NEWS RELEASE
From the office of the Green MEPs


18 March, 2004

'WOMEN BUILDERS NEEDED TO PLUG SKILLS CRISIS' - GREEN EURO-MP CALLS FOR EU CONSTRUCTION TRAINING STRATEGY

WOMEN need to enter the building trade in their thousands every year to solve a growing skills crisis in the UK's construction industry, London's Green Party MEP Jean Lambert told a conference to mark the publication of a new book entitled 'Women in Construction' today.

"The industry itself reckons 83,000 new employees will be needed annually until at least 2007 just for capacity to stand still," said Mrs Lambert.

"The reality is far more builders will be required, with very specialist skills, to meet the needs of the 'green' construction sector. New building regulations and awareness on energy efficiency, for example, mean we'll need a whole new generation of construction workers - with a 21st Century
skills portfolio.

"This won't happen by itself: the EU needs a strategy for training and employment in construction. We are told we are building a New Europe - I want women to be fully involved in both the physical and political dimensions."

Mrs Lambert's comments came at an ESRC-sponsored conference on women in construction held today at the University of Westminster to mark the publication of 'Women in Construction'.

Currently, women make up just 9 per cent of the building trade's workforce in the UK. As Mrs Lambert observes in her introduction to the book, a number of factors are responsible for the lack of female builders: attitudes in society at large, educational expectations, resistance in the trade itself and working practices on construction sites.


Ambitious targets for sustainable building to reduce our energy needs and combat climate change offer an enormous opportunity to transform the role of women in the building trade, the conference heard.

"Women could spearhead this change if we adopt a new philosophical approach to construction aimed at meeting two of the EU's major goals - sustainable development and gender equality," added Mrs Lambert.

Other speakers at the conference included Jill Wells of the International Labor Organisation in Geneva, Christine Wall of the University of Cambridge, Linda Clark, Elisabeth Michielsens and Barbara Susman of the University of Westminster and US electrician and author or 'We'll call you
if we need you' Susan Eisenberg.

ENDS

For more information please contact Ben Duncan on 020 7407 6280, 07973 823358 or at press@greenmeps.org.uk