Cowboy builders who rip off homeowners are to be targeted by drones in a new bid to protect the public.<\/p>\n
The devices will help council staff investigate complaints about rogue workmen and inspect shoddy jobs.<\/p>\n
Cameras fitted to the drones will stream live footage of roofs and other hard-to-reach spots to inspectors.<\/p>\n
The remote-controlled devices could also be used to gather evidence against builders and provide proof of planning control breaches.<\/p>\n
Dodgy contractors cost the UK economy \u00a310billon a year \u2013 up from \u00a33.5billion in 2010, according to the Federation of Master Builders.<\/p>\n
Trading standards chiefs have invested nearly \u00a32,000 in one of the hi-tech devices, which is to be licensed by the Civil Aviation Authority.<\/p>\n Matt O\u2019Neill, assistant head of planning and trading standards at North Yorkshire County Council, said: \u201cLike many councils, we use advances in technology to help us to work smarter.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a useful addition to the tools available to the county council, enabling us to make more efficient use of our limited resources and to enhance health and safety.\u201d<\/p>\n He said the drone could be used for inspections of poor roofing work and maintenance assessments of property, bridges and public footpaths.<\/p>\n Other councils could adopt a similar scheme if it proves successful. Mr O\u2019Neill added: \u201cWe researched the market and talked to other public sector drone users to identify the type that would meet our requirements, taking specialist advice from our legal and finance teams.\u201d<\/p>\n It comes amid a rising number of complaints about botched, unfinished and overpriced building work.<\/p>\n Separate research based on criminal convictions by website PropertyHeads shows high-risk areas for cowboys are County Durham, Kent and Essex.<\/p>\n The firm recently launched an online database to shame rogue traders.<\/p>\n Around 1,000 convicted offenders have been named on the website after being checked against court records.<\/p>\n Users will be able to look through the blacklist as part of their background checks before hiring workmen.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/li>\n <\/a><\/li>\n <\/a><\/li>\n <\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Cowboy builders who rip off homeowners are to be targeted by drones in a new bid to protect the public. Drones are already having a major impact on the way we live<\/p>\n Matt O\u2019Neill, assistant head of planning and trading standards at North Yorkshire County Council, said: \u201cLike many councils, we use advances in technology to help us to work smarter.Read More<\/h4>\n
Top news stories from Mirror Online<\/h3>\n
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\n The devices will help council staff investigate complaints about rogue workmen and inspect shoddy jobs.
\n Cameras fitted to the drones will stream live footage of roofs and other hard-to-reach spots to inspectors.
\n The remote-controlled devices could also be used to gather evidence against builders and provide proof of planning control breaches.
\n Dodgy contractors cost the UK economy \u00a310billon a year \u2013 up from \u00a33.5billion in 2010, according to the Federation of Master Builders.
\n Trading standards chiefs have invested nearly \u00a32,000 in one of the hi-tech devices, which is to be licensed by the Civil Aviation Authority.<\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt\u2019s a useful addition ..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19083\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mdpair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}