Mayor of London Ken Livingstone said he wanted to get more women into Olympic construction jobs, but there weren’t many on view during a site visit this week.

Instead, there was Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell donning hard hat, safety goggles and Caterpillar boots. The floral jacket seemed a bit out of place, but maybe it was proof you could still be a woman in a man’s world.

She was there to promote a construction training scheme for the unemployed, especially those from run-down east London. The area will be the venue for the Olympic Park, including the main stadium, velopark and aquatics centre as well as the Olympic village and media centre.

The Plant Training Centre is part of the government’s 2012 legacy plans.

“For many, the legacy of the Games will begin now, by securing access to the jobs and opportunities which are being created,” said Councillor Chris Roberts, leader of Greenwich Council, which is one of the five host boroughs for the Games.

Even Prime Minister Gordon Brown commented: “The construction of the site can be the catalyst for lasting and social and economic change.”

The centre offers employment hope in an area where hundreds of thousands of traditional industrial, manufacturing and docklands jobs have disappeared over the decades.

During the past three months, 40 unemployed people have enlisted for the five to 10-day courses, run by the National Construction College.

They learnt to drive forklift trucks, forward tipping dump trucks, excavators or road rollers, with 78 percent passing. The plan is for 200 to go through the training by June 2009.

Not all took to it. For some, the chance to work on one of the most iconic projects the country has seen for a long time was not enough to get them out of bed.

The ones likely to succeed are those with the right attitude — and a talent for PlayStation. Apparently, the video game console is good for eye-hand co-ordination, skills needed in the construction industry.

One who did pass and who has since been taken on is Martin Eaton. The 47-year-old from Bethnal Green, in London, is working on the area which will form the archery venue during the Paralympic Games.

He understood the impact of the legacy.

“The Olympic Games was a factor behind me wanting to train as a construction worker because I would like to say I had a hand in helping it,” he said.