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Tag: capital investment

A £20 billion repair bill to fix the UK construction industry after the recession

A £20 billion repair bill to fix the UK construction industry after the recession

Just what has been the cost to construction of the recession? Could and should policymakers have made the slump in activity less painful? Were there better policy options? These questions need desperate attention. Mistakes were made. Bad and avoidable mistakes, in my view. Lessons must be learned. Construction is a strategic industry. Having a construction industry is not an option for any nation. That makes it special, like health, education or defence. Recessions can disproportionately hit construction. The damage, however, will…

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Six graphs showing the pain suffered by construction firms from 2008 to 2012

Six graphs showing the pain suffered by construction firms from 2008 to 2012

Recessions are gruesome and unfair things. They do not strike evenly and that is plain to see in this selection of graphs drawn from data  the provisional results of the Annual Business Survey 2012, released today. Readers should use caution and note that these are figures taken from businesses. They do not necessarily reflect the actual performance of the industries as a whole, as for instance the turnover data are not consolidated. So it will reflect, for instance, intertrading among firms…

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