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Provisions for changes to the act were not made in the Queen鈥檚 speech, which means that proposed amendments to payment and adjudication procedures will probably not go before parliament this year.

If the reforms were to be made, they would have to be appended to another piece of legislation or introduced as a private member鈥檚 bill.

Supporters of the act still hope it could pass through parliament as part of the bill that will set up the Homes and Communities Agency. Construction lawyers said this was 鈥減ossible but unlikely鈥�.

Prime minister Gordon Brown did, however, add a draft apprenticeships bill to the government鈥檚 programme.

This will put into law the government target of offering an apprenticeship to every student that wants one by 2013.

This could amount to 500,000 places by 2020.

The move to promote apprenticeships received a mixed response from the industry.

Max Hamps, director of ConstructionSkills Apprenticeships, praised the draft bill as 鈥渃ritical鈥� but Amy Tschudin, manager of the Chartered Surveyors Training Trust, said unless greater funding was given it 鈥渨ill not add up鈥�.

Other measures included in the programme were:

• A bill to increase protection for vulnerable workers
• A bill to put infrastructure projects such as airports and power stations under a single consent regime
• A bill to make the government鈥檚 carbon reduction target of 60% by 2050 legally binding.