Shepherd and Clugston ‘opens doors’ to major developments
IN a bid to inspire the next generation of Yorkshire construction professionals, Shepherd Group and Clugston are offering people an exclusive look behind the scenes at two of the region’s most exciting development sites next month.
Built environment specialist Shepherd, which is leading the project to deliver the landmark 6 Wellington Place commercial office development in Leeds city centre, is taking part in the Open Doors Weekend 2015 initiative.
The event has been organised to spark the imaginations of young people and raise awareness of construction career opportunities available.
On March 6 and 7, the company is inviting local school children and the wider community to don hard hats and take guided tours of the 104,000 sq ft development to see for themselves the work that goes on in one of the UK’s most dynamic, creative and important industries.
Located in the heart of Leeds city centre, 6 Wellington Place is the second project undertaken by Shepherd in partnership with MEPC as part a masterplan to create more than 1.5 million sq ft of commercial, retail, leisure and residential space in the area.
Meanwhile, Clugston Construction will open the doors of the recycling and energy recovery facility in Leeds on the same dates.
Clugston is carrying out the development on behalf of Veolia, Leeds City Council’s residual waste management partner.
When complete the facility will process up to 214,000 tonnes of black bin waste to recover valuable recyclable material prior to sending the residue to be turned into energy to power up to the equivalent of 20,000 homes.
New research by the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB has revealed that the UK construction industry will need an additional 223,450 jobs over the next five years to handle the country’s expected output growth by 2019 – an average 44,690 new recruits each year.
The Open Doors Weekend is the result of a partnership of four leading industry bodies, UK Construction Group (UKCG), CITB-ConstructionSkills, The Considerate Constructors Scheme, Construction News and the Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB).
Mark Perkins, CEO of Shepherd, said: “We are immensely proud of Shepherd’s long history and close affinity with generations of talented Yorkshire construction professionals and look forward to welcoming the community to explore Wellington Place on Open Doors Weekend.
“We are committed to fuelling the pipeline of young talent, to help ensure that our business remains future-proof and that regional investment translates into local recruitment. Our goal is create a long-term skills legacy to reflect this area’s proud engineering heritage.”
“At Shepherd and across our industry, the UK can boast an array of the world’s most creative, dynamic and innovative teams whose ingenuity represents the international benchmark across the built environment sector.”
Paul Gouland, marketing director at Clugston, added: “Construction is undergoing rapid change and needs to develop a skilled, diverse workforce to meet these challenges and maintain its position as one of this country’s most dynamic, creative and important industries. Nowadays construction is more about careers than jobs and the expected increase in demand for management roles in the next few years means that we need quality talent entering the industry now to fill these future positions.”
