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Tag: new orders

Latest stats pour cold water on construction growth prospects and house building

Latest stats pour cold water on construction growth prospects and house building

For those who read the latest output figures and cheerily saw an industry enjoying boom level growth in the second quarter, here is a bucket of cold water from the national statisticians at the ONS – the new orders figures. The fact that the orders figures are down is not totally unexpected. There was a clear and planned surge in public sector spending – some cynically suggesting that this was connected to the General Election in May. This surge was…

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A last hurrah for construction before the axe falls

A last hurrah for construction before the axe falls

If you didn’t know what was coming, you could read the latest set of figures for construction orders and output as very promising indeed, with contractors both winning more work and doing more work in recent months. In constant prices, output in the three months to May was as strong as in any quarter since the third quarter of 2008 – you remember the quarter in which Lehman Brothers collapsed and the world’s financial markets went into convulsions. Certainly, after…

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Annual orders figures reveal extent of construction freefall – a £17 billion drop in two years

Annual orders figures reveal extent of construction freefall – a £17 billion drop in two years

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…

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