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Training helps jobless get work at King’s Cross site
Andrew Brightwell
LONG-term unemployed in King's Cross will be taught building skills to help them get work on the massive redevelopment projects in the area.
Camden Council, Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL) bosses and the London Development Agency launched King's Cross Working last Friday at the project's headquarters in the goods depot at King's Cross.
A total of 15 six-month training courses will be offered including NVQs in carpentry, plumbing and electrical work.
Holborn and St Pancras MP Frank Dobson has campaigned for years to ensure that some of the jobs created by the regeneration of King's Cross go to local people.
He said: "It's a rather peculiar area. There are a lot of people working here but a lot of people are out of work here because most of the jobs are filled by people who travel into work from other places.
"That is partly because those who live here don't have the skills to get the jobs.
"The future prospects of people who gain industry building skills are also fantastic.
"Some people from Scotland and the north of England are staying in caravans here during the week and then going back home at the weekends, which is a crazy situation.
"CTRL took up the idea immediately but it has taken a long time to get the likes of the London Development Agency and the Learning and Skills Council to get it together."
Roger Madelin, chief executive of Argent, the firm masterminding a £2billion redevelopment of the King's Cross railway lands, said local people had already missed out on working on the CTRL high speed link into St Pancras, due to finish in 2007, and the new UCL Hospital in Euston Road, because it had taken so long to start up a training scheme.
He said: "Frank Dobson mentioned that it has taken five years to get this project together and in the time it's taken to set up there has been about £2billion of construction work here."
Angela Riviere, King's Cross Working's workplace coordinator and deputy centre manager said: "The problem is there are so many different contractors, so it is hard to assess.
"What I can tell you is we have already got some 40 or so people from our courses who are working on the construction sites nearby and that number will be going up soon."
andrew.brightwell@hamhigh.co.uk
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