Reaching for recession resilience

The UK may have narrowly avoided entering recession at the end of 2022, but any signs of relief could be short-lived in the construction industry. With client demand softening and contractor sentiment sliding, 2023 has got off to a challenging start and the prospect of a contraction still looms.

Falling demand should allow tender price inflation to ease back from the high levels seen in 2022, but other threats – from contractor insolvency to the loss of skilled labour – make the outlook far from rosy.

No one behaviour can neutralise the complex, overlapping threats posed by a market contraction, but this edition of the UK Market Intelligence (UKMI) report pinpoints where the risks lie, and how programmes can become more resilient during the downturn and recover more quickly after it.

At a glance