We need more women on building sites - experts

Women should apply for construction courses to address a lack of graduates in the sector, according to several building experts.

Based on current estimates, there will be a “substantial” lack of engineering and surveying graduates to meet the predicted demand for the construction sector in the coming years.

The warning was give by the chief executives of the Association of Consulting Engineers of Ireland (ACEI), Engineers Ireland and the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) said, based

Director General of the SCSI Patricia Byron said: “It needs to be the best person for the job, but Leaving Cert results show that women perform about as well as men in science and maths, so if the results are about as good there should be a similar number of women compared to men.”

Byron said that based on an estimate of 3% economic growth annually until up to December 2019, “over 2,000 new jobs are expected to be created across the surveying profession, split evenly across construction and property roles”.

The SCSI estimates that there are currently about 1,000 people graduating a year from courses that lead into surveying. “(It is) only enough graduates to fill half of those positions."