Mr. Gareth R. ThomasTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions how many construction industry inspector posts are vacant in each region of the United Kingdom. [160278]
§ Mr. MeacherIn April 2001, the number of vacant construction industry inspector posts in each Division of the Health and Safety Executive's Field Operations Directorate, were as follows:
Division Number of vacancies Scotland 0 Yorkshire and North East 0 North West 0 Midlands 0 Wales and West 0 London and South East 8 Home Counties 0 Total 8
Mr. Gareth R. ThomasTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what action the Government are taking to recruit suitable people to fill vacancies for construction industry inspectors in London and the South East. [160277]
§ Mr. MeacherThe Health and Safety Executive (HSE) usually fills construction industry inspector posts internally from its pool of experienced general inspectors of health and safety. HSE is currently running a major campaign to recruit trainee inspectors nationally, the majority to fill the vacancies in the Field Operations Directorate, and this includes those in its London and the South East Division, In order to help address the resource shortfall more quickly, HSE is also seeking to deploy inspectors from other divisions into London for limited periods and is exploring the contribution that could be made by additional specialist inspectors supporting operational construction inspection.