Construction to weather weak economic outlook, says Experian

Experian has said construction output will weather a weakening economic outlook, in its latest set of forecasts.

The research firm said construction output is expected to grow by 5.5% this year, 5.1% in 2015 and 3.5% in 2016.

The only change since Experian’s summer forecasts is a slight increase in forecast ouput for 2015, up from 4.9%.

The firm shaved down its GDP forecasts for 2015 and 2016 to an average “of around 2.4%”.

Experian said factors including the poor performance in the Eurozone, constrained growth in consumer spending, weak wage growth and uncertainty around the 2015 UK general election would hold back the UK economy.

However, Experian said it did not expect this to impact on construction: “Despite this, our central forecasts for construction for the forecast period remain buoyant and little different overall from those put forward in the summer.”

Experian’s forecasts comes after the Construction Products Association, in its autumn forecast published this week, predicted construction output will grow by 4.8% in 2014 and 5.3% in 2015 - up from the 4.7% and 4.8% it forecast in the summer.