North West to get 22,500 construction jobs boost

The Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) has today revealed figures that showing almost 22,500 new construction jobs will be created in the North West.

The CITB’s annual Construction Skills Network (CSN) report estimates that over the course of the next five years employment in construction employment will increase on average by 1.6% per year in the region, a sharper increase than the national rate of 1.1%.

The North West is anticipated to see an annual average growth rate of 2.6% in total construction output over the next five years, fractionally more than the UK rate of 2.5% following investment in the infrastructure and commercial sectors.

Infrastructure is expected to be the highest performing sector in the region with a yearly increase of 5.6%.

There are a number of current and new projects in the pipeline, such as work on the £290m, 10km long dual carriageway linking the A6 to Manchester Airport, numerous office and residential developments in Manchester city centre, and the nuclear power station at Moorside in Cumbria.

The CITB has teamed up with the construction industry to help people find out about the range of jobs and careers available by creating the Go Construct web portal.

Steve Housden, CITB Sector Strategy Manager for the North West, said: “We can’t build the Britain we want without apprenticeships and the careers they lead to. That’s why we want these new statistics, showing solid, sustained growth, to inspire more people across the North West to start apprenticeships and more construction firms to take them on.

“We also want to attract workers who have left the industry to return, and upskill those in it, so we can deliver major projects and new housing faster and better.”

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