Construction showed a sharp increase in demand for temporary and contract staff in July, and was also joint top of the ranking of industries with highest demand for permanent staff.
The findings are drawn from the latest monthly “Report on Jobs” compiled by KPMG and the Recruitment Employers Federation.
The report is based on a survey of 400 recruitment and employment consultancies in the UK.
An index measuring demand for temporary construction workers stood at 69.6 in July, representing a sharp rise from the 61.0 recorded in June and indicating accelerating demand.
The second-placed nursing/medical/care sector scored 67.4 and the UK average for short-term workers was 62.2.
For permanent construction employees, the index stood at 68.3 in July 2015, significantly above the UK average of 63.2.
"Businesses are struggling to find the talent they need and this will have long-term implications for their growth plans and potentially impact the wider performance of the UK’s economy."
Bernard Brown, partner at KPMG
The survey, however, also shows that skills shortages are not unique to construction, with 43% of respondents to the survey saying that availability of permanent staff was down in July, the highest level in eight months.
Respondents to the survey said that availability of temporary and contract staff had deteriorated in all sectors in July, with a seasonally-adjusted index standing at 41.1, the highest level since March.
Bernard Brown, partner at KPMG, said: “Businesses are struggling to find the talent they need and this will have long-term implications for their growth plans and potentially impact the wider performance of the UK’s economy.
“The construction industry in particular is struggling to keep pace with demand, with businesses heavily recruiting both permanent and temporary workers.
“This is driving significant pay growth in the sector of almost 5%, even outstripping Britain’s surging services industry which in comparison saw pay increases of just over 3%.
“The risk is that a shortage of skilled labour in this sector could impede Britain’s major building projects and put the brakes on the country’s booming real estate market.”
As Brown said, construction’s skills shortages have helped to give the sector the highest year-on-year increase in pay, calculated as 4.9% compared to 1.5% in manufacturing, 3% in the private sector as a whole and just 0.4% in the public sector.
The survey identified architects, construction technical staff and surveyors as the most in-demand roles in the industry.
