Speed is vital in investment in public sector jobs to alleviate the ailing construction industry in Scotland, recruiters have claimed.

Following the publication of the Scottish government’s budget bill for 2009-10, which would commit £230m to public sector projects over the next year, Chris Logue, director at Eden Scott, which has a public sector division dedicated to NHS, education, local government and notfor- profit organisations, told Recruiter that the key issue for Scottish staffing firms would be the speed of the recruitment process.

“Major capital projects have to go out to tender, so the big projects will take a while as they go through a rigorous recruitment pro -cess. It will take time for this money to filter down to the real economy,” Logue said.

Government projects include work on the SECC Arena in Glasgow and Fife Energy Park, infrastructure works on Edinburgh Bio-Quarter, road projects and improvements, the construction of affordable housing and modern facilities in colleges and universities, which would boost the beleaguered construction sector, Logue added.

“These will create jobs for architects, project managers, site managers, site engineers, while all construction sector disciplines will benefit,”
he said.

Logue added that because these projects were medium to long term, recruiters would have medium to longterm visibility, allowing business to make long-term decisions, in a period when a lot of companies are making short-term decisions.

Brian Smith, managing director at Scottish construction recruiter Vanguard, anticipates that contracts would not be awarded until well into next year, at a time when his firm’s candidate pool was expanding by the day.

Smith said instead of trying to create jobs in the public sector, he would prefer the government to concentrate efforts on getting banks to lend to one another.

“Compared to this time last year, we’re down at least 50%. There is still a demand for housing here. The market should turn around in June.
It has to bottom out. If it doesn’t, it’ll be catastrophic. If money is released and people can get mortgages, then the situation will turn around over night.”