No improvement in civil engineering workloads, CECA warns

The Civil Engineering Contractors Association (CECA) survey of civil engineering workload trends has revealed no improvement of the trend in new orders won by contractors.

And, so says the April survery, there has also been a weakening of expectations of the trend in orders in the coming 12 months.

This is despite indications of a slight recovery in total civils workload, driven mainly by better results for the change in work on both strategic and local roads.

For the change in order books there is a better result for work on motorways and trunk roads, but the result for orders for work on local roads has gone the other way. The result for change in orders for this type of work is the weakest for more than a year.

Once again, overall results are bolstered by those for the change in and orders for works carried out in preparation for building developments, and other civil engineering works not counted in the official statistics for ‘infrastructure’.

Historically most important for smaller firms, these works are now also important for many larger contractors, especially with increasing use of brownfield sites for new building developments.

The latest CECA survey results confirm the recovery of the civils market in Scotland, mainly on account of a revival of work for the recently reorganised water industry.

However, as the Scottish market improves, contractors in Scotland are not sharing in the easing of cost pressures and in the supply situations for labour, plant and materials that is evident in England and Wales.

CECA chairman Peter Heathershaw said: “It comes as no surprise that our latest survey provides little indication of improvement of civil engineering’s situation across Great Britain as a whole, although the confirmation of recovery from the slump in Scotland is most welcome.

“Hopefully the election will be followed by resolution of some of the uncertainties that CECA members are facing, but I am not confident."