GQA Qualifications

As of February 2025, there was a significant change to the CSCS card for Labourers.

On the 1st February 2025, the first application of the Labourer card ‘‘lifespan” reduced from 5 years to 2 years. This applies to all cards requested from the 1st Feb onwards, regardless of the course date.

Workers who continue to be employed as Labourers at the time the card reaches the expiry date will be able to renew the card for a further 5 years but must provide evidence that they are employed in a labouring role.

Following the success of the 2024 conference, we intend to host another even better event towards the end of 2025 to help keep you up to speed on industry and legislative changes that may affect your business. What would you like to see at this year's conference?

Promote a programme of regular digital newsletters to keep everyone informed about GQA-related matters. Keep an eye out for this!

Invest in a business development team to help ensure we can, together, best service the needs and challenges facing your business.

Introduce chipped CSCS cards to help reduce potential fraud. Want to know more? The 2025/26 full statement can be read on the GQA website: https://ow.ly/fGrr50UQgOt

We are working to Improve systems and processes to provide better reporting and management of learners and their portfolios, including GQA Online. This is another initiative we believe is important for 2025/26.

The 2025/26 Company Statement, highlights the initiatives GQA believe are the most important for the coming year. We are looking at launching an online facility for individuals and centres to renew or replace CSCS labour cards which will speed up the administration and distribution of cards. Creating a more streamlined process.

With GQA continuing to grow, and with more new opportunities and exciting developments ahead of us during 2025 and into the early part of 2026, we want to ensure that the way we communicate guarantees that you are always up to speed with news and information that may be important.

The first of several initiatives that GQA believe are among the most important for the coming year is that we intend to Invest in product development to meet the skills challenges facing the UK and wider afield.

We’ll be sharing more on our plans for 2025/26 in the next few days.

From February 2025, there will be a significant change to the CSCS card for Labourers.

As of the 1st February 2025, on the first application the Labourer card ‘‘lifespan” will reduce from 5 years to 2 years. This applies to all cards requested from the 1st Feb onwards, regardless of the course date.

Workers who continue to be employed as Labourers at the time the card reaches the expiry date will be able to renew the card for a further 5 years but must provide evidence that they are employed in a labouring role.

To assist and reduce the burden on individuals, the Health and Safety test used for the initial application only will now be valid for 3 years from the completion date allowing it to be used as part of the renewal process.

As part of a renewal application, CSCS require individuals to provide evidence of employment as a Labourer. The evidence required must be to provide one of the following:

A fully completed GQA 348 template. This must be completed by the learner and provided with the application to GQA.

OR

A letter on company headed paper from the Employer (or from the Main Contractor for self-employed individuals)

Please note, that this is not a change introduced by, or restricted to, GQA’s Labourer card, it applies to all CSCS Alliance Members, including direct applications made to CSCS.

Confirmation of this can be found in the link below:
https://ow.ly/kuGg50UPrKs

A full YouTube video on CSCS cards can be viewed from the following link:
https://ow.ly/8TxF50UPrKz