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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 28 Jun 1984

Vol. 352 No. 5

Written Answers. - Building Industry.

356.

asked the Minister for the Environment if he noted in the CIF-EEC survey of the Irish building industry report for March 1984 the growing proportion of firms which have been forced to cease building altogether; and if so, the corrective measures he proposes.

The CIF-EEC survey of the construction industry is a relatively new indicator of short-term trends in building and construction. The survey attempts to measure the opinions of a sample of firms engaged in building and construction on past and future trends in building output, prices, employment and the level of work in progress. Like all opinion surveys, the results must be treated with caution and are open to a number of interpretations. Subject to these qualifications, it is noteworthy that the results of the March survey are, in general, more optimistic than those of earlier surveys. In particular, a higher percentage of respondents in the residential and non-residential sectors reported increased activity compared with the previous quarter and also reported improved prospects for the following quarter. Among the important information contained in the survey is the average number of months required to finish work in progress and contracts in hand on the survey date. In the case of the non-residential and civil engineering sectors of the industry the level of work which the firms had in progress and for which contracts were in hand at the end of March was above that at the end of March 1983 while in all sectors the level in March 1984 was above the level in December 1983.

The Deputy's question refers to the proportion of residential building firms reported in the March 1984 survey as having been forced to cease building altogether — 19 per cent in the March 1984 quarter, compared with 15 per cent in the December 1983 quarter. In interpreting these figures a number of factors must be borne in mind. Firstly, it is inherent in the nature of the industry that a number of firms may experience periods of inactivity between the completion of projects and the starting of new ones. Secondly, ease of entry and exit have always been traditional features of the industry, and thirdly, the fact that the information on the proportion of firms to have ceased building was given for the first time in the March survey suggests that special caution should be exercised in interpreting it until the results of further observations are available.

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