• employment in the UK (2005) over 2 million
• 7% of total employment in UK
• 40% of construction workforce are self-employed
• Gross UK domestic output of 8%
• output of £77 billion
• over 90% of companies employ fewer than 10
• 34% of UK workforce are qualified to S/NVQ Level 3 or above
• 80% of the workforce is male
• productivity comparable to international construction sectors

Smallest occupational group is scaffolders.  The largest occupational groups:

• wood trades
• managers 
• electricians
• clerical
• bricklayers

Source: Working Futures 2006 and Sector Skills Agreement for Construction – England 2005

Total employment in construction has slowly increased over the last 10 years.  The number of those who are self-employed in the UK construction sector have increased significantly by 28% between 2000 and 2004.  In comparison, direct employment in the sector has increased by 1% over the same period.

After recent rapid growth, total employment covered in the sector is anticipated to remain fairly static over the next 10 years.  This sector has very high shares of self-employment.  In 2004, more than 35% of workers covered by CITB-ConstructionSkills were self-employed.  Skilled trades dominate the occupational distribution of employment: almost 2-in-5 workers in CITB-ConstructionSkills are in this occupational group.

There are 201,100 enterprises generating £152 billion of turnover.  The number of private contractors in the sector has decreased overall for the period 1994-2004 in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.  The South East has the highest number of firms (32,046), compared to the North East which has only 4,634.  The number of firms with less than 7 employees has also decreased since 1994, from approximately 184,500 firms to 153,500 firms.  In contrast, larger organisations have increased significantly.  The number of firms with over 1,200 employees has double over the 1994-2004 period.

In 2002, average gross weekly earnings of full-time male manual workers were £411.10, compared to £611.30 for the counterparts in non-manual work.

Source:  Working Futures 2006, DTI 2005,  Sector Skills Agreement for Construction – England 2005 and Data provided by CITB-ConstructionSkills 2005

For more data on employment trends in the sector see:

47% of Trades are self-employed.  Professionals, on the other hand, are twice as likely as Trades to work for limited companies.  Similar proportions of Trades and Professionals work as sole-traders (31% compared to 37%).  67% of Trade owners are aged 35-54 years working, predominately, in the domestic sector (64%).  The majority of Professionals are aged 45 years plus.  Professionals mainly work in the domestic sector (49%) and the commercial sector (38%).  The age profile and experience of the Trades and Professionals is that of long-established businesses.  Nearly half of those self-employed as Trades and Professionals are satisfied with their current size, but professionals are more likely to aspire to growth.

On-the-job learning is considered more valuable than formal training, as it requires up-front investment and trainees often move on after.  47% of Trade firms and 46% of micro-professionals do not train their staff.  Professionals (46%) are more likely to provide off-the-job training compared to Trades (26%), but provide less training overall.

77% of Trades and 84% of Professionals want a combination of on-site and college training.

Source: Sector Skills Agreement for Construction – England 2005

Since the last recession, construction has been more stable and many employers are now finding that skills shortages are becoming increasingly problematic.  Future skill demands in the construction sector are focused upon the development of communication, project, people and financial management skills.  IT skills are particularly under-developed.  The sector is currently operating close to full capacity in a tight labour market and severe skills shortages are reported across most of the sector.  Construction has a disproportionately high share of hard-to-fill and skills shortage vacancies.

The shift from strictly demarcated trades towards a more generalist, multi-skilled approach to the construction process is a current and on-going issue for the industry.  Whilst quite specific skills are often required for the substantial market in refurbishment and maintenance, there is also a growing need for a broader set of skills for the site assembly of prefabricated components.  Increasingly, a range of tasks are performed by one individual, who is therefore required to have a proportion of the skills of each specialism. 

In addition, the construction industry has suffered from both a poor public image and a poor safety record.  These factors combined mean that the qualification of the workforce will remain high on the agenda for the industry.  See education and training for more information on qualifying the workforce.

Source: Skills Needs Analysis for the Construction Industry 2004 and Skills in England 2003

For more information on skills shoratage and hard-to-fill vacancies, plus replacement and expansion demands see:

Future employment in the construction is based on the following statistics:

• output increased by 4%
• new private housing increased by 12%, new public housing by 10% and other public work by 20%
• repair, maintenance and improvement increased by 7%
• infrastructure decreased by 11%
• commercial work decreased by 6%
• industrial work decreased by 6%

Future employment is the sector is forecast to grow by 2.3% per annum until 2008.

The potential for rapid technological change to transform the sector through process innovation (improved building techniques) and product innovation (higher quality buildings) is increasing.  The use of pre-fabricated units on-site has enabled the industry to make improvements in productivity.

Construction activity is particularly sensitive to the economic cycle and tends to suffer higher peaks and lower troughs compared to other sectors.  Large fluctuations in activity typically mean that in times when output is rising, skills shortages have built up quickly.  However, the traditional ‘boom-bust’ cycle has meant that a fall in activity tends to follow shortly afterwards, which has resulted in an equally sharp decline in skills shortages as more labour becomes available.  Consequently, skills shortages have not presented the industry with severe difficulties, as their duration has been temporary.

59% of employers in construction expect an increase in their work, 36% expecting their workload to remain the same and 5% expecting a decrease in workload.

There is a need for the industry to recruit and retain 88,000 trained people each year for the next 5 years.

Source: DTI 2004, CITB-ConstructionSkills Employer's Skill Needs Survey 2003 and Skills Foresight Report 2003

For more details on future drivers and challenges for the sector see: