The Scottish Building Federation has called for more action to encourage people to work in Scottish construction after new figures revealed a drop in employment within the sector.

The latest Regional Labour Market Statistics, published today by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), revealed that employment in the Scottish construction industry fell from 171,000 in December 2013 to 164,000 in June 2014.

Scottish Building Federation managing director, Vaughan Hart, said: “These figures suggest that, although industry output has risen significantly in recent times, this has yet to translate into more construction jobs. Our members are reporting increasing difficulty in finding suitably skilled tradespeople to fill vacancies.

“We need to redouble our efforts to attract people back into construction and to equip them with the skills and training they need. This is absolutely vital to ensure we have the resource to cope with growing demand as the recovery continues to gather pace.”

The overall employment level for Scotland is at a record high, with an increase of 0.5 percentage points.