This article is from page 4 of the 2008-11-18 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
CLARE building firms are having to let staff go as the industry grinds toa halt, it has been revealed.
Building workers are seeing the writing on the wall and heading for Dubai, Australia and even Iran in preference to staying here and join- ing the dole queues.
“There is no house building going on here at the moment and compa- nies have no option but to let people go,’ said Tony O’Shea, Chairman of the mid-western branch of the Con- struction Industry Federation.
One of the county’s most success- ful firms, Tom Hayes Ltd of Killa- loe, which has been in business since 1955 has been forced to let more than 35 staff go in the last few weeks.
The company worked on some of the largest building projects in the region, including the Jim Kemmy Business School in the University of Limerick campus.
‘There are no big projects at the moment and we have no alternative but to let people go,” a company spokesman said in a newspaper in- terview. “There is huge need for investment in the building industry here. Hopefully, the Limerick regen- eration project will help to stop the decline,” he added.
Many younger craftsmen have headed off abroad to destinations
as far flung as Australia, Dubai and Iran, the spokesman said and the company is doing its best to hold on to staff who have families and com- mitments here.
Another mid-west firm which had employed 200 people at the height of the boom has now been reduced to just two workers.
The Construction Industry Federa- tion nationally is expecting that job Kesocta WU oom NIM He CoMKsre le sMOeCLOROeLe if the downturn continues. Up to 4,000 jobs are expected to go in the mid-west alone, the CIF says.
The building trade has taken a hammering with the rise in interest rates, a clamp-down on lending and international economic slowdown.
Auctioneers are reporting a mas- sive slowdown in house sales and many builders have been caught out with homes which they constructed in anticipation of buyers who have not materialised.
Despite massive amounts being slashed off the price of both new and second-hand homes, buyers are still slow to come to the fore, with many unable to get mortgages large enough and many more sitting tight for the market to bottom out.
One prominent Clare mortgage broker said that his business has dwindled “to the point where you’d be lucky to get a couple of business queries a week now”.