Month in numbers

10
The number of cubic metres of air which the new Part L of the Building Regs allows to escape from a building every hour. Contractors should have been testing all buildings over 1,000 sq m since the rule came in last April. John Prescott's office has ordered building control officers to be more strict in checking tests have been done. The tests are done a couple of days before handover.

But how do you test a building for air tightness? You transport a big fan to site. Close all windows and doors and tape over air-con vents. Attach fan by board with flange to double doors and blow air in until the pressure reaches 50 pascals. Instrumentation on the fan then measures how much air is escaping.

Stuart Moxon, compliance testing manager at Taylor Woodrow Technology, says the whole process takes two hours.

12
The amount - in per cent - by which industry scored better than Rethinking Construction demonstration projects for client satisfaction with service: 71% compared to 59%.

And your average job outperformed demo projects on predictability of cost, as well, with 59% against the demo projects' 55%. In all other categories, the Rethinking Construction exemplars scored higher than industry. However demo projects' scores for 2003 were lower than in 2002 in six categories: client satisfaction with product and service, defects, predictability of construction cost and predictability of design time and construction time. Industry is improving in all but one.

Rethinking Construction chairman Alan Crane said: "I think that we have reached a plateau because expectation levels are going up. The target is becoming tougher."

198
The number of senior managers in construction firms, out of 200 surveyed by KPMG, who said that skills shortages are damaging their business; 36% said profits would be squeezed, 36% said deadlines would slip and 27% are turning away work.

So what did the boardroom-dwellers suggest to improve the situation? A resounding 65% had no response. The most popular answer was salary and benefits increase at 12%.

Despite the greatest skills gap being for skilled tradesmen (56%) only 4% thought that better health and safety would improve the industry's appeal.

Employing more women and people from ethnic minorities was not the solution for many. 68% said they were not concerned about women's under-representation in construction. That rose to 78% who were unconcerned about the lack of ethnic minorities.

48m
The fixed-price sum set for Taylor Woodrow's contract to build the Welsh Assembly. And that doesn't include IT and furniture.

This figure is four times the sum mooted in 1998, and the Welsh Assembly has already spent £7.5m on it. But by capping the building costs Welsh politicians will be hoping to avoid the controversies of the Scottish Parliament.

The Assembly sacked the Richard Rogers Partnership, which had won an architectural competition to design the building, in July 2001 over concerns about rising costs. However, it then reinstated the firm in January this year as part of a Taywood-led consortium which will see RRP as a consultant with Arup and M&E engineer BDSP.

Work is planned to begin in August this year, completing in August 2005.

4bn
The cost of the redevelopment project at the dormant Millennium Dome. Mayor Ken Livingstone last month gave his consent to consortium Meridian Delta's planning application, which encompasses 190 acres of land on the Greenwich Peninsula as well as the failed visitor attraction. He didn't get the 50% social housing he was holding out for, but the developer, which is made up of Quintain Estates and Lend Lease, upped percentage from 35 to 38.

The consortium will transform the Dome into a 26,000-seater venue for sporting and entertainment events which will be run by Anschutz Entertainment Group. Meridian has planned 10,000 homes, 340,000 sq m of offices and 33,000 sq m of retail.

The government selected Meridian Delta to work in joint venture with English Partnerships in December 2001.