Boost for Scottish construction industry with launch of multi-million pound training centre

Today saw the launch of the brand new £3.8 million National Construction College (NCC) centre at Inchinnan near Glasgow and the Scottish headquarters of parent organisation ConstructionSkills, the Sector Skills Council for construction.

 Maureen Watt MSP, Minister for Schools and Skills, joined guests including ConstructionSkills Chairman Sir Michael Latham, Chief Executive of ConstructionSkills Mark Farrar and Scottish Director Graeme Ogilvy to officially launch the new NCC and ConstructionSkills Scotland centre. 

The new state-of-the-art training centre has been developed in reaction to a growing industry need for more construction training in Scotland. NCC is the leading provider of specialist construction training in the country, and the new centre offers improved facilities and higher quality training provision for the industry.  

The new purpose built campus will deliver training for up to 160 apprentices and 6,000 adult learners every year. It offers in excess of 4,700 square metres of training space, consisting of 12 purpose built classrooms, 7 conference and meeting rooms, 3,000 square metres of floor space dedicated to specialist occupations and a 100 seat restaurant.

The centre also includes a 1,200 square metre scaffolding facility, which is the second largest purpose built scaffolding training centre in the UK, after the scaffolding centre at the College's Bircham Newton site in Norfolk.

Field Operations Manager for the National Construction College, Nigel Donohue, said: "We are really excited to be launching the new site, which allows us to offer first class training at unrivalled facilities to learners and companies in Scotland.

"The construction industry in Scotland is currently very strong and with major projects planned such as the Leith development, the 2014 Commonweath Games and the Scottish Government's £3 billion Transport Investment Programme, the new NCC Scotland will support the growing need for construction training across the country."

The new facility also headquarters for ConstructionSkills Scotland and will provide a central focus for all construction training across Scotland, with businesses, federations and other construction bodies able to use the facility, bringing together best practice in construction in Scotland under one roof.

Chairman of ConstructionSkills, Sir Michael Latham, commented: "The exciting developments currently underway in Scotland mean that more than ever, we need to make sure that we work with Government, employers and other partners to ensure that we have enough job ready recruits to meet this challenge. Our work is crucial and the new NCC training centre, alongside the new ConstructionSkills offices are meeting industry demand."

The new training centre will offer apprenticeships in general construction, groundworks, scaffolding, plant maintenance, built up felt roofing, roof sheeting and cladding and interior systems. Adult training will be delivered in scaffolding parts 1 and 2 and advanced, as well as in general construction, groundworks and a range of bespoke employer led training in the colleges' apprenticeship offerings. The new centre will also continue to deliver its market-leading health and safety courses and will support the industry with sustainability training and its newly developed management and leadership programmes.

The National Construction College offers outstanding training to both young apprentices and adult students for a wide range of specialist courses, which are delivered by experienced instructors at the College's six sites across the country, providing training for more than 30,000 people per year.