Annual orders figures reveal extent of construction freefall – a £17 billion drop in two years
February 11th, 2010
The recession has ripped away from construction roughly £17 billion in annual new orders, despite £ billions more public sector sponsored work.
That’s the clear message to me from the annual tot up of the new orders won by contractors released today.
Forget the niceties of which sector is doing how well and you are faced with the grim picture of an industry in near freefall.
In 2007 new orders in cash terms came to £50.6 billion. The figure for 2009 has been put at £33.6 billion.
That is a drop of a third.
But without the support of the public sector the drop would have been far more severe as over that period the public sector has sought to swell orders, either directly or through PFI-style funding.
Private housing, private commercial and private industrial orders in cash terms are running at about 40% of the level they were at peak.
Naturally the picture doesn’t look so bad if you look at the constant price volume figures.
But that just tells the other side of the story, construction having to do more work for less cash.
Related posts:
- Annual construction output forecast to fall £23.5 billion over next two years
The first of the spring forecasts for construction has winged its way... - Latest official figures reveal extent of the house building challenge
The release of the first quarter 2009 house building figures for England... - Case to boost construction grows as ONS figures reveal an industry accelerating into recession
The latest construction output figures suggest the decline is the industry is... - Why the latest orders figures are so disturbing
The latest official data for new orders in construction could be read... - Latest new orders figures cast a long dark shadow over construction
The construction new orders figures released by the Office for National Statistics...
