Educational requirements disqualify experienced construction workers

At work..Photo: Gorm Kallestad / NTB scanpix

From the 1st of July next year, companies without engineers, or qualified technical staff will only carry out the least demanding jobs in the construction industry.

 

The Building Quality Directorate distinguishes between three action class companies in the construction industry who can be approved. One is given the simplest assignments, while three approvals are needed for companies doing the most advanced work, wrote Klassekampen newspaper.

There has been room for discretion, for example, for companies that have done good work.

Now the recommendations have become a legal requirement, and the government has given companies until the 1st of July 2018 to obtain proper formal competence papers.

‘These are professionals with trade papers, who have been working hard for years, building up companies from the bottom, and employing people. Just because they haven’t taken technical college or engineering education, they are discriminated against’, said Julie Brodtkorb, director of the Machine Contractors Association.

Klassekampen asked for a comment from the municipal minister, Jan Tore Sanner of Høyre (H), but the ministry didn’t want to comment on the matter. They referred to the Directorate for Construction Quality, which states that the proposal for new approval rules will be in consultation in the New Year, reported the newspaper.

 

©  NTB Scanpix / Norway Today