Ambitious construction targets under Labour could slip because there are NOT enough skilled workers, say industry chiefs

Labour's plan to build 1.5million homes in England in five years is at risk due to a shortage of skilled workers, industry chiefs have warned. 

Sir Keir Starmer hopes that easing planning restrictions and reintroducing compulsory housebuilding targets for councils will prompt a construction boom. 

Tim Balcon, chief executive of the Construction Industry Training Board, welcomed Labour's commitment to build more homes but said Britain would need more than 150,000 more workers. 

'It is essential that the new Growth and Skills Levy drive up construction apprenticeship numbers that have declined under the Apprenticeship Levy,' he said.

'We simply do not have enough workers in the construction industry right now – in 2023 there was a net loss of 10,000 construction workers.'

Steve Turner, Executive Director of the Homebuilders Federation, agreed that the supply of labour would need to be 'ramped up' to meet the extra demand, with overseas workers required at least in the 'short term'. 

He told MailOnline: 'Every 10,000 homes takes 30,000 people to build them, which is why it's so economically beneficial. So the industry is going to have to undertake recruitment and training.

'Already there's a percentage of people from abroad working in housebuilding in London especially. The ambition of course is to train our own homegrown workforce, but in the short term we'll probably need some skilled labour from abroad to supplement it.'

Mr Turner said there was a particular need for more bricklayers and groundworkers.

James Corrigan, managing director for infrastructure at Turner & Townsend UK, echoed these concerns. 

'Persistent skills shortages threaten to derail this ambitious programme if they are not tackled head on,' he said.

'The speech points to the reorganisation of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education, and the creation of a new Skills England body to assess national and local skills needs.

'The sooner the better, as overall capacity in construction and infrastructure must be built up quickly and planned strategically if the UK is to deliver at the scale and speed that the government would like without encountering bottlenecks and significant cost pressures.'

The Planning and Infrastructure Bill, one of 40 pieces of proposed legislation unveiled in the King's Speech yesterday, sets out reform to the planning system.

The King said in his speech: 'My ministers will get Britain building, including through planning reform, as they seek to accelerate the delivery of high-quality infrastructure and housing.'

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said: 'We will reform the planning rules to build the homes and infrastructure the country desperately needs.'

The Bill aims to speed up building projects by simplifying the consent process for major infrastructure schemes and modernising planning committees so they can process applications more quickly.

The legislation would also reform compulsory purchase compensation rules so that compensation paid to landowners is 'fair but not excessive' when it comes to building affordable housing or important social and physical infrastructure.

This is with the goal of unlocking more sites for development and improving land assembly - the process of uniting separately owned parcels of land such as neighbouring gardens - which the Government expects will make housebuilding faster and make housing more affordable.

The Government will seek to use development to fund nature recovery in cases where both are stalled. It will explore how to potentially do this over the summer.

The majority of the Bill is expected to extend and apply to England and Wales. Some measures may also extend and apply to Scotland.

Chancellor Rachel Reeves said Labour would reform the planning system to make it easier to build houses on less desirable parts of the green belt, which Sir Keir Starmer has dubbed the 'grey belt'.

Labour's Pat McFadden, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, was quizzed on his morning media round on Wednesday about how the Government would tackle nimbyism and whether individual MPs would block developments, as well as what kind of land new housing could be built on.

Mr McFadden told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'We were very clear during the election campaign that we would come out of this on the side of getting things built more quickly.

'That may be controversial in some places, I've no doubt that it will be.'

But the Labour MP for Wolverhampton South East added that doing nothing would mean aspirations of home ownership or even renting a home at a reasonable price would continue to be unrealisable for a generation of young people.

He said he could not guarantee that MPs would not try to block developments in their local communities, telling Times Radio that they were entitled to their views.

'In the real world, there'll be some developments that some people don't like. That's always going to be the case,' he said.

Chris Philp, the Conservative shadow House of Commons leader, told LBC on Wednesday he was concerned that Labour's plans would see green belt protections 'ripped up' and that local councils who are democratically elected would be 'steamrolled' and ignored by the central government.

The Tories built 2.5 million homes since 2010, Mr Philp said. He conceded that the figure was well below the target to build 300,000 homes a year.

He called the term grey belt 'a piece of nonsensical and shameless spin', in comments to Times Radio.

Mr McFadden, meanwhile, said Labour's policy was to build on 'brownfield first'.

He told Times Radio: 'But it's simply a myth to say that there are parts of what we call the green belt that haven't been built on in recent years. And it's been done in an uncontrolled way.

'And we don't want to sacrifice the beautiful parts of our countryside. But we do have to get things built in this country.'

The King's address - the first speech from the throne under a Labour government for 14 years - contained 40 pieces of legislation with an emphasis on improving transport, creating jobs and accelerating the building of houses and infrastructure as Labour seeks to escape Britain's recent cycle of low growth.