Dean Halfpenny - Managing Director Prima Systems

In this episode, Faith Abu Do sits down with Dean Halfpenny to explore the challenges and opportunities facing today’s construction industry. Dean shares his personal journey from a non-academic background to a thriving career in the trades, highlighting the value of practical skills, adaptability, and resilience. Together, they discuss the need for earlier vocational training, better support for neurodiverse workers, and strategies to attract younger generations into a physically demanding industry. The conversation also looks ahead to the impact of AI and the cultural shifts needed to improve the perception of trades and secure the sector’s future.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I'm Faith Abudi, and this is the DIIC podcast. Um right, okay, so thank you again for joining in on today's um podcast uh with DIIC. Well, my name's Faith Abudu, as usual. Uh welcome to DIIC Diversity and Inclusion in Construction. Today I've got with me Dean Halfpenny. We are going I think this is going to be a very, very informal um sort of conversation. It's I want to cover a lot on age and workforce, but at the same time, Dean being my employer.

SPEAKER_01 0:50

I'm old then.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

No, that's not what he means. It just means, as I mentioned before, it's that wealth of knowledge of the industry, Dean, for me. It's it's understanding how the industry works, what's what's what are the challenges, what's affecting us, especially on trades. And looking at your background, I mean, we we had a conversation a couple of months ago where we're talking about your journey um to where you are today. I want to be able to educate the audience as to it doesn't matter where you start from. Or does it? That's the question.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

No, I think most people you look at young, as I was, that's what 15. Didn't have a clue. Wanted to travel, wanted to be a surf bum, you know, just do what I wanted to do. But reality is you've got to earn a wage. Yeah. So, you know, you there was no no focus on what I wanted to do. I didn't want to do what dad was doing. I just walked, well, was chilled. I'd be a gardener for no real reason. Family wanted me to be a farrier because they had horses.

SPEAKER_02 2:00

Right.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

I don't like horses, so I was definitely not going to be a farrier. So gardening was just chilled out. I don't know what made me do it. It was just like, yeah, chill.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Sorry to interrupt. If you're enjoying this content and you'd like to participate, please get in touch. Email us at info.diic.org.uk.

SPEAKER_01 2:18

Be outside, always want to be outside. Didn't do very well at school, so didn't really have qualifications to do X, Y, and Z. But at the time we had careers, and Careers was down the mine. Freight clearance in Dover really was our biggest employers locally. So no, Gardener did that for a little bit, very short period of time, and then decided they were they had some bricklayers in repairing these old walls, so I was helping them. And I thought, well, I'm gonna be a brickie, they earn loads of money. So it wasn't that I wanted to be a bricklayer because I wanted to be one, I just thought money's loads better. Um, unfortunately, that backfired because my first job was on the YTS scheme as a bricklayer, £27.50p a week, half of which went to my mum for keep. So I was loaded. Um, so that was a year, I think. I can't remember totally, but then yeah, just on up through different companies as an apprentice. Uh I think we did about six, five, six years in total, advanced craft, so slightly different from today's training. It was long-winded. I still have memories turning up my first proper day. Um, I was at Hogbin Brothers in Selling, Faversham. Turned up long hair, big goatey beard at the time on my motorbike.

SPEAKER_00 3:46

I'm trying to picture you in still, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:50

And uh yeah, this gentleman they said, Oh, you're working with Des. And he turned up in a three-piece suit, brick there, in like this tweedy suit thing. And I'm like, Fly me, we're we're a bit opposite here, aren't we? Uh but he yeah, he was excellent, took me under his wing, really learnt a lot from that. So sort of diversified off brickwork into all sorts of bits and bobs. Um, did that, then I went out on my own. So yeah, went out self-employed for a few years. Then my dad asked me to come and join the company. Bearing in mind I'd been on and off as a from about five years old, going to see dad at weekends meant going to work, basically, and then throughout so yeah, there was some false pretenses of coming back, luxury company car, and turned out to be a van. So he sort of tripped me back and ended up just fitting windows. Not sure how that really happened, but wouldn't knock it for the world. Worked hard, worked all over, stayed away for years working with a good team of guys, some of whom are still with us. So Kevin is was 17 when I was out there with him on the tools, so still here. So we're doing alright, aren't we? Those Adam. Adam's been here 25, 25, right. Maybe more, maybe 26, because team him and Chris is quite close. They started similar times. But yeah, Kev was out there, and we see Billy out there as well, who's still here in '82 now. Wow. So he's been there.

SPEAKER_00 5:23

There has to be something about the the business. Um, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 5:28

We've seen Kev's kids grow up. Um we were down in Brighton working away, and he had Steve, who's now working for us. Um he went away. Steve uh appeared on the planet, and uh within a few hours Kev's back down with us working. So there's nothing I can do at home. So it's just like okay, different world. So we've seen all his kids grow up over the years, so yeah, it is a family, you know, we know them all, so it's the way we we try and just make it a happy family where we can. We have fallouts occasionally, so it happens, doesn't it? Yeah, you know, um, but we always rebuild and move on, it's always for the better. Um so yeah, we we were out fitting, then we moved into doing surveying, which did for a few years. Surveying, really project management, same thing. It all became a blur when dad gave you a job. There wasn't a title, it was just go and do that. You've never done it before, but hey, you'll make it work. And and you did. There was no internet back then. So learning, I'm not sure how we learn, truthfully. I think it was you had what was in your head, you had the ability with your hands, and you sort of read books, I guess. So I still have Bibles of building books and that I probably read and digested, but there was no internet, it was hard to slower to learn, yeah. Um, but yeah, we we worked on some really large projects. I think I was 21 and we did a uh project for 18 months in Gravesend. That was the largest one we ever did, right? Which was a whole road, which was interesting characters throughout. You learn to manipulate people to a point, you find their personality and you've got to learn how to communicate with them. One minute you've got this character, and then you go in another, and you've got someone else, you've got to learn to change your communication method. You can be rough and gruff to one person, and then you go in the next, and you've got to be all prim and proper because you know when you've got to just to be able to communicate at different levels. So that was a good learning curve, quite like communicating with people and the challenges of where do I need to balance myself to be able to get a productive relationship with them or get what I want out of them, maybe sometimes. But you've got to balance that communication method. Yeah. So I think that was the most important thing to learn at 21. How do I talk to people? Not how do I do it, that's quite easy. It's people skills, is probably the biggest one. Uh, and being able and willing to listen to what they have to say.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

Yeah. I mean, can considering your your experience in in trades, then, I mean, all of those different roles and and coming to where you are today, what you do today, with regards to um education for any young person or anyone at that coming into the world of work today, particularly on trades, do you think the industry's got it right in terms of weighing?

SPEAKER_01 8:41

I think you've got to start younger because at school I really didn't do well. I could have done, but I had no purpose, especially in maths and English, certainly no purpose for what I wanted at that particular time in life. Obviously, when I left, I thought going to be a bricklayer was just picking up a trowel and and laying a brick on top of a brick, and there you go. But actually, it proved to be frighteningly technical with the books and the the maths required. Um, because you're just not doing as we do now, everything's pre-built, your arches are pre-built, all this. So going into college then and and saying now you've got to build this free-centred arch or whatever it happens to be, a gothic arch, and I'm like, hmm, how do you do that? And they're like talking trigonometry and angles, and I'm like, I should have done better at school, shouldn't I? But there was no purpose at school, no purpose for maths.

SPEAKER_00 9:35

But not everyone would like school, that's the thing. And in that case, in I mean, today's world, is that do you feel we're making provisions for those group of people that are not thriving on?

SPEAKER_01 9:51

Yeah, it's hard to say. My godson Luke is 23 now. He was similar to me at school, so he just couldn't get his head around anything, really. At least I enjoyed history and bits and did well in them. Um, but there was no, yeah, there was no he could find no purpose in maths. And he's similar to me now. He's now we've pushed him, he's now a carpenter, and he's having to use maths. So it's like a I told you this, why didn't you listen to me? You know, and he's oh you're always moaning at me. And I'm like, well, I tried to steer you in the direction away from my pitfalls and errors, but that they they don't. So I think it is hard, yeah. It's trying to get a focus in what I schools just seem to focus on academia, and and if you're not academic, yeah, then you're doomed, aren't you? Because you're gonna rebel. I did. English, no, can't maths, no. So why am I gonna bother? I'm not. But if I'd push to a thing to say, look, you need it to do this, um, you know, you want to be manual, because that's where my hard to be sort of typecast. Yeah. But obviously at school they're gonna typecast me and go, he's not going to university, is he? No, I'm not. So what am I going to do? Well, my intelligence level was here, so I'm going to be at this level. I'm not going to walk into the role I've got now. That can only be done through experience and hard work and self-education to a degree. Um, so yeah, it's difficult. You're coming in at the bottom end, I mean spat out sort of thing, without knowing or having the backup because you do need it, unfortunately. I still can't. I'm not very good at English, still can't spell, don't know anything about grammar. Luckily, computers are really clever now. They're big like even when I struggle to figure out what I'm spelling sometimes, most of the times. Big red squiggle underneath it. Yeah, I don't know what you're going on about. But I go, well, I do, I just don't know how to spell it. So um and and structuring of compositions as such isn't my forte. But you know, I I don't think it would have made any difference really if I knew what I was going to do or not. Sometimes we struggle, yes, and and English is one that I struggle with. Um, but what a team, you know. I used to go back to the team, and when Sue was here, I'd give her all my letters and she would mark them like a schoolmistress. I just wanted them changed so they made sense, not give it back to me with two out of ten, which she used to do. Which I just used to beat me and make it even worse next time when I handed it in. But you have the team that helps in your weaknesses. Um, but coming, yeah, it's really hard, you know.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

In in saying that, I was reading an article the other day about neurodiversity and neurodivergent individual and to touching on and spellings and actually comprehension and things like that, a high percentage of um trades people, not just trades, the labour for us in construction, a high percentage have got some form of disability, whether he's ADHD, whether he's dyslexic, or name it.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

Is that just because we come out of school and get pushed in a direction though, don't we? You know, because it's just like you're not going this way. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:10

Um It could be that, and it could just be industry not or generally society not recognising the reason why a young person is being rebellious. Well, they call it rebellious. Is it that or there's something else to it that we're not actually acknowledging that it's there and trying to figure out how to support them and how to better channel the that energy into in into built environment or into construction, especially trades?

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Yeah, it was probably easier a few decades ago when there was more tolerance out there, you know. So it's quite stringent now on rules and regulations, so it's hard to maybe have the bit of banter that you used to have to break the barriers down a little bit. So it's you're all doing things by the letter of the law, aren't you? So you've got to sort of yeah, anyone that's difficult on sight is going to be viewed as difficult and if not removed.

SPEAKER_02 14:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:14

Um, because that's just the black and white policy that's out there, isn't it? It's what we said before. If you don't understand people, how do you make a judgment on them? Well, you can only make a black and white judgment at that point, and you would say you're not fitting in, just remove without getting to the bottom of their issues, you know, whereas we are here, yeah. Quite a few people, Stephen who's coming back, he's got a few problems. But we know Steve, and you work around those weaknesses, and they're also strengths as well, yeah, that you can build on. But it's yeah, it's a dynamic that as a small company we can do, but if we're on a larger site, you don't have the flexibility or the time, you know. I think the part half the problem is that so people are so overworked. How do you sit down and have an hour's chat with someone to discover their true fraughties or complexities to be able to manage them properly? That's the issue. And and you are right, we do have quite a high percentage of people that are maybe challenged academically or having a few other disabilities that makes it more challenging to deal with them. I think on smaller building sites you can get away with it, but when you come in to where we're going to now, everything is so monitored and controlled that we we have a little bit of an issue to really as an as an industry. But then it's our responsibility to to manage those people.

SPEAKER_00 15:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Really.

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Um since joining the business, um I very quickly realize the the struggle we have in terms of our fitters. And I think you'd be the best person to actually answer the question around that. Um because I know that that gap is gonna get bigger if nothing is done, um, get in the hands and and mind we need, um, to actually especially with the £39 billion um funding recently announced for social housing and where we're focusing on past 2030 now, um if we're gonna meet target in terms of um making available 266, I think it is, sixty-six thousand homes, social affordable homes, um twenty twenty-seven, twenty thirty, if I get that right. Considering the struggle we have now in getting fitters to do the job.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

Yeah, young fitters. Yes. Because they are old. Don't think we have any under 30 now. Right. And that's not for the want of trying. And and that's just this the way society has progressed. You know, I know, as I say, with Luke at school, my own daughter at school, it was very academic pushed. You know, I had to push the other way and explain that's not the direction they're going in. There isn't there wasn't the push to go into the lower avenue well lower skilled, shall we say. They're not, but that's how they're construed. Um vocational subjects at the time. It was get your exams on that school, that gives a good tick box for the school, and go to university, good tick box. It's doing nothing to the people that we need to fill in. And we shouldn't not, going to university doesn't mean too much to me. I I like people with life skills that have learnt the hard way, and I think sometimes common sense prevails over a degree, because you don't get a degree in common sense, do you? That's like you've got to learn over the years, you can be highly intelligent but woefully scary in their ability to function as a human being. Um, and I think that the you know we know society's changing, kids can make or believe they can make money via the world of social media and and that, and I'm sure some do, but there is a sort of a dream world there that they seem to be vogging. I see I don't do any social media, so I don't know the answer, but TikTok or whatever my daughter tells me about. I just don't see why you want to stare in a make a picture of yourself all the time when there's better things to do in life. Really? Yes, it's all a bit. I like the way you put it then. I just uh let's just get on with your life, you know, and and and face some reality as you've got to go out there, you've got to earn some money, you know. Um but the the the I was speaking to uh a nephew the other Sunday, yeah. And his remit on work, I was grilling him to get job, he's in his twenties, and he said, Well, I'm trying to make a living playing computer games. So he's there and he's talking about a competition he's got that evening where he can win a thousand pounds. And I'm saying, Well, how long's it taken to get here? And he was like, I'm saying, Man, you know, you've got to win two of them a week, three a week, four a week. Uh yeah, no, no, no, I just do it when I want to do it, you know. Something like this is a half-eyed effort at doing what you want to do in the real world is go and get you need to get a job. Yeah, there's plenty out there, you could come and work for us. Oh don't want to get up in the morning, I don't want to do this, and I'm and you're just thinking, okay, the culture's slightly changed.

SPEAKER_02 19:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

And there doesn't appear to be any pressure, parents, or whatever. Um, you know, I was on £27 and I had to pay my mum half that because that's what we did. That's what I think most families do. We support each other. Nowadays, there's an acceptance that they can maybe they get more handed to them than we used to, I don't know. But there just doesn't seem the desire to get out there and and work, which makes it hard, yeah, because we need these people massively. Not going on a computer game, you're not gonna make it, and good luck if you do, hats off because you can make loads of money. But it's like being a professional footballer, there's a very, very full small percentage of people in the population that actually ever make it. So there's a bit of realism there as well, without shattering their dreams, of course. Difficult balance as a parent. Yeah. But you know, it's the same.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

So you'd you you'd agree with me though that when it comes to tech, i.e. AI, that is sort of changing the face of construction, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 20:43

No, I love AI. Use it, it helps me. It's just another medium, isn't it? Uh instead of trawling and searching, something works it out for you. But it can't do that with them, the hands. AI is not helping us there, is it? It's not helping someone to lay a brick, it's not helping someone fit a window or a carpenter fit a door. It's that's the real world we're living in. Yeah. AI, good luck to you. It will tell you how to do it, which is not do it yet. Yeah. But we sin that or you know, all off-site construction, it's still there, but it hasn't taken off to the degree that we would have hoped to really. Um does us out of a job, but you would think it makes sense to build things in factories where it should be precise and accurate, and we're still laying bricks and mortar to build houses. So we need young people. We need to uh bring some level of importance to those roles. You know, I think that's a good thing. But we we had I don't know, because we we had a gentleman worked here, he moved into a new estate, and they have a covenant on there to say no trades vans. What why? What what What is wrong with my guy compared to the doctor that he lives next door to? What is if as a plumber, why can't he live next door? Why can't he park his van there? So we had the guy phone up, your man's parked his van here, he can't, blah blah blah. And I was just like, I can't find you so obnoxious. Because what's the difference? Why is that van devaluing your street? You need him. You know, if your heating went wrong, you'll be the first one. Do you want him to park round the corner? But you want him, and um uh plumber's probably earning a good few hundred pounds a day.

SPEAKER_00 22:32

Is this again not back to the perception about the industry, especially on trades, because we get this on um the different tiers in construction, uh the client, the main contractors, and the subcontractors, and in most cases, I mean subcontractors are massive, massive element of um the supply chain. Um now, but it's that perception around that area or that category of of um of the industry, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 23:06

I think the public I supp I don't know. Do we look are we uh is the industry looked down upon, you know? I don't know, possibly it is. Yeah. You know, if you go, my son's a dentist, they're proud, aren't they? I guess. And if you just say, Oh, my son's a chippy, is it being I don't know, it shouldn't be. I think you know, any of the trades are equal to. There shouldn't be, you know, no one should be embarrassed by it. The money is amazing at the moment. That's because there's a shortfall of people out there that you're commanding good money.

SPEAKER_00 23:38

That's what I was gonna say. I mean, plumbers, we plumbers, electricians, what the if you're if you're in trouble, they're expensive.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

Exactly. So So the problem is, yeah, I think it's the education at the very beginning, from school onwards, it's vocational. That's what you're gonna do in life. You're good with these, you've got a reasonable brain that when it's attached to them, and and that's what you need, that coordination. And then if you've got that, then there's nothing wrong with there's a role for everybody, and we should embrace the roles we have, and we need to excite young people to say, you know, there's no harm in getting up at half five in the morning driving to the middle of London and it's snowing, it's not an attractive, you know. If you look at it and break it down, and that's what Luke did for me when when he'd gone and he was he went off to do sales and he did his little lifeboard thing, and then he had a picture of him and his van and it was all snowing. He goes, Why do I want this life path when I could have this life path? Yeah. Um life path was actually a false dream in the end. You know, he had his little Caribbean picture of where he was going to go and live when he'd made his first millions, and the reality hits in that there's no difference, and now his life all swapped around, you know, and he can see that what he can get from what he's doing, you know, he can charging 250 a day, so he's now going, I want my house and I want this. So he's pulled himself back into a bit of reality. Yeah, you know, and and but he's he has the ability to progress now. So he's set up his own company, he's doing really well.

SPEAKER_00 25:12

Could it be that we're not shouting enough about remunerations that attach to this different roles, particularly in trades?

SPEAKER_01 25:21

Yes and no. I think it's good to know where you can get to, but you've also got to make sure that that process is quite long to learn otherwise you're back to people doing something for six months believing they're excellent and actually really poor at how they execute it. And I think then that's the the general consensus. If someone's bad at what they do, then the industry gets the bad rap for it, and and there are bad people in our industry, yeah. You know, and it is a complex under beast to understand every interaction, and that's what we try and train. So our guys know how to do stuff, it's the interaction of what the what is the consequence consequence of your action further down the chain. And I think um that that's what needs to be educated in there. Doing the trade is quite easy, it's having a broader understanding of everyone else's trade. So you think if I do this, this undoes this for the next one, and then you get a fractured workforce out there or process, it breaks down. Um but money is good, people should love it. But you've got to look at that, money's good, but you're getting reined on what, 30% of the year.

SPEAKER_00 26:40

Yeah, but I think it's um given everyone the chance to understand uh what's at stake, um, whether you on the field or behind um the screen, it's that chance for you to choose what you want to do and understanding um wages or compensations attached to them. Um and again it's that perception again around subcontractors as opposed to because you've got the white colour, the c blue colour roles. Um and for certain roles, obviously, i.e. QS, we get a lot of aspiring um QSs coming through the door. Everyone wants to be QSs, you know?

SPEAKER_01 27:23

Um QS project manager. Well, it looks like you're but we know here, don't we, that certain elements of our external workforce are earning more than me. Because they're good at what they do and and they can command that money. But we've seen it happen before. So we've seen peaks in what people can earn, then it drops off, yeah, and then it builds back up again. But you know, they've got to work hard for it. So they could look, yeah, at certain elements we have here and go, how much? You go, Yeah, you sort of on a doctor's salary. Do you know that? It's hard though, and you are gonna break sooner than the doctor because it's physically hard work. So you've got to have that mentality to go, I can't do this beyond certain age. It's 60, surely, is the max. You know, and then there's that unattractive thing. What do you do after 60? You know, do you re-educate yourself?

SPEAKER_00 28:16

How about bringing people from tools to bringing them back in? Yeah, just open them right.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

And it isn't as high, because that's why we've done what we've done over those years. It's very hard to bring them in without failing. And then you don't want to see them fail because they they I think when you're younger, I suppose when I came in and started having to do the things I wasn't really good at, like maths and that, I've had 30 plus years of trying to learn how to do it, where bringing them in where they haven't, yeah, and then suddenly going, You could be a project manager, and they all could. I really do believe they all could, but there's just this physical barrier now. So, like Kevin he's wants to retire off the tools, but he won't come in here. He knows he can't do it, but he's already built that barrier up, and it'll be such a long progress to unravel everything out of him to start going.

SPEAKER_00 29:19

So what would be the option for people like that, then would you say?

SPEAKER_01 29:23

I don't know really. I'm quite broke, so I think physically I can't couldn't do that. So I don't know for Kev. It's worrying, really. We do I do talk to him and say what can we do? You know, I could see Kev taking over from what his Billy does, his dad, you know, so he can downgrade from from there. But it is hard, yeah, to know what what do they do? Like a how many old you know, scaffolders, bricklayers. It's a hard, brutal industry. Really physical, every day. Every day, physical hard work that breaks you down. They are needed, that's the thing, for sure part of construction. Oh, all everyone, you know, but there are some real key ones that are physically heavy work day in, day out. When do they break, you know, and then what do they what do they do? Because the good old days of you can work slower and that isn't there because we're always push for price, so everything has to be done quick and and efficiently, so it's hard to to do. I don't know. We've got to bring the young ones in because the old ones are working beyond their working physical age, you know. Um, and we do now. I suppose the difference is we learnt in the past that in in the past we would lift things we shouldn't have lifted, you know, and now we are very wise to doing it differently, using mechanical means and robots, etc. So we would expect to see the younger generation working longer because we've not had they haven't had that physical drain on them over the over the decades. Um but yeah, it's still you know, how do you excite them to come in? You know it is good money, it's one thing, but it's good money in X period of time. You know, it's progression.

SPEAKER_00 31:10

Um can be called Yeah. I I I think um perhaps it's worth I think this is a question we'll would need to put forward to the likes of CITB, because these are governing bodies that you would expect that uh there should be plans in place as to how can we swap this round? If we're thinking of changing perception of the industry and attracting young people into trade roles, um well it's a culture change, isn't it, really?

SPEAKER_01 31:43

It's to go back, you know, it was recognised back then, but we did a s you know a a five-year apprenticeship. It meant something, and you were appreciated when you came out the end of that. There's just nothing formalized anymore, really. Things are so fast-paced out there, you know, and you're not covering all aspects of the role. You can, you know, a bricklayer can lay to a line and that's it, he's a brickie. And he can actually earn good money by doing a minimal element of the role. The broader skill base is definitely missing. Yeah, you know, our industry, no, I I'm still learning. Every day is a learning day, so there's never a day, you know, when people come and go, I can do this, and I'm like, Oh no, you can't, because you can't. You just haven't got the knowledge bank in there, um, and you don't have the communication skill to manipulate it out of me, you know. And some people are really good at that, they know very little, but they're excellent at tweaking what they need out of people, feeding off of people, which is a good way of progressing. But other people don't have that communication skill, you know, or willing to accept they don't know is one of the biggest weaknesses. You know, I always put my hand up in front of a group full of people and go, I don't understand what you're talking about because I don't. And if that means I learn by asking, then that's the whole point. But people do just plod on and that slows them down. But I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 33:08

I I would like to bring um any company that is, I don't know, scaffolding businesses. Um, if you're out there and you're into scaffolding or heavy lifting, I'd like to have a conversation. And it it yeah, questions around this needs to be answered. We need to understand what what we need to be doing differently as an industry to sort of attract um the right hands in mind that will take on um this role from um yeah, the older generations that will be retiring because we we're gonna have an avalanche of um of our tradespeople um going out. How do we replace them? That's the that's the question. Um I think the likes of CITB needs to come in for us to um tackle this head on, really. So yeah, if you're listening in on um Spotify, Amazon Podcast, or Apple Podcasts, whatever platform you leave on, um yes, please do reach out. Uh send me an email uh fake.abudu at dimic.org.uk, um, or you simply email info at dimic.org.uk. We've been talking to Dean Halfpenny, uh the managing director of Prima Systems, um Ashu now, that's my bit unaware, um, supplying and installation of Windows Doors, cotton walling, and we are past 2030 certified. So all things social housing or um making available infrastructure staffer purposes, anyways. That is all about prima systems. Am I right? Yeah, I covered it.

SPEAKER_01 34:56

Just about matched over everything, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:59

Brilliant, right? Thank you so much um for giving your time and lending your voice, then. Really appreciate those. Thank you for coming along today's podcast. We hope you've enjoyed today's content. Please do like, share, and follow for more.