Severe Skills Gap In Construction Industry

Companies have been urged to offer more apprenticeships to tackle the “severe” skills gap in the construction industry.There are now five applicants for every vacancy, according to a new study.

The study, from training firm ConstructionSkills, found that In England so far this year, over 12,000 candidates have applied to ConstructionSkills and thousands more are expected but to date only 2,400 vacancies have been offered by employers. With the housing market subdued and the increased difficulty of securing credit likely to affect construction, as with most other sectors, apprentices have an increasingly vital role to play in helping a business diversify their services and win new business.

Max Hamps, director of apprentices for ConstructionSkills, told the Financial Times newspaper: “There are hundreds of thousands of construction firms in England but only a fraction are taking on apprentices. The small businesses that thrive from generation to generation are those that appreciate the value of training.”