Skills shortage sees young chippies earning up to $100,000

Specialised builders in their early 20s are starting work on wages of up to $100,000.

Registered Master Builders Federation chief executive Pieter Burghout said one highly specialised building apprentice just out of a four-year training programme had started on $100,000.

He said the qualified ceiling installer worked in an area of extremely high demand but a labour shortage throughout the trades had helped push up pay rates generally.

Wages are rising due to the shortage of highly skilled labour. Burghout said builders who had just finished their apprenticeships were earning up to $60,000 for an average 50-hour week. The trainees were often in their early 20s and the pay rates reflected the desperate skills shortage as well as the high demand for their time.

"The chippie has gone from being the lowest on the heap to the top." Burghout said builders who were asking $35 an hour three years ago were now demanding $60 or more.

About 110,000 people work in the building sector, 45,000 to 55,000 of whom are builders.

Burghout said builders were turning down work on existing houses and taking on new house construction work instead.

"They prefer the one-year contract to a group of smaller jobs," he said.

He estimated 100,000 houses needed repair, addition or alteration work and said this backlog had accumulated during the five-year property boom.

Demand for work on existing houses was running at an all-time high, partly because of the huge apprenticeship training downturn in the 1990s, which left the industry with its critical labour shortage.

An average one-year wait to get a builder now was slightly better than the 1 1/2-year wait of 12 months ago.

"Now, at least the builder might answer the phone," Burghout said.

Last year, builders were so rushed that many had rejected calls from prospective clients.

The builder shortage was worst in Auckland, Tauranga and New Plymouth. People in Nelson, Wanganui and Palmerston North had shorter waits.

Burghout said the Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation had 9000 apprentices, 2000 of whom would finish this year.

During the late 1990s, only 800 apprentices a year were joining the industry.

Statistics NZ released figures last week showing more than $3 billion worth of construction work was completed in the March quarter, up 10 per cent on the same period last year.

The value of non-residential work rose 10.6 per cent and residential 2.6 per cent.