New Towns should feature training – Hill

The government’s New Towns programme should include construction training centres so that a new workforce can help deliver these large communities, according to Andy Hill, founder and ceo of the Hill Group.

Speaking to Housebuilder, Hill, who welcomed the announcement trailed ahead of the Spring Statement of £600 million for construction training, said that training centres should feature within the infrastructure of the government’s New Towns, which are set to deliver 10,000 homes or more, amenities and green space.

Hill commented that the initiative needed “multi-tenures and multi-developers to create these training opportunities” which “should be shared around”.

The Hill Group, Hill said, had the potential to deliver large scale schemes – “maybe not New Towns, but we can build sustainable, high-quality developments that we can fund and put in the infrastructure for”.

Reflecting on the Spring Statement, delivered on March 26, Hill commented that the additional investment of £2 billion into social and affordable housing was “interesting” but registered providers (RPs) “seem to have run out of money”.

Shortly before the Spending Review, the government said the funding injection would act as a “bridge” between the current Affordable Homes programme and the next grant …