Featured Region: Yorkshire & the Humber

Yorkshire & the Humber, like most of the UK, has suffered from the dual pressures of a struggling private sector and shrinking public sector funding. During 2010 the region enjoyed 12% growth in the underlying value of project starts, in part thanks to high levels of education and health work. The cuts to government funding meant that these projects dried up during 2011, while the private sector wasn’t able to recover sufficiently to compensate.

Last year however, saw an improved performance. Growth in industrial and private housing project starts, combined with a strong infrastructure sector helped to lift underlying project starts by 7%.

A strengthening in private sector planning approvals over the last year is expected to help support the flow of new project starts over the next two years. Whilst the continued squeeze on public sector budgets will limit growth in the region to 1% this year, the recovery is forecast to strengthen to 7% in 2014.

Yorkshire and Humber consists of the following Counties: Humberside, North Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire.