forms a vital part of the Scottish economy and it is right that there is a cross-party group in the Parliament that works in partnership with all parts of the industry to promote the construction industry in Scotland.
In the four minutes that are available to me, I should like first to underline the diversity of the construction sector. In the gallery are representatives of painters and decorators, heating and ventilation contractors, brickies, joiners and many other sectors of the industry. The construction industry accounts for about 12 per cent of Scottish gross domestic product, and if we add in building materials and associated industries, we have a substantial chunk of the Scottish economy. Today's announcement on housing, and particularly the substantial increase in investment in social housing, emphasises some of the challenges that the industry will have to meet in the next few years if it is to provide the new houses, the new roads and all the other projects that are in the pipeline.
I will emphasise the three or four key challenges that face the industry, the Parliament and the Executive in trying to ensure that we have the capacity to realise our targets for housing, roads and the other projects. The first issue, which Marilyn Livingstone mentioned, is skills and the skills shortages in different parts of the construction industry. During the next few years, we will need to recruit some 27,000 people into the building industry in Scotland—half of that is due to natural wastage and the other half is due to the new investment that is coming on stream.
However, we are nowhere near meeting that target. Despite the great efforts of the Construction Industry Training Board, the 5,000 modern apprenticeships that relate to construction and the sector skills council for the construction industry, we still need to do more to ensure that people with the right skills come on board in the years ahead so that we meet our investment targets. I hope that the minister will examine skills in the construction sector in particular, because as the Deputy Minister for Enterprise and Lifelong Learning he is in a unique position to take action on that front.
The second issue is procurement. One of the major problems that the construction industry faces is that we have a bit of a bust-and-boom situation—perhaps less than in the past, because in recent years there has been more of a continuous boom. However, as Marilyn Livingstone mentioned, it is essential to have a predictable continuum of work for a period of years and not months if are to ensure that our indigenous construction industry can not only compete effectively here in Scotland but chase work elsewhere in the United Kingdom and in Europe.
My final point, in the last of my four minutes, is on the availability of land and the planning issues that need to be addressed. In relation to water alone, it is reckoned that some £500 million of development is being held up because of the problems in the water industry in Scotland. By concentrating on construction and related industries we have the opportunity to give a major boost to economic growth in Scotland; members in all parts of the chamber agree that economic growth is our number 1 target. The construction industry can not only contribute to economic growth but help further to reduce unemployment in Scotland.
I ask the minister to take on those issues on behalf of the industry—that will be of benefit not only to the Parliament and the construction industry but to the Scottish economy as a whole.
I, too, thank Marilyn Livingstone and congratulate her on obtaining the debate, which has been worth while. I agree with just about everything that she and Alex Neil had to say.
It is not always recognised that the construction industry is one of Scotland's largest industries, in terms of investment, employment, subcontracts to other suppliers and trades, diversity—as Alex Neil rightly said—and the sheer change in Scotland's environment that is brought about by the industry. I have different figures from Alex Neil's. I thought that the industry accounted for about 10 per cent of gross domestic product, but that depends on what is added into the figure. The industry is certainly big; it has a turnover of about £10 billion. It is not too much to say that the construction industry's health is essential to the Scottish economy's health. I might say slightly fatuously that the Parliament has through this building contributed significantly to the construction industry, but perhaps we will pass over that.
The industry faces several challenges. The first is the need for a steady flow of orders, which has been touched on. That is essential to any business but is vital in construction, which relies heavily on the public sector directly for orders or indirectly, as Alex Neil said, for an adequate planning system and the availability of water, sewerage and other infrastructure. The offshoots of that were brought home to me recently when I visited a company that operates in the railway industry and which cannot take on its usual number of modern apprentices, because of a temporary dip in the number of orders that are coming on stream, which results from the up and down way in which contracts appear. If business dips, staff and suppliers experience all sorts of effects such as that. One objective of Government policy must be to help to avoid such problems.
The second challenge is the growth of the black economy. That will always be a feature of the industry to an extent, but the answer to part of the problem is to have approved and recognised standard certification that the public know and trust. I very much welcome the work of the Construction Licensing Executive on that. For the customer, I am sure that there have traditionally been too many crests, emblems and certificates, most of which mean next to nothing to most people. The exception is registration with the Council for Registered Gas Installers, which is well recognised and about which the public know.
Public authorities that offer construction contracts should ensure that the companies that they deal with are suitably certificated. The support that is promised in the partnership agreement for owner-occupier associations should also provide a mechanism for supporting high standards in housing repair work.
The third challenge is skill shortages, which have been touched on. I hear different accounts from different people about the extent of such shortages. The work of the cross-party group on construction has recognised the need to change the image of construction among young people and to provide more work experience and more apprenticeship opportunities. However, not all young people with a possible interest are ready to commit themselves when they leave school. More must be done to allow older people to encounter fewer obstacles to entering the industry. Employers seem reluctant to take on such people, because they cost more, but that is a bottleneck that we could do without. Partnership between the industry and the Scottish Executive, and probably a different funding level, will be needed.
In any event, the prevalence of labour-only subcontractors is excessive, not only because such firms do not pay the construction industry training levy of 2.5 per cent of the wage bill, which should go towards industry training, but because of other, more general, reasons.
Public procurement is another challenge. Making that as straightforward as possible and devising mechanisms to enable smaller companies to operate on a level playing field are key issues.
I urge Parliament to remember the value and significance of the construction industry and to support it through a steady and planned flow of public sector contracts. That is not easy to achieve, but the benefits for skills training and planning, the ability to invest in improved standards and value for public money will be significant. What I say applies not least to labour-only subcontractors. A steadier flow of business to the industry, which we have not always had, could reduce that problem. I very much support the motion.
I commend Marilyn Livingstone for securing the debate on this important topic. I am starting to feel a bit concerned, because I have hardly disagreed with a word that anybody has said. As members will appreciate, that is an unusual position for me, but never mind.
Robert Brown said in passing that he would not say too much about this building, but it is appropriate that an early members' business debate here is on construction. In my experience, people in the construction industry love and loathe the building in equal measure. They love it because, whatever one thinks of its aesthetics, it is a remarkable building. The quality of some of the work that has been put into it is evident for all to see. However, some loathe the building because the cost overruns were not a good advertisement for cost controls in Scottish construction. I dare say that we will get over that in time and that this building will become a monument to what is good about Scottish construction, once the costs have been forgotten.
National construction week was about two weeks ago. It was one of the most successful yet, with more than 1,600 events taking place during the week throughout the UK. Thousands of young people had the opportunity to get involved and visit architectural practices and engineering consultancies as well as to try out traditional crafts such as painting and decorating, joinery, roofing, bricklaying and plastering. A number of events took place throughout Scotland, including some in my area. One such event took place in Rosyth on 11 October. It was an Army resettlement day, at which a presentation was given that outlined the career options in construction that were available to men and women who were leaving the armed forces. Given the current uncertainty over the future of the Scottish regiments, some might say that there is something to be read into that, but that is a matter for debate on another occasion.
Members have drawn attention to several key issues in the industry, and I would like to add a little to the points that have been made. First, there is the issue of the shortage of skills and labour. Sixty-nine per cent of existing vacancies are hard to fill, and there is no doubt that that causes difficulties for the industry. It is a particular problem for smaller businesses that employ 10 or fewer workers, which account for 96 per cent of the construction sector. There is a role for agencies to try to encourage more young people into construction. Some of us were present at a seminar that was given at lunch time by Careers Scotland, at which the question was raised of how we can encourage more young people into trades such as construction and engineering, as simply not enough people are going down that road at present. Agencies need to address that matter.
Secondly, there is the question of continuity of work, which both Robert Brown and Alex Neil raised. We have a major issue with development constraints. There are numerous communities throughout Scotland where building projects could and should take place, both in housebuilding and in commercial and economic development, but where they cannot take place because the water infrastructure is not there and Scottish Water is not making the necessary investment to allow construction to progress. That bottleneck could be dealt with if the political will existed. I urge the minister to take account of that when he responds to the debate.
I refer briefly to construction licensing. There is a problem with rogue traders and firms that do not account properly for value added tax, national insurance and other statutory requirements. There is also a problem with rogue traders that rip off elderly people who live by themselves. However, we must be careful. There is a case for attracting new entrants to the building industry, and we should not build the barriers so high that we deter people who are genuinely trying to enter the industry, set up new enterprises and drive things forward.
There are great opportunities for the Scottish construction industry. I hope that the minister is listening to the debate. With a few policy changes, the future will be even brighter.
I thank Marilyn Livingstone for bringing the debate to Parliament. The construction industry needs a boost. It is obviously essential to increase the number of affordable houses for rent and purchase. The minister stated this morning that his overall plan commits £1.2 billion towards that worthy cause. One of the major stumbling blocks to improving the quality and availability of Scotland's housing is the shocking lack of skilled artisans and tradesmen. Why not experiment in one of Scotland's 32 regions along the following lines and, if the scheme succeeds, expand it across the whole country?
Scotland has large numbers of retired tradesmen in disciplines such as plumbing, joinery, painting, bricklaying, electrical engineering, plastering and slating. Many of those retired tradesmen have a lifetime of acquired skills—and let us face it, people are generally living longer. A great many of those tradesmen would relish the opportunity once again to lift up the tools of their trade, possibly on a part-time basis. Many of them opted for early retirement and regret taking that step. Also, probably due to blatant ageism, 40 per cent of Scots between the ages of 60 and 65—many of whom are construction workers—are not in employment.
Why can we not be innovative? We could use a tiny proportion of the £1.2 billion that has been committed, initially on an experimental basis, to finance one local authority direct labour organisation to build 10 detached bungalows. The council could recruit, either on a part-time or a full-time basis, some of the master tradesmen who are currently languishing in retirement. In parallel with that, teenagers could be recruited as apprentices who would be trained in the most practical manner by building an initial batch of homes from the foundations up. The group of tradesmen and apprentices would be responsible for the on-going completion of the 10 homes. All the work would be carried out by the trainees under the quality guidance of senior citizen tradesmen who, in turn, would be guided by the managers in the works department.
We would have a win-win situation. First, we would finish up with 10 soundly built houses. Secondly, good-quality senior tradesmen would be given the opportunity to augment their pitiful pensions. Thirdly, the area would find that, in a few short years, it had an influx of highly skilled young tradesmen, who would provide a huge boost to the construction industry. Finally, the council would have 10 soundly built affordable quality homes. Of those, 50 per cent could be rented and the other 50 per cent could be sold to first-time buyers to finance the building of the next batch of 10 homes. That would provide an innovative approach to a vexed problem.
Should the pilot scheme prove a success, it could be extended to all 32 councils in Scotland. If each council were given a target of providing 100 homes in its area, that would result in 3,200 new-build affordable social houses being completed. The houses could be built to an acceptable, easily built architectural standard. Scotland's construction industry needs all the help that it can get. If the aforementioned scheme was adopted, it would provide a huge boost to the construction industry and it would help with the provision of much-needed social housing and of the skilled workers of the future.
I am grateful to Marilyn Livingstone for initiating tonight's debate on an important topic for Scotland's economy.
My constituency of Central Fife is perhaps a microcosm of the Scottish economy, given that it includes the high-tech industries of Glenrothes and the mining, engineering and shipbuilding industries of the coastal strip of Leven, Methil and Buckhaven. Just as the area has seen its fortunes rise and fall in line with the state of the Scottish economy, the fortunes of the construction industry in my constituency, like those of the industry elsewhere in Scotland, have risen and fallen.
Today, in Central Fife and in the rest of Scotland, we see encouraging signs in both the public sector and the private sector that things are looking up. The job losses in high-tech industries such as engineering and fabrication seem to have bottomed out and demand for construction is rising. To put it crudely, the continued existence of firms such as Donaldson Timber Engineering Ltd, which makes roof trusses, and Lomond Homes Ltd, which builds houses and industrial units, depends on that strength of demand and on a pool of qualified and trained labour coming through from which the firms can draw.
Many members will know of my long involvement in objective 3 European structural funding under the old European social fund. A major requirement for such funding was that projects should promote skills development and what was known in the jargon as mainstreaming the horizontal themes. That meant that equality and sustainability had to be built in as core themes in any ESF-funded project. I suggest that the construction industry is ideally placed to apply those themes both in its recruitment and training and in its delivery.
The industry could apply those themes in recruitment and training by promoting the development of skills, especially by increasing the number of women and minority ethnic workers in the industry. At the moment, those groups are under-represented, but their numbers are rising. I congratulate the training agencies and the industry on that, but more must be done.
On building practices, we need buildings that are green, environmentally friendly and energy efficient. There is a message there not only for the industry but for local authority planners and development control committees, those who design and let public-private partnership contracts, the construction companies, the college trainers, the architects and the engineers. The lesson is that, if we are to implement those horizontal themes—those major elements of European economic policy—to build social justice and an environmentally sustainable economy, the cheapest and most traditional approach is not always best. It is time to start looking at those elements that will last the pace and are environmentally sustainable. That will ensure that the buildings and the trades that have built them are there for generations to come.
I am pleased to have been able to speak in the debate. I thank Marilyn Livingstone, Alex Neil and those who have supported them for their work on the cross-party group. I hope that everyone in the chamber, including the minister, will be able to support the message in the motion.
I join others in congratulating Marilyn Livingstone on securing the debate. I know that she has worked hard on the matter over the past two or three years. Before I start, I apologise for the fact that I have to be at a meeting in Glasgow later and will have to get a taxi at 6 o'clock.
I echo everything that other members have said about the advantages to be gained from working in the construction industry. Much has been said about the benefits to Scotland's economy, which is absolutely correct, but it is important to remember the benefit that people get from the feeling that they have real and lasting employment. The skills and training that people in the sector receive have been overlooked for far too long by Government and education authorities, which appear to have thought of the sector as being beneath them. I am glad that the skills involved in the construction industry are being recognised. I pay tribute to Alex Neil, Marilyn Livingstone and everyone in the industry who has pushed hard not to glamorise the industry but to ensure that it is an industry that young people—and even old people, as John Swinburne suggested—might want to become involved in.
Marilyn Livingstone and Christine May have spoken about ethnic minorities and women. I agree that it is crucial that we encourage more ethnic minorities and women into the industry. There must be a better gender balance in the industry. It is true that more women have been entering the industry but not enough have done so. We should be trying to ensure that schools assist in that. I know that some schools have day-visit schemes, apprenticeship schemes and that type of thing. The fact that we do not have a gender balance in the construction industry causes me great concern.
Another area of concern that all the members who have spoken have raised are the rogue traders in the industry. I believe that, in 2002, the Construction Licensing Executive was created to restore confidence to the consumer and make regulation of the industry easier.
Another on-going area of concern relates to accidents at work. From speaking to Sid Patten—I am sorry to hear that he is ill—and others, I gather that health and safety measures are being examined in collaboration with Glasgow Caledonian University. Perhaps the minister could give us an update on that. The study is examining how factors such as climate, daylight hours and so on affect accidents in the industry.
The security industry as it relates to the construction industry is another area of concern. I have written to the Minister for Justice on many occasions to ask when we are going to regulate the security industry in Scotland. The answer that I have had back is basically that we will have to wait until the Queen's speech, which I think is on 3 November, to find out whether the matter will be covered in United Kingdom legislation on the security industry. I have written and have not found out whether the matter will be included in the Queen's speech. I ask the minister whether he can give us an update on that. If the matter will not be included in the Queen's speech, could we please have security industry legislation for Scotland? The problems in the security industry are bringing the construction industry into disrepute and bringing Scotland into disrepute. The firms are really fronts for drug runners and we need to examine the issue thoroughly. I ask Allan Wilson to take that point on board and perhaps pass it on to Cathy Jamieson if he cannot answer it.
The construction industry employs more than 132,000 people directly and is worth £10 billion in sales and turnover. That is positive and the industry is on the up. It is up to the Parliament to ensure that we join the construction industry and give it the positive legislation that it deserves to enable it to move forward. I thank Marilyn Livingstone for enabling me to speak in a debate on the subject.
I join other members in thanking Marilyn Livingstone and the cross-party group on construction, including its vice-convener, Alex Neil, for all the work that they have done and for giving us the opportunity to debate the construction industry in Scotland. As a former construction worker—I suspect that that is something that is not commonly known—who is now helping, I hope, to construct sound economic foundations upon which we can build a vibrant industry here in Scotland, I want to set out what the Executive is doing to help build the competitive industry that we all want. There has been a great deal of consensus in the chamber tonight.
We all agree that the construction industry plays a vital role in our economy, in our built heritage and in our environment. The industry accounts, according to the figures that I have, for around 5 to 6 per cent of our GDP—that is another figure to add to those that have been bandied about. In preparing for the debate, I checked the figures—as members would expect me to do—and I note that in the first quarter of 2004 the Scottish construction industry's GDP increased by 1.2 per cent on the fourth quarter of 2003 and output also increased by 8 per cent in a year-on-year comparison. By anybody's standards that is a substantial contribution. We can all agree on the figure that has been referred to, which is that the industry has a turnover of approximately £10 billion. That makes it one of the largest sectors in our economy. Whichever figure we use, Alex Neil's point is ultimately the correct one: the industry makes a major contribution to our economy more generally.
Consequently, we are supporting the industry in a number of ways. We want to work with it to address construction issues. We have established a Scottish construction forum, which comprises industry representatives—including construction unions—and the enterprise networks, to explore options for a construction innovation and excellence centre.
With regard to helping the industry, does the minister agree that the fact that the expense of tendering processes for major public-private partnership projects such as road works is a huge deterrent to medium-sized companies in quoting for such work? Is he prepared to examine the tendering process to see whether duplication of effort could be avoided, which in turn would allow more medium-sized companies to compete for such work?
I will come to procurement, which was raised by Murdo Fraser, Alex Neil and other members; it is obviously a critical consideration.
I hope to take all the points that members have raised in the debate to the forum, so that we can have a serious discussion. We will then come back to the cross-party group, as requested by Marilyn Livingstone, and continue that discussion. The ability of our small, indigenous companies to participate in the process and to get the maximum benefit from the vast sums of money—now public money in a large part—that are being expended on new construction projects, is an issue that I particularly want to take a personal interest in. I am happy to give John Scott that assurance.
The forum meets regularly throughout Scotland. It is now working to address five key themes. Those are: to raise consumer awareness and address client education; to counter the incidence of bogus self employment; to ensure that contracts require full health-and-safety-trained work forces; to encourage modern work-force-centred management styles in the industry; and, finally, to address work-force development. I look forward to discussing those matters with the forum.
In a way, our approach to work-force development embodies who I am and where I come from. We want to promote skills and training development and we are helping to raise standards in the construction industry. We are also investing in modern apprenticeships, increasing the vocational options in the school curriculum and investing record levels in the further education sector. I think that I have said in the chamber—not in this building but in the previous chamber—that my five brothers-in-law are all engineers who worked in the shipyards in Clydebank at various times and moved on from that basic skills training to develop careers throughout the world. Many of them—probably all of them—earn more than I do, because of the foundation of skills and learning that they gleaned all those years ago in the Clydebank shipyards. Like the members who have spoken in the debate, I want to promote more modern apprenticeships, particularly in engineering and the construction trades, because for people who acquire those basic skills, economic and employment opportunities surely follow, as night follows day. The benefits to individuals and the economy cannot be overstressed.
We have heard concerns about rogue traders in the industry. That issue needs to be tackled. The Executive supports the aims of the Construction Licensing Executive. The building trade associations are working with the Scottish Consumer Council and Citizens Advice Scotland to develop a self-regulation scheme that will combat rogue traders and improve consumer protection in the domestic market.
On 1 November we will launch the Scottish building standards agency. One of the ways in which the agency will modernise the building standards system will be by introducing approved certifiers of design and construction, which should improve compliance with building regulations and minimise delays in the issuing of warrants. Scottish Enterprise Glasgow, in partnership with the sector skills council, CITB-ConstructionSkills, is also playing a vital role in supporting more than 4,500 young people and adults to obtain the skills that the industry needs if it is to thrive. On roughly the first day of my new post, it was a personal pleasure for me to appoint a long-standing friend and colleague, Alan Ritchie, to the board. I know that he will make a valuable contribution to developing the skills agenda.
The Executive attaches great importance to its responsibilities as a procurer of services from the construction industry. Our procurement guidance for construction works—the client pack—is available on our website and is, I think, an exemplar of best practice. We also recognise the importance of acting as an enlightened client—Murdo Fraser referred to that—and we are acting to provide the industry with advance information on our plans for investment in infrastructure services.
Murdo Fraser will forgive me if I do not comment on water tonight. Time will not permit me to do so. However, the member must be aware of the ongoing consultation on quality and standards III, which is designed to consider development issues—"constraints" is not always the correct word.
I was going to refer to the issue that John Swinburne mentioned, but he is away. We are happy to take all the issues that have been raised to the Scottish construction forum for a round-table discussion. We will seek the advice of experts in the industry and thereafter meet members of the cross-party group on construction, including Marilyn Livingstone. I hope that all the issues can be discussed and addressed in the spirit of consensus that has been evident in the chamber during the debate.
Meeting closed at 17:54.