Council Painters Retrain to be Tilers

Council tenants in Durham City will wait less time for many maintenance jobs following a workforce revamp. More than half of the council's painters volunteered to retrain as tilers under a new initiative designed to multi-skill staff and cut waiting times for certain jobs. The council spent £5,000 to bring the plan to fruition, and believe it is money well spent.

Steve Brown, from the property services division, said: "These men all volunteered and have put in a great deal of hard work and dedication to reach NVQ level 2. "The council is proud to have funded this innovative programme of improving staff skills.

"It means our 6,000 tenants will wait less time for all tiling work, while the staff involved are now both qualified painters and tilers giving them greater skills for the future. "There is also more flexibility. If they are working on an outdoor painting job and it starts to pour with rain they can move inside to a tiling job."



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Tags: painters, training courses, tilers