Social housing hardest hit in ongoing construction decline
4th August 2015

Building in the UK is still not shaking out of its post-election gloom, largely due to a ‘steep decline’ in social housing project starts according to industry analyst Glenigan. The underlying value of construction starts fell by 27% year on year in the quarter to July.

The news was better in private housing, where an 8% year on year drop in starts was modest enough to keep the sector in growth for 2015 so far.

The social housing decline is largely attributed to a steep decline on projects gaining consent in 2014 but Glenigan also notes that housing associations are now digesting the new challenged to their business and funding models as a result of new Conservative government policies such as mandated rent reductions and the extensions to right-to-buy.

Non-residential activity suffered a 26% decline in the quarter, with the commercial, public and industrial sectors all contributing to the decline.

Regionally, only North East England was any upturn, at 13%, though the South East saw a drop of only 1%, the first sign of improvement since activity began to contract last spring.

www.glenigan.com