The British Chambers of Commerce and founding partner Aviva are establishing a £3m five-year industry-led programme to increase skills and capacity in Local Planning Authorities. The programme will pay for at least 100 undergraduate and masters’ level qualifications for people entering the planning industry, and for people already working in LPAs who need to develop skills for more senior planning roles. It will pay for the learner’s training and will aim to facilitate work experience and jobs within LPAs. In return, at the end of their course of study, the learner must commit to work in a council planning role for at least two years. The BCC is asking businesses from all sectors to contribute to the programme’s fund with the aim of raising at least £3 million. Aviva is contributing £500,000 as the first UK firm to support the scheme. The BCC says members of all sizes are clear that limited resources and specialist skills within the planning system are delaying important investment that would promote growth across the UK. The programme aims to address this by increasing the pipeline of talent into the sector and expertise among existing planners. Whilst the programme is industry-led, ahead of the Spring Budget, the BCC is calling on the Government to commit to matching the £3 million contribution to ensure that LPAs can employ newly qualified graduates for at least two years . The Government is being urged to introduce a mechanism for those LPAs in greatest need of additional planning skills and resources to access dedicated funding. Baroness Martha Lane Fox, President of the British Chambers of Commerce said: “The UK’s economy is being held back by a slow planning system, and we must address the lack of resource by giving local planning authorities some hope of support. “The Chamber’s membership is consistently telling us a slow planning system due to limited resource is blocking much-needed investment and halting growth. We want to work in in partnership with government to take concrete steps to support them to help unlock our planning system. “Investing in Talent, Building Communities is a five-year programme led by the BCC, with founding partner Aviva, to help local councils with endless delays in the planning system,get on with driving the British economy forward. It is vital that businesses of all shapes and sizes across the country contribute to this initiative. The Spring Budget offers the Chancellor an opportunity to match the industry’s commitment to unblocking Britain’s planning problem, he must seize it.” Amanda Blanc, Group Chief Executive of Aviva said: “Greater planning capacity is key to supporting more investment in UK housing, regeneration and infrastructure.  More planners and more specialist planning skills will allow businesses to invest with more certainty and greater speed, boosting economic growth and make a meaningful difference to communities across the UK.”

Completion of the first full sized Small Modular Reactor (SMR) nuclear vessel demonstrator assembly at Sheffield Forgemasters has signalled a global leap in welding technology. Sheffield Forgemasters has pioneered the industrialisation of Local Electron-Beam Welding (LEBW), and complete weld-assembly of the vessel marks a pivotal moment in global welding development, taking less than 24 hours to complete four, thick, nuclear-grade welds, typically requiring a year of work to complete. With a diameter of three meters and a wall thickness of 200mm, construction of the vessel showcases the reliability and capabilities of LEBW, setting a dramatic new standard for weld-joining thick walled components, previously untrialled in a demonstrator model. Professor Jesus Talamantes-Silva, Research, Design and Technology Director at Sheffield Forgemasters, said: “We are delighted to have reached a significant milestone in assembling a nuclear vessel demonstrator, using electron beam welding for the first time at this scale, with 100 per cent success and no defects.” Sheffield Forgemasters deployed specially developed parameters, meticulously fine-tuned during the welding development stage, including innovative sloping-in and sloping-out techniques to start and finish the weld, ensuring a clean and complete weld-join. It is the only company in the UK with the capability to manufacture the large forgings required for SMRs, and it now has years of developmental lead on global competitors in welding thick-walled assemblies. Dr Michael Blackmore, Senior Development Engineer and Project lead, said: “The implication of this technology within the nuclear industry is monumental, potentially taking high cost welding processes out of the equation. “Not only does this reduce the need for weld-inspections, because the weld-join replicates the parent material, but it could also dramatically speed up the roll-out of SMR reactors across the UK and beyond, that’s how disruptive the LEBW breakthrough is.” The demonstration of LEBW technology’s potential opens new horizons for more efficient, low cost and less time-heavy nuclear assemblies and also has far reaching implications for other projects which require thick walled welded assemblies. Dr Jacob Pope, Development Engineer and LEBW machine tool installation lead, added: “We thank the Government’s Department for Energy Security and Net Zero for enabling the project through its Nuclear Innovation Program. “We also thank our esteemed partner, Cambridge Vacuum Engineering, for their invaluable support throughout this endeavour. Their remote and on-site assistance played an instrumental role in the success of this milestone, highlighting the collaborative spirit that drives us forward.” Future company activities include an upcoming joint industrial project supported by key participants from the USA and UK. The objective is to initiate a code case or multiple cases to facilitate the deployment of this technology in accordance with the standards set by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).