Building industry worker numbers fell by 16% in July

THE NUMBER of building workers in the Republic fell by 16 per cent in July, according to the latest figures.

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) said yesterday that employment in private sector construction companies with five or more staff fell by 16 per cent in the 12 months ended last July.

The CSO's construction employment index does not give actual figures for employment or job losses in the industry.

Figures released last week by the Department of the Environment indicate that up to 30,000 jobs could have been lost in the house-building industry alone this year. According to the department, builders began work on 15,386 new homes in the first six months of 2008, less than half the 31,747 that they commenced during the same period last year.

Each new house built is estimated to employ two people, so a fall on that scale indicates that more than 30,000 jobs could have been lost in this sector alone in the first half of the year.

Construction firms built 88,000 new homes in 2006, when the residential industry hit its peak. They employed more than 180,000 people at that time.

The CSO's figures show that employment in the overall industry is down 18 per cent on mid-2006. Two years ago, just over 280,000 people worked in construction. An 18 per cent fall on that figure translates as a loss of over 50,000 jobs.

The Republic's building industry is one of the activities that the credit crunch has hit hardest. The high interest rates and low availability of credit makes it difficult to fund new projects and slows demand for new homes.

The banking crisis has accelerated the rate at which residential building has been slowing. The industry hoped that large scale, publicly-funded infrastructure projects would help take up the slack as house building slowed.

However, a shortfall in the public purse means that such developments are also under threat. Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan is expected to include some measures aimed at easing the pressure on the building industry when he publishes his first Budget next month.