COVID-19: UK’s critical HVACR needs

Covid-19: Onus falls on industry to determine UK’s critical HVACR needs

 

HVAC in UK

 

Text from the next link: https://www.hvnplus.co.uk/uncategorised/covid-19-onus-falls-on-industry-to-determine-uks-critical-hvacr-needs-23-03-2020/

There is no formal government advice at present on how heating and cooling specialists should determine what projects should be postponed or considered essential in terms of the national pandemic response.

The HVACR sector is presently having to self-define the projects and work deemed to be vital in supporting critical UK infrastructure as the country aims to curb social interaction to limit the spread of the Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic.

Industry body BESA has said it has received no guidance from government at present on where heating or cooling projects should be prioritised or limited to try and limit social interaction and potential contamination from site workers.

David Frise, chief executive of the industry body, said that the task now fell to industry itself to collectively decide where and how work should be limited to protect the safety of staff and ensure that emergency work on vital building functions can be provided.

He said, “We would see work in hospitals, schools and the food supply chain and other public services, such as care homes, as priorities.”

Mr Frise said BESA was presently looking for industry feedback to better identify critical types of work that may be needed to keep key public sector buildings and homes safe.

The claims were made during a free-to-watch webinar provided by BESA that served as the first in a series of updates looking at the major and emerging impacts on industry from the restrictions placed on society by efforts to tackle Covid-19.

BESA’s guidance added that it would fall to individual companies to decide on where they feel it is safe to perform work such as ventilation cleaning, potentially in the case of a site that has experienced an outbreak of the Covid-19 virus.

Debbie Petford, legal and commercial director for BESA, has said that it would be down to companies to undertake sufficient risk assessment over their capability to continue to offer services and limit potential infection to staff.  This was further complicated by ongoing pressures among emergency workers such as healthcare professional in the NHS to ensure they had access to a sufficient supply of PPE to protect themselves against infection, BESA added.

Chancellor’s commitments

BESA said in the webinar that there was a also number of points of clarification still needed from authorities around a major financial support package announced late last week by Chancellor Rishi Sunak. This includes an unprecedented commitment to provide 80 per cent of monthly wages of UK staff furloughed due to the impacts of Covid-19 across all industry sectors.

The job retention scheme financing, which will be backdated to 1 March, is intended to support individuals unable to work at home or provide their usual services due to restrictions introduced by government to try and limit the pandemic.

These funds will apply for furloughed workers for monthly wages of up to £2,500 for an initial three-month period, with an option to extend further. The chancellor announced the scheme alongside a decision to defer VAT and income Tax for three months.

BESA said it hoped government would clarify a number of issues around the financial support measures, notably on how long a wait there would be to receive payment under the employee retention fund, with upfront costs having to be covered by the employer. The organisation said it hoped for more detail whether it would be mandatory for the remaining 20 per cent of wages owed to an employee to be covered by the employers themselves.

Guidance is expected to be set out in the coming days and weeks amidst initial uncertainty over the exact detail of the support measures government was introducing to support drastic societal changes as a result of the covid-19 pandemic.  These measures following similar steps intended to introduce mass self-isolation by governments across Europe and the rest of the world.