Civil engineering contractors believe that growth years are now over, according to the first national poll since the EU referendum. According to the Civil Engineering Contractors Association’s (CECA) most recent quarterly workload trends survey, the sector’s boom period seems to be coming to an end as major projects stall. In the second quarter of this year, six out of 10 civil engineering subsectors reported a fall in workloads. Compared with a balance of over 20% reported in the first quarter, workloads increased for a net balance of just 2 percentage points; the lowest growth balance in three years. Alasdair Reisner, Chief Executive of CECA, said that these results are bad news for the UK economy and need to serve as a warning sign for policy makers. He said: “We know that infrastructure investment is a driver of economic growth. Given the recent disappointing economic forecasts following the Brexit vote, our figures show that the market is slowing just as the country needs it to speed up. “The new government can’t afford to sit on its hands. There are existing committed programmes of work where we need to see the delivery of schemes – now – if this situation is to be reversed.” Reisner also believes that unless the government is able to kick on and ensure more work for the construction industry, then a dramatic slowdown in growth is inevitable, which will spell trouble for the 200,000 workers in the sector, as well as bad news for the country on the whole. Earlier in the month, CECA said that new Prime Minister Theresa May must commit to infrastructure at the start of her tenure. Reisner commented: “The government must provide certainty on other elements of the country’s infrastructure investment pipeline. After three weeks of uncertainty, the new government must hit the ground running, and commit to a bold infrastructure agenda.”

Council leaders from the North West are backing the £1 billion campaign for rail improvements throughout North Wales and Cheshire. Manchester City Council leader, Sir Richard Leese and Liverpool Mayor, Joe Anderson are among the senior figures who have called for the Government to back the Growth Track 360 campaign. Also behind the campaign are Merseytravel chair Cllr, Liam Robinson and Manchester Science Partnerships chairman, Chris Oglesby. Growth Track 360 is led by political leaders, the public sector and a cross-border alliance of businesses and, if successful, the campaign would provide a welcome boost for Wirral, Cheshire and North Wales economies, as they would be connected to the planned HS2 line and provide better links to Greater Manchester and Liverpool. Over a 20 year period, the £1 billion investment would lead to more than 70,000 jobs being created in the North West region. Leese said that the campaign is crucial as connectivity is imperative to the region’s development and strength. He believes that by improving transport links between Greater Manchester, Cheshire and North Wales will provide a much needed boost to business in the region and support the aspirations of the Northern Powerhouse. Leese added: “Opening up communities, increasing networks, and delivering access to employment opportunities across the regions is key to strengthening our local economies and creating a more effective, connected and ultimately, powerful whole and I am fully behind this much-needed campaign.” The campaign is being driven by the North Wales and Mersey Dee Rail Task Force (NW&MD) and has so far secured the backing of the eight local authorities in the area: the North Wales Economic Ambition Board, the North Wales Business Council, the Cheshire and Warrington Local Enterprise Partnership, the West Cheshire & North Wales Chamber of Commerce, as well as the Mersey Dee Alliance. The campaign wants the line between North Wales and Crewe to be electrified, which would allow the region to be more easily linked to HS2.

North Sea oil platforms are facing the first big strike in decades, as hundreds of workers protest against the cost cutting measures that have been introduced in response to reduced oil prices. This week, employees of Wood Group (an oilfield services company, across eight platforms operated by Shell) have planned a 24 hour stoppage. The dispute is being viewed keenly as a test of whether companies will be able to force through further cuts in labour costs in the face of resistance from unions as part of the wider task of keeping oil and gas in the North Sea competitive. Since oil prices fell from more than $100 a barrel two years ago to a 12 year low of $28 in January this year, leaders of unions say that workers have already made significant sacrifices in this period. Since January, prices have rebounded back to about $47 a barrel, although this has not been sufficient to lift the darkness that surrounds the North Sea basins. John Boland, Regional Officer of Unite, which called the strike along with the RMT union, said: “Strike action by our members is not a decision they take lightly but they have been pushed to the limit.” Industry group Oil & Gas UK believed that by the end of 2016, the number of oil and gas jobs in the UK will fall by 8,000 from its 41,700 peak two years ago. Furthermore, when support jobs are included in this figure, it is expected to have fallen to 330,400 from 453,800, which is a loss of more than 120,000. The majority of losses have been suffered in the capital of the UK oil industry, Aberdeen, where the amount of people who claim unemployment benefit has more than doubled in the last two years. Meanwhile, figures also show that the average pay for an offshore worker has decreased to £62,000 from £80,000 in 2014.

Plumbers may be missing out on trade because of a poor online presence, according to UK digital marketing provider Yell. The company has found that a significant majority of plumbers (90%) have inconsistent or incorrect information online, including basic details such as correct email and phone number. Yell analysed the online presence of almost 5,000 plumbers in the UK throughout a number of sites including My Local Services UK, Facebook and Bing, and also asked customers throughout the country about their online expectations and habits. The findings revealed some basic and common errors in the approach of small businesses to reaching potential online customers, for example having different phone numbers listed on different sites. The feedback found that 89% of customers would try contacting a different firm if the details listed online for a particular company are not correct, which suggests that many small firms, including plumbers, are missing out on a considerable amount of potential custom. Some of the key findings from the investigation were that 54% of people rely on positive online reviews when deciding on a new local business or service, while just over half (51%) of customers said when they were looking for a new service, the most important source of information was a website. Marketing Director at Yell, Mark Clisby, said that if a company’s online information is incorrect, then it could be argued that this is worse than not being online at all. He added: “Not only is the company effectively invisible to customers, it can also seem careless or even untrustworthy. “This often happens because companies don’t always know all the listings sites where they appear, or when they move they forget to update their information. It’s easily done, but can be incredibly damaging for business.” Yell has launched Connect to support small businesses, which is a service that recognises the importance of connections and word of mouth referrals and recommendations.

  The committee highlighted failures in the design of household efficiency schemes and claimed that take-up of the Green Deal scheme was “woefully low” because it had not been adequately tested. The forecast was “excessively optimistic” and “gave a completely misleading picture of the scheme’s prospects to parliament and other stakeholders,” it said in a report. Th committee raised concerns about the £25 million of investment for the Green Deal finance company from taxpayers, as the Department for Energy and Climate Change (Decc) had “no formal role” in approving company expenditure. Decc spent a total of £240 million setting up and raising demand for loans under the Green Deal. Is also found that the government lacked information it needed to measure progress and the impact of fuel poverty for the Energy Company Obligation (Eco) scheme. The scheme ran alongside Green Deal and required energy companies to provide households with energy efficiency measures such as loft insulation. It has called on the government to ensure policy decisions are “thoroughly tested and based on accurate evidence”. The department must “be prepared to pull back on plans if it is clear they are unlikely to be successful and risk taxpayers’ money,” it said, adding that the Department “must not leave itself open to accusations of misleading parliament to achieve its own ends”. PAC chair Meg Hillier said: “The government rushed into the Green Deal without proper consideration of concerns about its weaknesses. This blinkered approach resulted in a truly dismal take-up for Green Deal loans and a cost to taxpayers of £17,000 for every loan arranged. Savings in CO2 were minimal.” The Green Deal and Eco schemes were implemented in 2013 to help improve household energy efficiency. The money available to Green Deal will not be renewed once it has run out, and the Eco scheme will enter a transitional year in 2017 before a new one is announced.

Ineos is aiming to accelerate its shale gas development in the UK by lodging up to 30 planning applications to drill test wells over the course of the next six months. The $50 billion petrochemicals firm is controlled by British billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, and one of its directors, Tom Crotty, said that the company has plans to begin drilling in the north of England early in 2017, while gas extraction could start in 18 months through the controversial fracking process. The plan has been announced at a time when the group is ending a six year tax exile with the opening of a new London headquarters for its upstream oil and gas operations which are based primarily in the UK. Ratcliffe was the UK founder of the company, which he took to Switzerland in 2010 as it was struggling to pay its taxes following the global financial crisis, while he has now also returned to live in the UK. Ineos’ primary concern now is to continue its free trade with the EU, in particular with Norway, where the firm has a significant petrochemical business, which Ratcliffe says “is a model that works for us.” The company has been built up over more than a decade through a number of acquisitions and last year moved into gas production after its $750 million acquisition of 12 North Sea fields from Russian oligarch Mikhail Fridman. The group also owns the Grangemouth refinery in Scotland and has ambitions of becoming a major producer of oil and gas, in particular shale gas. Over the last year, Ineos has backed a very public campaign to persuade the Scottish government to remove its moratorium on fracking. However, the campaign was unsuccessful and has resulted in the group bidding for licenses in England and now has rights covering 1m acres, primarily in North Yorkshire, the North Midlands and the Cheshire basin.

In an attempt to boost their business and tap into a new market, Calor is urging rural installers to become qualified LPG tumble dryer installers. Research has recently shown that LPG tumble dryers cost about 25% less to run that standard electric dryers, which makes them a suitable appliance for the two million homes in the UK that are off the main gas grid. In its recommendation of switching from solid fuel, oil and electricity to LPG home heating, Calor says that installers would benefit from the extra work along with this conversion, such as fitting a new LPG tumble dryer and boiler, along with other LPG appliances such as cookers and fires. The laundry is dried by the LPG tumble driers using the gas to hear the air inside the dryers and although they still use a small amount of electricity to power the control panel and turn the drum, this is still less than 10% of the full amount of electricity used by a standard electric dryer. Along with being cheaper to run in the long term, LPG models are also more energy efficient with Calor’s LPG dryers having an ‘A’ energy rating, whereas most common electric dryers have a ‘C’ energy rating. This means that they are more efficient than electric dryers by around 40%. Calor Appliance Manager, Teresa Wafer, commented: “Installers should arm themselves with these statistics about the cost and energy saving benefits of LPG tumble dryers, and inform their off-grid customers about these benefits in order to gain new LPG installation work.” Furthermore, Calor says that gas tumble dryers also help to reduce the static build up in fabrics, which can damage clothes, while the reverse tumble action reduction means that items are less likely to become creased and tangled. Calor LPG dryers can either be fuelled by Calor gas from bottles or a larger storage tank.

British Telecom has been once again been prosecuted for dangerous and disruptive roadwork failings in London. This is the second occasion in three weeks that BT has faced action from Transport for London and the 41st time in total in the last six years. The latest prosecution against BT comes after the work carried out close to Victoria Station on Victoria Station on January 26, 2016. On July 6, the company pleaded guilty to four offences at Westminster Magistrates’ court, which were: failing to serve necessary statutory works notices following completion, failing to serve necessary statutory works notices before commencement, unsafe execution of works and conducting street works without a permit. For these offences, the telecommunications giant was hit with a £3,250 fine and ordered to pay court costs of £1,800. In passing the sentence, the judge explained that this is not a one off breach of regulations; rather the records show that the company has frequently been in breach of them despite TfL issuing a large number of fixed penalty notices. The judge went on to say: “I understand no injuries occurred on this occasion but clearly more needs to be done to avoid these embarrassing prosecutions.” In June, BT was issued with a £4,500 fine along with £3,916 in costs for the dangerous street works on Brixton Road and Clapham Road in South London earlier in the year. Chief Operating Officer for Surface Transport at TfL, Garrett Emmerson, said that their priority is to make sure that roadworks are carried out safely in such a busy city, which is why BT has been prosecuted for the second time in three weeks. He added: “BT is a repeat offender – having failed to manage roadworks properly on a number of occasions. We will always push for the strongest possible action in order to ensure London’s streets are safe and free from unnecessary congestion.”

The failing standard of drinking water in many UK homes is being caused by poor plumbing, according to the annual report from the Drinking Water Inspectorate for England and Wales (DWI). The study has shown that almost a third of water that has failed the quality tests has come as a result of below standard fittings and poor plumbing practices in private pipes and properties after it has been transferred from the public water mains. The DWI annual report revealed that odour, taste, nickel and lead are among the problems with the deteriorating quality of drinking water in UK homes, primarily caused by incorrect fittings and materials or a lack of protection from water ‘flowing back’ into the internal pipework from household appliances. Marcus Rink, DWI Chief Inspector, commented: “A skilled and competent plumber using approved materials provides confidence in water remaining wholesome right up to the tap.” The national register for plumbers, WaterSafe, has urged homeowners to only use approved plumbers to make sure that their supply of drinking water remains safe. Julie Spinks, WaterSafe Director, said that UK water supplies are among the best in the world and the group will aim to maintain those standards by making sure that drinking water in homes is of the same standard as when it leaves the water treatment works at the water companies. She added: “The use of a nationally registered plumber such as the WaterSafe scheme goes towards securing safe clean water for all, delivering the high quality of water we have come to expect.” Every year, water samples are taken from customers’ taps, water mains, pumping stations, water treatment works and reservoirs to test for a number of substances which are then measured against the standards outlined by the World Health Organisation. In England and Wales, the overall pass rate for drinking water was 99.96%.