Big jobs to fuel building surge

But growth is predicted to ease in 2006.

The latest forecast from quantity surveyors Rider Hunt predicts an 18 per cent increase in the value of non-residential building work put in place in the year to March 2005.

The forecast comes just as Statistics Department figures showed a 42 per cent increase in non-residential building work in September compared to September last year.

Rider Hunt said some of the heat is forecast to dissipate the following year when growth should slow to just 5 per cent, as a result of softer household consumption growth, interest rate rises, a reduction in disposable income and a downturn in house-building and net migration.

The Rider Hunt survey, prepared by the Institute of Economic Research, found that construction industry growth was on a par with that of the mid-1990s construction boom.

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