Work starts on flagship London training hub to boost jobs and tackle 239,000 construction worker shortage

Construction has started on a flagship multi-skill apprenticeship training hub at Barking Riverside, London, which will boost house-building skills, create local jobs and support the delivery of new homes across the capital.

Backed by a £100 million investment from the National House Building Council (NHBC), the UK’s leading provider of new home warranties and insurance, the new NHBC Training Hub forms part of a planned national network of 12 multi-skill facilities. Together, NHBC’s hubs will train up to 3,000 apprentices each year in the trades most critical to house building, significantly boosting the construction workforce across London, as well as in Barking and Dagenham.

Designed to replicate real site conditions, the facility will train 200 apprentices each year in bricklaying, groundworks, site carpentry and timber frame erection in as little as 14 months. The hub is due to open this autumn and comes at a crucial time, as the UK construction sector is forecast to need an additional 239,300 workers by 2029 to meet existing demand.

Barking Riverside, East London’s largest development, has been selected as the site for the capital’s first NHBC Training Hub. With planning recently approved in principle for up to 20,000 new homes, the scale of the project creates a unique opportunity to train local people to help deliver them. The aim is to build a skilled workforce and support the local economy across Barking Riverside and the wider borough, an ambition supported by the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham.

Located on River Road, at a prominent entry route to the Barking Riverside development, the training hub will be two-thirds the size of a football pitch and is being delivered in partnership with house builder Bellway and Barking Riverside Limited, the master developer behind the wider scheme. The project is also backed by £1 million in funding from the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB).

Commenting on the new facility, Roger Morton, Director of Business Change at NHBC, said: “This training hub is exactly what London needs right now. Without more skilled workers, we simply won’t build the homes people need. Building 10,000 homes requires around 2,500 bricklayers, 2,500 groundworkers and 1,000 carpenters and we don’t have enough.

“That’s why NHBC’s £100 million investment matters. Our network of 12 multi-skill training hubs will deliver up to 3,000 apprentices a year, trained in real site conditions from day one. This will create site-ready tradespeople in as little as 14 months, which is twice as fast as more traditional education routes, helping to speed up the delivery of quality new homes we urgently need.

“But training alone isn’t enough. Builders and subcontractors must take on apprentices to turn this into a workforce that can deliver at scale.

“This is also about creating skilled, well-paid careers for people from all backgrounds. Construction offers real progression, with bricklayers earning £50,000 a year on average. The bottom line is simple. If we don’t fix the skills shortage, we won’t fix the housing shortage. Our hub at Barking Riverside shows how we can tackle both by investing in skills, creating opportunity and building the homes where they are needed most.”

Howard Dawber, the Deputy Mayor of London for Business and Growth, said: “This new flagship NHBC Training Hub at Barking Riverside will deliver first-class apprenticeship training in construction, which will help us tackle the shortage of much-needed trades skills and boost house building across the capital. Barking Riverside is an exemplary new town that is transforming east London with state-of-the-art new homes, community facilities, transport links and green spaces. I look forward to all the new opportunities that will be unlocked through this new initiative as we work to build a better, more prosperous London for all.”

Apprenticeship training will account for around 80% of activity at the new NHBC Training Hub, with the remaining space supporting upskilling for existing workers, traineeships, skills bootcamps, specialist masterclasses and sessions for career changers and school students.

Barking Riverside is one of Europe’s largest residential developments, delivering thousands of new homes across East London. The development is led by Barking Riverside Ltd, a joint venture between the Mayor of London and housing association L&Q.

Leigh Johnson, Managing Director at Barking Riverside Ltd, said: “At Barking Riverside, we have a responsibility to ensure that the benefits of this development are felt by the local community. Our scale demands innovative, forward-thinking solutions to ensure we can deliver at pace. Providing land and investing resources in the NHBC multi-skill training hub is a practical response to that challenge—helping to build a skilled local workforce while creating meaningful opportunities for residents. Here, we are supporting both the long-term success of the project and a more inclusive and sustainable local economy.”

Tim Balcon, CEO of CITB, said: “It is more important than ever that we break down barriers to developing a skilled home-building workforce and for employers to take on apprentices. These training hubs are an excellent example of a coordinated industry approach to address the skills shortages facing the industry. Similarly, Barking Riverside is a great example of the sort of large-scale housing projects that we expect to see as part of the New Towns Programme – these projects will provide pipeline certainty for employers across the country. It’s vital employers equally ensure there are jobs at the end of training courses for the fast-track apprenticeships these hubs will deliver.”

David Burns, Managing Director of Barking Riverside at Bellway, said: “Bellway is delighted to be the lead developer in support of the flagship multi-skill NHBC Training Hub in the UK. As a developer, currently building over 600 homes in Barking Riverside, as part of a wider 15 to 20 year project and supporting the regeneration of the area, having a highly skilled workforce is essential to our success in providing high quality homes. With an aging workforce, the challenges we face in the construction industry in meeting the government ambitions to build more homes can only be successful by providing training and skills to the next generation.”

Councillor Dominic Twomey, Leader of Barking and Dagenham Council, said: “This new facility will bring jobs and opportunities to Barking Riverside and to the borough as a whole. This huge £100 million investment by NHBC of 12 new multi-skill training hubs across the UK, will see Barking and Dagenham become part of a series of leading sites at national level in the training of housebuilders for generations to come. It will see our borough become a cornerstone in the training of the next generation of people who will build the homes our country needs. Our borough has a proud industrial history and I’m excited to see what this next chapter holds.” 

The new Barking Riverside facility is the latest addition to NHBC’s growing network of training hubs, joining existing centres in Lichfield, Cambridge, Newcastle and Hull. A further hub in Northstowe is also planned to open later this year.