? Your understanding?....A few posts ago you're there watching them do **** all allday, in order to observe that you must be doing **** all yourself! while it comes to light whether you work their or not, I notice you ignored my Q to you whether you had worked middle east like I have some days ago. While I was there my observation is that labourers work like trojans, hence the speed buildings get put up. You're confused, its this country where labourers stand around on their mobile phones watching others piss around with a shovel. Not sure what time of the day you make your observations, but not much goes on in the heat of the day....presumably when you're milling round doing **** all!
I am doing pretty much **** all at the moment as it happens. I lived for over 3 years in the gulf though working in the construction industry, and your observation that, "labourers work like Trojans" in the gulf is very misleading in my opinion. You wouldn't even need to work in construction to know that. I'm not being critical of them, because they earn a pittance, but labouring in the gulf is not generally something that will burn off many calories.
Sorry mate, but your record of writing bollocks is way ahead of anyone else here. How do you explain buildings/projects being completed quicker abroad than here? certainly not by you in an office thats for sure!
I don't know on what basis you conclude that construction periods are shorter overseas for similar work. Generally speaking though, factors which would affect construction periods would include : -Procurement route -Method of construction/construction techniques/technology -Plant used -Availability of materials -Availability of labour -Completeness of design -Complexity of design -Experience of contract administrator and contractor -Weather -Cost -Site productivity -Coordination Anyone who has experience of working on major projects in the middle east and in the UK though would know that productivity rates (per operative) are far higher in the UK than in the Middle East.
Rob, this is derarailing the thread a bit, but let me say this as I appear to have trod on your profession....sorry but its ****! you do not need to have any basis for what I said, its just common knowledge that British projects are overtime and overbudget, built by lazy overpaid Brits, and equivalent projects abroad are not. Maybe living next to and working on the Channel Tunnel has scarred me! thats a joke btw!, but its a perfect example of everything wrong with British construction. I don't need anyone telling me how construction works here or abroad. If less money was spent on offices full of people compiling ****e like this (and abroad they are not!) and more on the manual workforce we might just compete!
I specialise in claims and formal disputes, which invariably involve delay, and - having been involved in numerous arbitrations in the middle east - I can advise that that is not the case. Many major projects in the Middle East have ended up in formal disputes due to delayed completion, often by several years. Just because one project was more in delay than an equivalent project though, doesn't mean that it took longer than the other project, and it certainly doesn't mean that the labourers and tradesmen didn't work as hard. You only have to look at construction sites in the two regions to know that there is greater productivity in the UK than in the middle east, probably by a factor of at least 5, which is part of the reason why sites in the middle east are flooded with labour.
http://baminternational.com/projects/nelson-mandela-bay-stadium-port-elizabeth-south-africa This stadia was started at the same time as the Olympic Park in Stratford, 2007/8. One was holding a tournament in 2010, two years before the other!....I rest my case Rob, no more from me!
The one in south Africa reportedly took 2 years to build, whereas the Olympic stadium in London took just under 3 years. They're totally different types of building though, one difference being that the one in London was built to hold 80,000 and the one in south Africa built to hold 45,000. The Olympic stadium construction was actually a very successful project. Wembley and Cardiff stadiums had long durations, but so too have many major projects in the gulf. There are two major international airports currently being built in the gulf which I believe are each 2 years behind. There was a major stadium project in Dubai recently which was substantially delayed as well. I would agree with you on reflection though that high rise buildings in Dubai can go more quickly than in the UK, but that's nothing to do with the labourers working harder. They don't work anything like as quickly as in the UK, and - whilst I don't have anything I can put on here to demonstrate that - it is a fact. Generally speaking labourers in the gulf spend most of the day standing round doing not very much. That's also a fact. I'm not saying that there aren't issues which could be addressed, but if people think that one of them is that they are being flogged into a state of exhaustion, then they have got it wrong.
I think using Dubai projects is not a good yardstick as you should well know. The amount of developers that have got caught out there is unreal due to this last global recession thing. The World Islands project being a wonderful example of this! I still disagree about brit labourers, the Olympic site was mainly Polish!, so again foreign workers are responsible for british project stats you quote. You've only got to look in this country for more examples, simlpe thing as garage, British owned, shut at 5 without fail. One owned by a foreigner, open all hours! A coil spring broke on a mates car Saturday at 12. All 4 garages still open with a brit there said sorry we shut at one, impossible. One owned by an Indian fella had it back on the road at 2.30pm.
It started with saying foreign workers don't work as hard or as long as brits, and I'll argue all day that foreign workers do.
Argue all day is probably what you'll have to do, mate! It's like banging your head on a brick wall!..
You would probably be better off sticking to discussions where you know something about the topic then, or where everyone else is as clueless about at it as you are.
Lol.to be fair Robs getting a fair amount of grief, being called a liar and full of BS, so that response was fairly mild! I'm sure NSIS can respond just as politely!
Just to back up Rob slighty, I think hes using the wrong wording as abroad projects are in general better managed. Their workers are working more efficiently and work is probably more efficiently assigned. Over the past year I've been dealing with two large sites, all falling behind schedule, all down to poor management. worker's are overloaded with tasks, deadlines are missed and in general I find British workers seem to working their socks off but not getting anywhere. Foreign workers tend to get things done, quicker and without as much issues so maybe when Rob says they aren't working as hard, it could be that the work is more evenly assigned.
Poor management with talented workers? That's England all over, from the football team to the political system.
I've seen some **** managed projects in the UK and overseas Boss, as well as some very well managed projects in the UK and overseas. Although I don't want to keep going against the grain, in my experience I would say that construction professionals in the UK are a higher standard than anywhere else. That's based on working on projects in the middle east and with professionals from south Africa, Australia, US, as well as Indian, Emirati, and various others. There are loads of expat professions - particularly older guys - who wouldn't be able to hold a job down in the UK. Saying that, there are some very good expats (including british) on the big projects. I don't mean any disrespect to labourers in the middle east, but these are guys who (as we know from this discussion) are paid a a pittance, and who live in crap conditions, with no prospect for advancement. It's no wonder really that they don't break their backs trying to impress, and they don't have to because there are 1,000s of them on every job. To that extent, I would agree with you when you talk about work being "evenly assigned". I've seen loads of major delays in the middle east. These can relate to payment issues, material shortages (concrete was almost impossible to get in Dubai in 2007), issues with permits and licenses (you have to get 'no objection certificates' in UAE before you start work, connect power etc), and all manner of other problems including the usual variations, late designs, contractors not having management resources available etc. That said, as notso has pointed out, some projects out there do fly up, but it's not due to labourers working hard but I'd guess more to do with : wide availability of major plant such as cranes, lack of care about quality (some of the concrete is absolutely ****), sites flooded with labour, repetitive nature of construction and simple structural designs, and probably as you say, so decent planning and organisation.
