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Under the New Roads and Street Works Act (1991) (NRSWA), the installation, renewal, maintenance and inspection of underground apparatus in any streets or roads must be under the control of competent people.

Your team, working, or supervising, works in the highway could be required to hold one or more of the Street Works qualifications, depending on their job. There are sixteen units of competence for Operatives and Supervisors. Nine units apply to Operatives and eight to Supervisors. One unit (Unit 1) applies to both groups.

This means that street works will be supervised by a qualified street works ‘supervisor’. In addition, whether the street is excavated or not, a ‘trained operative’, with an ‘operative’ qualification must be present on site at all times when the work is in progress. One person cannot cover the operative and supervisor roles for a site at the same time.

Street Works cards must be renewed every five years. Registration on the Streetworks Qualifications Register (SWQR) must be current in order for someone to act as a qualified operative or supervisor.In England card holders need to be reassessed every 5 years. A card can be renewed six months either side of the expiry date shown on it, with the new card valid for five years from when the old one expires. Your team must attend a training provider for the re-assessment test in order to update the card.  

Candidates who re-register in the six months after the card has expired cannot work as certified operatives/supervisors until the card has been re-registered.

If the card has lapsed for more than the 6 months, the team member will need to attend a full training course and sit the qualifications again.  Different rules apply in Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales.

Merit Skills’ course MS-123 provides participants with the skills and knowledge necessary to carry out or monitor the excavation, backfill and reinstatement of the highway, in accordance with the Specification for the Reinstatement of Openings in Highways (3rd edition April 2010) and the Code of Practice for Safety at Street works and Road works 2002.

By the end of the course the participants will be able to carry out or monitor the following:

  • Interpret utility plans for underground apparatus
  • Demonstrate competence in the use of pipe & cable location equipment
  • Identify Underground Apparatus
  • Select and deploy suitable signing and guarding equipment
  • Select , check and position portable traffic signals
  • Identify the construction layers in footways and carriageways
  • Employ safe excavation techniques and support utility apparatus
  • Select ,check and store excavated and imported materials for re-use
  • Lay and compact bituminous and non-bituminous reinstatement materials
  • Select and use suitable compaction equipment
  • Safely dispose of surplus materials

Book your training now

MS-123 - Excavation, backfill and reinstatement for operatives (1-6 and 9) and supervisors (1, 10-14 and 16)

5 days

£600 + VAT per person

Call 01733 246415 to discuss your requirements or email info@meritskills.co.uk

Peterborough Training Centre, 9 Broadway Business Park, Yaxley, Peterborough, PE7 3EN

www.meritskills.co.uk

The following courses are also available:

MS-115 - New Roads & Streetworks (NRSWA) Refresher and Reassessment (Operatives & Supervisors)

MS-127 - New Roads and Street Works – Signing, Lighting and Guarding for Operatives or Monitoring Signing, Lighting & Guarding for Supervisors