CPA Bulletin

28 CPA Bulletin > August 2024 www.cpa.uk.net TRAINING & CERTIFICATION: 1 Training and Certification Plant Operator Schemes Red Card Background to Red Cards The concept of what is commonly known as the ‘red card’ came into being for Plant Operators at the launch of the Construction Plant Competence Scheme (CPCS) back in 2003. CPCS was formed by the then CITB-CTA scheme along with Lantra Awards and National Plant Operator Registration Scheme (NPORS), in line with the construction industry’s CSCS card scheme requirement. CPCS introduced a two-stage carding process which comprised of a trained operator card - denoted by a red-coloured card and a competent operator card - denoted by being blue in colour, hence the industry adoption of the terminology of red cards and blue cards. The red card was attained by undertaking any relevant training and the resultant skills and knowledge being assessed by an end test. The red card was non-renewable with a limited validity and for which the card holder had to attain in that time, the National (or Scottish) Vocational Qualification (NVQ/SVQ) relevant to the item of plant they were tested on. The VQs are competence-based qualifications, attained through work place-based evidence. Red Card Site Acceptance An ongoing issue remains however that red card holders are in some cases being refused entry to site as either the organisation’s policy or site management perceives that all red card holders are novices with limited skills and experience. This is not always the case, for which the aim of this article is to provide some clarity as to red card holder’s abilities with example of various circumstances as to their stage of operational competency. In the first situation, the individual is a novice and undergone training and have to demonstrate a basic set of skills and knowledge at the point of testing on the machine. They will naturally have limited ability to work at site level and who would require a certain period under supervision to apply their learnt skills in the workplace. Without this transition period however, they will be unable to attain sufficient site experience to achieve the VQ, which prevents them from achieving the blue card within the red card validity period. The next situation is that a red card holder, although new to a category of machine, may already have sufficient site-experience through other trades, or is carded and experienced on other machine types and may become competent on the machine in a very short time, but will not have yet attained the VQ. The final situation is a competent operator who is experienced on the category of plant but is not carded e.g. coming from another sector and without having the VQ and needing to access the workplace, would only be eligible to go through the red card route and again, potentially unable to access site to carry out operating activities. A key factor with the last two situations is that the NVQ/SVQ qualification process requires evidence of operational ability from the workplace which is then mapped against the qualification standards by an approved assessor. This is a process that takes time to achieve, to which the red card holder could be very capable but in the process of attaining their evidence or awaiting to be signed off. There have been situations however where, although red card holders are accepted on some projects, that a red card holder may not have the required ability for a particular activity and therefore this is a skills issue rather than a carding issue. This should also apply to blue card holders who may also not have the ability to carry out certain functions without additional training. Assessing All Cardholders Although the industry through the Construction Leadership Council (CLC) is advocating VQ achievement as the indicator for competency, the guidance to the Construction, Design and Management Regulations (CDM) says that: ‘Sole reliance should not be placed on industry certification cards or similar being presented to them as evidence that a worker has the right qualities’. It then details the process to ensure that the individual should be assessed on their level of existing health and safety skills, knowledge, training and experience and then compare them with what they will need for the activity and provide additional training to take up any shortfall. CDM does however endorse the attainment of the VQ as a measure of competence. The two CSCS-alliance plant card schemes - CPCS and NPORS - on their respective websites offer learning content material which can be used to support an internal assessment process.