ETHICAL AND SUSTAINABLE EMPLOYMENT IN CONSTRUCTION: THE CASE OF BLACK AND MINORITY ETHNICS’ (BME’S) ENGAGEMENT

misbe2011 Tracking Number 134

The instability of employment resulting from fluctuations in demand and the widespread use of contracting systems poses major problems of attractiveness to the construction industry. As this practice has a considerably negative impact on training, retention and progression of manpower in the industry, coupled with the fact that the industry is one of the largest employers, positioned as most country’s top employer with over two million employees in the UK, for example; which had been projected to increase into the foreseeable future had it not been negatively impacted upon by the recent downturn, the inevitable situation of anticipated skills shortages in a number of professions would have resulted. Even then, as much needed investment is cut from training in the sector, this issue of skills shortages can be very devastating in the event of an upturn which is indeed certain. Consequently, it is anticipated that the construction industry should have been looking to expand its recruitment base and therefore would become progressively multicultural to reflect the diversity of the population. Although the objective of equal opportunity policies is to ensure proportional representation to job opportunities by eliminating differential treatment based on an individual’s social group identity, adopting a policy, however, has not guaranteed to enhance opportunities for minority groups. Indeed there is a view that many equality initiatives can be superficial gestures devoid of any real action and substance. As a result, the paper has the aim of considering the ethical as well as the sustainable aspects of increasing the engagement of the BME sections of the population who, hitherto, have been underrepresented. Is it not the case, that migrants perhaps are confounded by the complexity of the professional accreditation processes, for example? It is worth noting that the white population has been seen to be aging while BMEs have quite a younger age profile making it sustainably intelligent to proportionally engage this section of the population for the future of the industry. Furthermore, it is ethically prudent to involve the sections of the population whose involvement has, until now, been very minimal in the industry. It is probably, for instance, a recipe for bitterness and resentment where religion has been used as a tool of marginalisation in the industry. Keywords: BME, ethical, sustainable, diversity and employment.