Posted by James Mace at 16:41 on 14 May 2010 The search is on to find the nation's best whistling builder. The campaign, called Whistle While You Work, is being spearheaded by David Morris, the World Whistling Champion.
The first rounds will be held in TradePoint stores around Britain and contestants will be judged on their volume, range, creativity, etiquette and tunefulness - plus of course the infamous builder's wolf whistle.
Posted by James Mace at 17:07 on 12 May 2010 After Gordan Brown's swift exit from Downing Street yesterday, builders have arrived at the famous address today to help new Prime Minister David Cameron to move in. A truck from a building services company which specialises in removing partition walls was seen parked outside No10 today.
Posted by James Mace at 10:10 on 06 May 2010 Phil Spencer, star of Location, Location, Location, has helped to launch the Federation of Master Builders search for Britain's Master Builder.
Posted by James Mace at 12:12 on 27 Apr 2010 The families of two workers killed at the Olympics site in Stratford are planning a protest to call for better health and safety in the industry.
Both Shaun Curry, 39 and Harry Sheridan, 58 lost their lives in accidents on Olympic-related projects. Workers will on Thursday stop work and march from Pudding Mill Lane, Stratford, to the Stratford City site, where a commemorative event will take place.
Posted by Ivy Lamb at 17:09 on 23 Apr 2010 Builder Joe Larkin hit back over the way he was portrayed on an episode of Channel Five’s Cowboy Builders.
Homeowners Nicola and Sam King called producers of the show after sacking Mr Larkin’s firm, which had been employed to add a first floor to their Egerton bungalow.
Posted by Ivy Lamb at 14:17 on 23 Apr 2010 A Birmingham builder who suffered a major loss of income thanks to the recession was given a two-and-a-half year jail sentence for running a cannabis farm at his home.
Michael Hanlon, 31, could have made up to £58,000 from the operation. Hanlon has previously admitted charges of cultivating cannabis and abstracting electricity.
Posted by James Mace at 11:55 on 20 Apr 2010 Posted by Ivy Lamb at 15:31 on 16 Apr 2010 A builder from Attleborough will run the entire length of Britain to raise money for three charities after they helped save the life of his friend.
Matt Harrison, 29, will run 873 miles from John o' Groats to Lands End. "I hope to run 30 miles a day and give myself one day off a week. Hopefully I should be able to complete it in 35 to 40 days. I have done two London Marathons before so I have experience."
Posted by Ivy Lamb at 16:28 on 01 Apr 2010 Betty Wagstaff had £1,000 worth of work done to her garage roof by South Devon cowboy builder Brian Joseph Kerr.
Wagstaff, who had no idea that Kerr was not a legitamate builder, is now even worse off than she was before. The garage is warped and the roof leaks. Repairs will cost over £1000.
Kerr was banned last week for 15 years from managing a company without the permission of the courts.The rogue builder used a string of aliases and different trading names to hide his bad building practice.
Posted by Ivy Lamb at 12:32 on 25 Mar 2010 Posted by James Mace at 16:46 on 23 Mar 2010 A study by bank Santander has found that cowboy builders have caused almost £7 billion worth of damage to homes in the UK.
According to the research, nearly one in five or 18% of UK households have been affected by shoddy workmanship, totalling £6.8 billion and an average of £1,592 per job.
Posted by James Mace at 17:19 on 16 Mar 2010 The Considerate Constructors Scheme (CSS), charged with discovering London's most considerate builder, has unvealed Andy Lock as it's winner for 2009.
Posted by James Mace at 15:18 on 15 Mar 2010 Building regulations in the UK are set to be changed in October this year to improve the energy efficiency of new build and refurbished homes.
The following changes to building regulations will be made to Parts L, F and J to make homes 25% more efficient:
Posted by James Mace at 11:15 on 05 Mar 2010 Builders from Southampton were shocked to discover an unexploded German World War II bomb at a building site that they were working on.
Posted by James Mace at 17:17 on 04 Mar 2010 A train station in Carlisle has been given an exciting new DIY makeover in preparation for the filming of a new television advert. The station's bridge has received a stripy-coloured makeover, while one of the platforms has been transformed with turquoise paint, purple wallpaper and lampshades hanging from the ceiling.

Posted by James Mace at 09:28 on 03 Mar 2010 A new deposit protection insurance has been introduced by the Federation of Master Builders (FMB) to help to protect homeowners.
Posted by James Mace at 16:12 on 02 Mar 2010 A builder from Northumberland has received 90 letters from the Inland Revenue saying he owed £100 - and 90 more saying he didn't.
Trevor Bell, of Bedlington, Northumberland said: "They would not fit in the postman's bag." The Revenue is said to be investigating the mix up.
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Posted by James Mace at 15:06 on 26 Feb 2010 A builder from Yorkshire has been jailed for four years after conning homeowners out of tens of thousands of pounds.
Darryl Glynn from Selby managed to get customers to hand over £54,990 for work that was left undone, leading to rain-damaged houses that had to be vacated and bills of at least £34,000 to fix.
Posted by James Mace at 11:29 on 23 Feb 2010 A new survey has revealed that the average Brit spends more than two weeks of their lives waiting for tradesmen. The time is equivalent to 366 hours or 15 days.
Posted by James Mace at 10:44 on 16 Feb 2010 Posted by James Mace at 09:42 on 19 Jan 2010 Posted by James Mace at 17:33 on 12 Jan 2010 A builder from Lewisham is telling people to ‘do their homework’ before hiring someone to carry out work on their home.
Posted by James Mace at 10:59 on 05 Jan 2010 The world's tallest building was officially opened yesterday. Standing at 2,717 feet (828 metres) tall, the Burj Khalifa tower in Dubai dwarfes its nearest rival, the Taipei 101, and has 160 floors with 500,000 sq m of space for offices and flats.
Posted by James Mace at 17:04 on 26 Oct 2009 A local house builder from Cambridgeshire is doing its bit to save one of Britain's most beloved endangered species of bird, the swift.
Posted by James Mace at 10:43 on 30 Sep 2009 A builder from Watford has admitted conning four elderly homeowners out of thousands of pounds. Thomas O'Brien admitted overcharging the pensioners by a total of almost £20,000 at St Albans Crown Court.
Posted by James Mace at 09:21 on 29 Sep 2009 Former Baywatch star Pamela Anderson is being sued by five building companies after failing to settle unpaid bills.
The 42-year old actress allegedly owes more than £690,000 for work carried out on her new home in Malibu, California.
Posted by James Mace at 12:50 on 15 Sep 2009 Posted by James Mace at 12:21 on 11 Sep 2009 All you tradesmen out there could be in luck. Recently married Carly Zucker claims that she'd find new husband Joe Cole just as attractive if he was builder.
The brunette beauty stated in a recent interview that,
Posted by James Mace at 08:27 on 12 Aug 2009 It can seem like mission impossible but if you do the right research they can be tracked down. Why can't builders just turn up on time, do the job properly and stick to budget?. And how do you get them to do so? Having renovated many houses and flats in the last few years, I have learnt that the answer lies in careful research and painstaking paperwork.
The first step is to find a good builder, because a bad one will want to rack up costs.
Posted by James Mace at 12:16 on 06 Aug 2009 Posted by James Mace at 17:02 on 31 Jul 2009 A family of five from Hull has been left homeless after claiming to be stung by a cowboy builder.
The Allen family from west Hull was hit by flooding six months ago and after moving into rented accomodation, paid £26,000 upfront to a builder who failed to carry out the work.
They have since been told that the property could be condemned.
Tracey Allen, 39, said: "We had to move out in February although we discovered the secondary flooding just before Christmas.
Posted by James Mace at 14:21 on 21 Jul 2009 A buider from Taiwan has had a miraculous escape after shooting a nail through his own heart.
Ling Sen, 38, accidently fired a 6cm nail from a nail gun towards his chest whilst labouring. The builder carried on working before he even realised that the nail was embedded in his body.
Posted by James Mace at 17:40 on 08 Jul 2009 For all you tradies out there who want to keep your finger on the pulse www.ebuild.co.uk have got a useful search facility where you can find out the latest building plots in the UK.
Each new building plot listed contains extensive details including the guide price, name of the owner and their contact details.
Go to www.ebuild.co.uk/building-plots to see what building plots have been registered in your area recently.
Posted by James Mace at 10:00 on 26 Jun 2009 Here at ProblemSolved we value the power of review.
Posted by Samee Mohammad at 17:28 on 13 Mar 2009 Gary Bates, a builder from Stroud, Gloucestershire, was so fed up with his wife's nagging that he put her up for sale in a trade magazine – getting "9 or 10" offers, it emerged today.
After the latest blast from wife Donna while she was watching Dancing on Ice, Gary snapped and placed the unusual advert in Trade-It.
"She was nagging me for doing something small, while she was watching some rubbish on TV,” complained the father of two. “So I just thought I'd put an ad in to get rid of her.”
Posted by Samee Mohammad at 17:01 on 06 Mar 2009 As the economy shrinks and competition for jobs heats up, unemployed builder Gary Gray reminds us that a direct approach sometimes works best.
Posted by Samee Mohammad at 10:47 on 10 Jul 2008 The economic downturn has had new house builders and developers quaking in their boots.
Posted by Samee Mohammad at 17:41 on 13 Jun 2008 The Federation of Master Builders has opened nominations for its annual Master Builder competition. It seems builders can even recommend themselves for these awards, which will cover the following areas: NEW HOMES. New Homes built by a builder who constructs fewer than 50 new homes a year SMALL RENOVATION PROJECTS. Professional residential / domestic restoration, refurbishment or extension costing less than £50,000 LARGE RENOVATION PROJECTS. Professional residential / domestic restoration, refurbishment or extension costing more than £250,000
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